New Zealand has expressed its disappointment over Australia’s decision likely to result in more criminals with no connection to the country being deported there. Immigration Minister Andrew Giles announced his intention to update a ministerial directive, Direction 99, after several Administrative Appeal Tribunal (AAT) decisions cited it for allowing foreign nationals guilty of serious crimes to avoid having their visas cancelled.
The directive was created following concerns from New Zealand’s Labour government over mass deportations of its citizens who had closer ties to Australia. It comes after a New Zealand man, known as CHCY, was allowed by the AAT, under ministerial Direction 99, to keep his Australian visa despite being found guilty of raping his step-daughter.
The 37-year-old man, who left NZ when he was aged 17, raped the 14-year-old while her mother was in hospital giving birth. Another man, jailed for choking the mother of one of his children, was allowed to stay in the country by the AAT and, weeks later, allegedly murdered a man in Brisbane.
New Zealand’s Prime Minister Chris Luxon said he had expressed his regret over Australia’s decision to modify Direction 99. It’s not fair that we get deportees coming back to New Zealand that have got very little connection, or no connection to this country—that’s not right.
Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters accepted that Australia had a right to determine what level of offending by non-citizens was unacceptable but added, “We do not want to see [the] deportation of people with little or no connection to NZ, whose formative experiences were nearly all in Australia.
Mr. Peters expressed the wish to discuss the proposed changes as soon as possible and noted Prime Minister Albanese’s previous commitment to take a ‘common sense’ approach to the deportation of people to New Zealand who had effectively spent their entire lives in Australia.
Mr. Albanese responded that Australia made decisions in its own national interest, and that he and Mr. Luxon enjoyed “a good relationship.” Shadow Immigration Minister Dan Tehan called on Mr. Giles to explain why he refused to entirely rescind Direction 99 in light of CHCY’s offending.
To rape a stepdaughter while your partner is giving birth in hospital—what it shows is that ministerial direction 99 is clearly failing,” Mr. Tehan told Sky News. I don’t think that you could get a worse example that that ministerial direction is clearly failing and that is why it needs to be rescinded.