Au pair decisions haunt ex-minister Dutton
Peter Dutton waved through another au pair detained by border security after being approached by a former Queensland police colleague who reportedly intended to employ her.
But Defence Minister Christopher Pyne has described concerns over the intervention as a ‘‘classic storm in a tea cup’’.
‘‘I really don’t think there is anything to see here,’’ he told Nine yesterday.
An Italian au pair had her tourist visa cancelled after arriving in Brisbane in June 2015 because officials believed she planned to work and it was reinstated after Dutton intervened, according to The Guardian.
The case is similar to that of French woman Alexandra Deuwel, whose tourist visa was cancelled and then reinstated after Dutton’s office was approached by AFL boss Gil McLachlan, on behalf of his extended family
Both events occurred in 2015 when Dutton was immigration minister.
Pressure continues to mount on the Queensland Liberal MP to give more details about his decisions in the first two au pair cases, as well as a third that occurred around the same time. All three will be examined by a Senate committee inquiry which starts next week and is due to report in September when federal parliament resumes.
Dutton, who said he had dealt with hundreds of visa issues, exercised his ministerial powers to intervene in cases brought to his attention, as was his right to do.
In the case of Deuwel, the 27-year-old was detained at Adelaide airport on October 31, 2015, after admitting she intended to work in breach of her tourist visa for farmer Callum MacLachlan – who is related to Gil McLachlan. A series of emails given to Labor by a whistleblower show MacLachlan reached out to Gil McLachlan, who contacted Dutton’s office to lobby for the woman to stay.
Dutton used his discretion to grant her a three-month tourist visa on the condition she did not work, after being told by border authorities she was previously counselled in May 2015.
‘‘I looked at it and thought it’s a bit rough, there’s no criminal history; she’s agreed that she wouldn’t work while she was here,’’ Dutton said on Thursday.
He claimed ‘‘enemies in the media’’ are dredging up the case to ‘‘get square’’ for his role in last week’s Liberal leadership battle which toppled Malcolm Turnbull as prime minister.
Pyne said Dutton looks at hundreds of requests every year and rightly made decisions based on who was likely to abscond. ‘‘If they have a good case for being unlikely to abscond then he lets them go free. I think that’s the right thing to do.’’
Details of the second case, which emerged on Thursday, involved a man who, according to The Australian, worked with Dutton when he was an officer in the Queensland Police Services in the 1990s.
As a minister, Dutton cannot be compelled to appear before next week’s inquiry, but senior public servants are expected to be on the witness list.