Mum fights deportation
A GEELONG mother is making a desperate 11th-hour plea to the Federal Court to halt her looming deportation and separation from her children.
Kelly Webb, 33, a convicted criminal, is facing removal under the Federal Government’s “character test” laws.
If deported to England, Ms Webb will be separated from her three-year-old-daughter, an Australian citizen.
She has written to the Federal Court applying for leave to appeal after she was denied ministerial intervention on her cancelled visa last month.
Meanwhile, top QC Ian Hills has slammed the legislation, saying it should include an “Australian-made” clause excluding people who immigrated as infants.
Ms Webb was brought from England at the age of two in 1988, but never became a citizen.
After serving time in prison for several crimes as an adult, she has been held in the Maribyrnong Immigration Detention Centre for 17 months as she fights removal.
Her youngest Shae-Lee, 3, will daughter not be allowed to leave the country with her mother.
“I look at my daughter and it just kills me,” she said.
“She is saying, ‘When are you coming home?’ They won’t allow her to leave with me.
“I won’t have a home or any money over there.”
Ms Webb has five children, all of whom are living with extended family.
Under the laws targeting foreign-born criminals, the Department of Home Affairs must cancel visas when a noncitizen is put behind bars for at least a year.
Ms Webb suffered “monstrous” abuse at the hands of a stepfather she killed in selfdefence in Geelong at the age of 16, which set her on a path of crime.
As an adult, she came to the attention of authorities in 2016 when she served an 18-month sentence for committing a burglary with a knife.
She won a reprieve in 2017, promising authorities she would remain crime-free but later faced a Geelong court on theft charges, prompting her planned removal.
Mr Hills said people who had lived in Australia for almost their entire lives should not be deported.
“It has always troubled me that people who come as infants and who do not take out citizenship, commit an offence and then suddenly find they are being deported,” he said.
“It throws up these cases that are very sad when compared to someone who comes here as an adult and commits serious offences. ‘Australianmade’ is probably a good exclusion clause to have.”
Ms Webb’s former lawyer Liz Dowling called for the federal laws to be changed.
“Her mother is adopted and Kelly came here as a two- yearold. She has no one in England,” Ms Dowling said.