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Speaker 1: Good morning and welcome to the Daily OS. It is Tuesday,

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Speaker 1: the fifteenth of February, joined by co founder Sam Kozowski,

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Speaker 1: here to take you through the day's news. Sam take

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Speaker 1: us through what we know about Jared Haynes.

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Speaker 2: It was a big day for the former NRL footballer.

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Speaker 2: Jared Haynes won his appeal in the New South Wales

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Speaker 2: District Court and had his sexual assault conviction quashed. This

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Speaker 2: means he's off to face a retrial. It will be

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Speaker 2: his third trial in the court. In May of last year,

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Speaker 2: Haynes was sentenced to five years and nine months in

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Speaker 2: jail after being found guilty of two counts of sexual

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Speaker 2: intercourse without consent. In September twenty eighteen.

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Speaker 1: Elective surgery restrictions in Victoria eased yesterday, which now means

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Speaker 1: that metropolitan private hospitals will be able to return to

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Speaker 1: fifty percent of all surgery arrangements and seventy five percent

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Speaker 1: for regional private hospitals. Public hospitals are still restricted to

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Speaker 1: emergency and urgent elective surgery only. Victoria also lifted its

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Speaker 1: Code Brown alert on hospitals yesterday.

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Speaker 2: Bridge we told you about yesterday between the US and

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Speaker 2: Canada right on the border there has been cleared after

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Speaker 2: being blocked by Freedom Convoy protesters for the last six days.

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Speaker 2: The blockage caused disruptions to trade and the supply chain,

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Speaker 2: with Ford Motorco, General Motors and Toyota having to cut production.

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Speaker 2: Officials said twenty to thirty arrests were made.

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Speaker 1: The good news today, Adelaide United has announced it to

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Speaker 1: launch an inaugural A League Pride Game next weekend. The

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Speaker 1: club will be the first professional soccer team to host

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Speaker 1: a Pride game in the whole of Australia. Players from

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Speaker 1: both men's and women's teams will wear rainbow names and

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Speaker 1: numbers on the back of their playing jerseys in support

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Speaker 1: of the LGBTIQ plus community. Today I am joined by

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Speaker 1: Billy Fitzsimon's political journalist for The Daily Ohs to circle

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Speaker 1: back on a story about a month ago, Australia and

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Speaker 1: the world was gripped by the story of world number

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Speaker 1: one tennis player Novak Djokovic when he was temporarily detained

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Speaker 1: in the country.

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Speaker 2: Breaking news just in the visa of Novak Djokovic has

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Speaker 2: been canceled by Australian Border Force.

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Speaker 1: So Novak Dokovich has been detained in Australia ahead of

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Speaker 1: a court hearing that will determine whether the Tanna star

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Speaker 1: can stay in the country. At the time, media attention

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Speaker 1: briefly turned to the plight of the people in indefinite detention. Billy,

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Speaker 1: can you take us back to this moment.

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Speaker 3: Yes, I'm sure many of you remember. It was one

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Speaker 3: of the biggest stories at the start of the year.

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Speaker 3: When Djokovic's visa was canceled at the Airport Zara. He

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Speaker 3: was taken to the Park Hotel in Melbourne, which is

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Speaker 3: an immigration detention center for refugees and asylum seekers, many

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Speaker 3: of whom have been through offshore processing in Australia. And

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Speaker 3: I'll explain more about that in a moment, but as

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Speaker 3: you know, this story really dominated headlines at the time

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Speaker 3: and I think one of the silver linings of that

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Speaker 3: story was that by having this extremely the famous person

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Speaker 3: stay in this hotel, it started to shine a spotlight

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Speaker 3: on the other people being held in the Park Hotel

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Speaker 3: and there really was a lot of media attention about it.

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Speaker 3: We covered it a lot at the Daily Os and

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Speaker 3: like you said, Zarah, the plight of the people staying

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Speaker 3: in these conditions was also in the media a lot,

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Speaker 3: and people of course predicted at the time that when

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Speaker 3: Jokovic left, so too with a lot of the media attention.

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Speaker 3: And that's certainly a month on has been the case.

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Speaker 3: But I think it's important to circle back at the moment.

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Speaker 3: It's been a month on and we need to keep

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Speaker 3: this in the headlines and keep learning more about the situation.

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Speaker 1: Okay, So to that learning point, Billy, can you take

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Speaker 1: us through the basics what actually is indefinite attention?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So to learn more about this, I spoke to

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Speaker 3: Sarah Dale, who is the principal solicitor at the Refugee

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Speaker 3: Advice and Casework Service, and she explained to me that

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Speaker 3: Australia's legal system at the moment allows for a person

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Speaker 3: to be in in mimigration detention with no fixed end date,

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Speaker 3: so there's no laws on how long refugees or asylum

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Speaker 3: seekers can be detained for. And Australia also has a

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Speaker 3: mandatory detention policy which means anyone who is not a

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Speaker 3: citizen and does not have a visa will be kept

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Speaker 3: in immigration detention, and that essentially means that people can

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Speaker 3: end up in detention for years and years and they

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Speaker 3: have no idea when they'll be let out.

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Speaker 1: So, Bill, you actually spoke to someone in indefinite detention, right.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I spoke to Mehdi Ali. He was fifteen years

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Speaker 3: old when he fled Iran and came to Australia by boat.

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Speaker 3: He's now twenty four, so it's been nine years since

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Speaker 3: he left Iran and came to Australia searching for a

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Speaker 3: better life. And when he arrived, anyone who arrived here

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Speaker 3: by boat at the time had to be transferred to

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Speaker 3: Papua New Guinea or NARU for offshore processing. Mehdi spent

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Speaker 3: almost six years in Aru before he came to Australia

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Speaker 3: under the Medivak Bill.

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Speaker 1: Can you just run us through what the Medivac Bill was.

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Speaker 3: The Medivak Bill was a law that allowed critically sick

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Speaker 3: refugees and asylum seekers in all short detention to be

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Speaker 3: transferred to Australia for medical treatment. And so Mehdi came

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Speaker 3: to Australia under the MEDIVAC Bill after he was diagnosed

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Speaker 3: with post traumatic stress disorder due to what he had

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Speaker 3: endured in detention for those six years. He was transferred

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Speaker 3: to Australia. As I said, and he's now in his

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Speaker 3: ninth year of detention.

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Speaker 1: So what happened when you interviewed him.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So, Mehdi said that the past nine years had

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Speaker 3: been torture and hell, and he's currently detained in the

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Speaker 3: Park Hotel, which happens to be the same hotel that

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Speaker 3: Novak Djokovic was briefly detained in. And I did ask

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Speaker 3: Mehdi about what the conditions were like inside immigration detention,

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Speaker 3: because I'd seen it in the media about people talking

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Speaker 3: about these horrific conditions. But when I spoke to him,

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Speaker 3: he said he doesn't want that to be the focus.

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Speaker 3: He really wants the focus to be on how people

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Speaker 3: are being detained without a deadline and without an explanation

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Speaker 3: and without a solution, Like he doesn't know when he'll

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Speaker 3: be allowed out, He doesn't know when he'll have the

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Speaker 3: basic freedoms that Zara, you and I have. The one

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Speaker 3: thing he did say, though, and it really stuck with me,

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Speaker 3: is that December and January are his least favorite times

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Speaker 3: of the year because it's when everyone is gathering with

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Speaker 3: their loved ones and with their families and with their friends,

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Speaker 3: and meanwhile he's in detention and he can't leave his

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Speaker 3: hotel and he actually said I wrote down one of

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Speaker 3: the quotes he said, he said, we are away from happiness.

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Speaker 1: You said you also spoke to this refugee expert. Did

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Speaker 1: she have anything to say about whether what you just

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Speaker 1: described breaches human rights?

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Speaker 3: Yes, speaking generally about refugees and asylum seekers across the country.

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Speaker 1: So not speaking about Mehdi's case.

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Speaker 3: No, Speaking more generally, Dale said, there are hundreds of

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Speaker 3: people that have been detained in Australia for so many

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Speaker 3: years that RAX, which is the refugee service she works for,

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Speaker 3: would argue is a breach of their human rights, particularly

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Speaker 3: those who are detained indefinitely. And she described the treatment

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Speaker 3: of hundreds of people in the detention network as egregious.

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Speaker 1: And what does the government say about this?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well, when it was in the media a lot

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Speaker 3: last month, Prime Minister Scott Morrison was asked a lot

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Speaker 3: about it at his press conferences and he was asked

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Speaker 3: specifically about the refugees being detained in the Park hotel.

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Speaker 3: He said, those who are there, with some obvious exceptions,

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Speaker 3: who have arrived more recently are people who illegally entered

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Speaker 3: Australia by boat. The policy of the government is that

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Speaker 3: someone who has illegally entered Australia by boat will not

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Speaker 3: be offered permanent settlement here. That's the government's policy.

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Speaker 1: So what are the options for people like Meddi?

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Speaker 3: Well, Australia currently has a law that states anyone who

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Speaker 3: has been to p and G or Naru will not

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Speaker 3: be offered permanent settlement here, which is what I just

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Speaker 3: explained Prime Minister Scott Morrison said. But there is an alternative,

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Speaker 3: and that is to be resettled in the US, who

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Speaker 3: Australia has an agreement with at the moment. And Sarah Dale,

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Speaker 3: the refugee expert I spoke to, she explained to me

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Speaker 3: that currently for those that have been to p and

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Speaker 3: G and Naru like Mehdi, the only option is to

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Speaker 3: be resettled in the.

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Speaker 1: US, and that's because they'll never be settled in Australia

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Speaker 1: outside of detention, correct.

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Speaker 3: And Mehdi told me that he took this option a

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Speaker 3: long time ago and he's been approved. But despite the

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Speaker 3: fact that he's been approved, he still has to stay

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Speaker 3: in detention until he can leave for the US. And

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Speaker 3: he's obviously asked when he'll be able to leave and

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Speaker 3: when he'll be out of the Park hotel and out

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Speaker 3: of immigration detention. And the answer he gets back is

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Speaker 3: we don't know. They don't know when he'll be let out,

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Speaker 3: and so for the moment, he's still stuck in indefinite detention.

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Speaker 1: We'll leave the discussion about indefinite detention there, but if

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Speaker 1: you have any questions about any part of what we've

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Speaker 1: just spoken about, get in touch on Instagram at the

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Speaker 1: Daily OS. It's a dense topic and we are here

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Speaker 1: to take you through it, even if it's out of

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Speaker 1: the headlines. Thank you for joining us today and we'll

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Speaker 1: see you tomorrow.