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Just send my children to school, and let them be in freedom. They should live in a human good atmosphere, they should learn something good, and not the things they are learning here.(1)

Commissioners: DR SEV OZDOWSKI, Human Rights Commissioner MRS ROBIN SULLIVAN, Queensland Children's Commissioner PROFESSOR TRANG THOMAS, Professor of Psychology, Melbourne Institute of Technology MS VANESSA LESNIE, Secretary to the Inquiry

We commend HREOC for instituting this Inquiry and thank them for giving us the opportunity to make input on an issue which is of grave concern to the Co-operative which, for 23 years has been advocating for the rights and needs of immigrant children and their families in a diverse multicultural society.

This is a paper prepared by Amnesty International for the HREOC Inquiry into children in immigration detention centres. In particular, this paper sets out Amnesty International's concerns with the detention of children, having regard to the international human rights treaties to which Australia has committed itself.

Michael Dudley Conjoint Senior Lecturer, School of Psychiatry, University of New South Wales and Sydney Children's Hospital, and Chair, Suicide Prevention Australia

Although it is not possible to precisely specify all the circumstance that lead people to arrive in Australia through people smuggling routes, there can be no doubt that they undertake perilous journeys which put their lives and that of accompanying family members at risk. Given the very high rates of approval for those who have sought asylum in Australia through these routes, it is reasonable to assume that most detainees have fled their countries for reasons of persecution.

Improving the health status of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples is a longstanding challenge for governments in Australia. While there have been improvements made in some areas since the 1970s (notably in reducing high rates of infant mortality1) overall progress has been slow and inconsistent. The inequality gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and other Australians remains wide and has not been progressively reduced.

Department of Justice and Youth Studies at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology The Department of Justice and Youth Studies (JYS) is part of the Faculty of Education, Language and Community Services (FELCS) at RMIT University. JYS offers undergraduate courses in Criminal Justice Administration and Youth Affairs, as well as Masters by Research and PhD programs.

This paper gives a brief overview of the mandatory detention laws currently operating in the Northern Territory and Western Australia. It examines their operation and gives some insights into how they have impacted on particular groups including young people and Indigenous Australians. It gives a critique of mandatory detention by reference to Australia's international human rights obligations, with particular emphasis on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The paper cites a number of recent reports and articles dealing with this subject.

The International Commission of Jurists is dedicated to the primacy, coherence and implementation of international law and principles that advance human rights. Its aim is to promote human rights through the rule of law by ensuring that developments in international law adhere to human rights principles and that international standards are implemented at the national level. The Commission was founded in Berlin in 1952 and its members are jurists representing different legal systems of the world.