Late-night inquiry unveils cost of Nauru deportation deal, as PM faces scrutiny over lack of details

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Australian taxpayers will be slugged $2.5 billion over 30 years to deport hundreds of former immigration detainees to Nauru under a deal with the Pacific nation, a parliamentary committee has been told.

The Albanese government signed a memorandum of understanding with Nauru, offering more than $400 million upfront and then $70 million each year.

The agreement will allow Australia to transfer up to 354 former detainees, including convicted criminals, to the tiny Pacific island which has a population of about 12,000.

Immigration officials were questioned during a late-night parliamentary inquiry on Wednesday, reluctantly confirming the massive cost of the deal.

Australia could stop paying the annual $70 million sum if Nauru decided not to accept any more people under the agreement.

A man in a grey suit and glasses is speaking.

Under questioning by Greens senator David Shoebridge, officials also confirmed Labor’s legislation could be retrospective. Source: AAP / Mick Tsikas

Under questioning by Greens senator David Shoebridge, officials also confirmed Labor’s legislation could be retrospective.

During the hearing, he challenged officials who said the agreement was not “secret” because it was not available to anybody.

Shoebridge’s bid to force Labor to release the full memorandum through a Senate order was voted down in the upper house.

Albanese pressed on lack of detail

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was repeatedly pressed about the lack of detail made public.

“We have arrangements between governments and those arrangements are ones we enter into across the board,” he told reporters in Canberra on Wednesday.

Earlier this week, Albanese declined to provide more detail about the deal during a television interview, saying “nothing is secret about it”.

Albanese’s refusal came after the High Court dismissed an appeal from an Iraqi man who had his temporary protection visa cancelled after being convicted and sentenced to almost six years in prison for detaining a person for advantage.

His temporary protection visa was cancelled in March 2023 and he was taken into immigration detention upon his release from prison a year later.

The group was released as part of what is referred to as the NZYQ cohort, as there was no foreseeable pathway for their removal.

Labor was heavily criticised by the Opposition for the fallout.

The 65-year-old man was taken back into immigration detention in February after Australia applied to Nauru for a visa on his behalf, meaning there was a real prospect of him being removed from Australia.

The man is one of three people fighting their deportation to Nauru under laws that allow non-citizens to be sent to a third country if they cannot be deported to their home nation.

Wednesday’s High Court decision would not set a broad precedent for deportations, as it was narrowly focused on the man’s specific circumstances, his lawyers said.

Laura John, associate legal director at the Human Rights Law Centre, said the man had lived through “untold horrors” of the Iraq war and faced indefinite separation from his wife and child, homelessness and destitution in Australia.

“Like every person, our client has a right to live in safety and dignity,” she said after the ruling.

“The government has refused at every stage of this process to consider the lifelong consequences of permanently exiling an elderly man to Nauru.”

His protection visa remains cancelled after the court’s decision, but the man has other legal avenues to fight his deportation to Nauru and that attempt will continue in the Federal Court.