Central to a functioning democracy is the notion of an informed public. What happens when we don’t know what the government is doing in our name?
Liberty Victoria’s Young Liberty for Law Reform is soon to release a report on issues of transparency and accountability in Australia’s immigration system. Coinciding with the release of their report, a panel discussion will be held at the Wheeler Centre on the 27th of April exploring the legal and cultural barriers to whistleblowers in Australia’s immigration policy, and the consequences that unfold when secrecy persists.
Incidents such as the accusations made against Save the Children employees in 2014, and the introduction of the Border Force Act in 2015 which criminalises the disclosure of ‘protected information’ for anyone working for the Department of Immigration raise serious questions about how much government secrecy is necessary to protect the public interest.
What kind of dangers arise when information is withheld about our immigration system? What are the limitations of our whistleblower protection laws? And what is required to ensure greater access to information and better protection for the people in Australia’s detention centres?
Join the panelists to see the consequences that unfold when we don’t know what we don’t know.
With
Anita Barraud, ABC Radio National Law Report
Jacob Varghese, Maurice Blackburn Lawyers
Roderick St. George
Suelette Dreyfus, Department of Computing and Information Systems at The University of Melbourne
Tickets are booked out. Email Liberty Victoria for possible spare tickets