Mr Power said Australia was likely to call for more help from New Zealand in re-settling refugees in centres such as Nauru. "In relation to Nauru I think it's pretty obvious that Australia has got itself into a real mess. I don't know how Australia is going to extract itself from the situation." He said in the past New Zealand stepped in to help, such as with the Afghan refugees picked up by the Tampa. "Maybe at some stage in the future it's probably likely New Zealand may be asked to play a role in helping Australia extract itself." He said about 85 per cent of those from Nauru had been found to be genuine refugees and Nauru did not have the capacity to re-settle them long term. He said efforts to re-settle them on Cambodia was failing.
New Zealand has the ability to use about 150 places within its annual quota of 750 to take refugees from Australia's detention centres.
Mr Power said Australia's capacity to influence the region was diminished by its hard line on the matter and the inflammatory language successive government had used. "Imagine if you're in the Indonesia Parliament or Malaysia and you get a phone call to say someone from the Australian Government would like to talk to you about refugee issues, you might think 'that clashes with my hair appointment, I'm not available.' But if someone from New Zealand was to open up the discussion, or someone from the Philippines there's more possibility of dialogue." Dr Anoop Sakumaran, the executive director of the Asia Pacific Refugee Rights Network, told the committee New Zealand's commitment on Syrian refugees was a step in the right direction. He said New Zealand was often clubbed in with Australia when refugees were discussed but the distinction between the two was important.
He said more than three quarters of all refugees in the world lived outside refugee camps and were technically illegal migrants meaning they could not work. Even for those in refugee camps, it could take up to four years to get a first interview to get refugee status with the UNHCR.
Figures in New Zealand have shown that up to half of all refugees had not found full-time employment after five years of settling in New Zealand. Mr Power said that was unlikely to be because of a lack of will to work. Instead there were issues about the recognition of education and training qualifications from other countries. Many employers were also suspicious about employing people with no local work experience or experience from other Western countries such as Australia and the United Kingdom.
