Australian media's response to the end of indefinite detention: towards a rights-based treatment of people seeking asylum?

Asylum in the Australian media

Migration has long galvanised politics in Australia. The media plays a central role in (re)shaping public opinion about refugees and asylum seekers and directs discourse and political debate surrounding the issue (Lecheler et al., 2019). Through the media, public opinion can influence government policy, creating a dynamic virtuous circle where policy decisions are often made in response to public sentiment as reflected and amplified by media coverage (Spitzer, 1994).

Historically, political discourse around asylum seekers has centred on contrasting the ‘bad refugee’, portrayed as someone who bypasses the system by arriving by boat, with the ‘good refugee’, who waits overseas for resettlement (McAdam, 2013: 437). This narrative has shaped the dominant representation asylum seekers and refugees across government documents, political rhetoric, and media coverage, often labelling them as ‘illegal’ or ‘queue jumpers’ (Every and Augoustinos, 2008a), associating them with criminal networks such as people smugglers (Cameron, 2013; Mayne-Davis et al., 2020; McKay et al., 2011), depicting them as economic migrants undeserving of protection (Every and Augoustinos, 2008b), or dependent victims without agency (Lippi et al., 2017; Mayne-Davis et al., 2020). Whilst Cooper et al. (2017) have found humanising representations of local refugees to dominate regional newspapers in 2014–2015, media syndication (Fairfax Regional Media and APN Australian Regional Media) was suggested to contribute to this. Notably, McKay et al. (2011) and Lippi et al. (2017) found more negative framing in traditionally conservative papers like those owned by News Corporation Australia (NewsCorp).

Since 2016, Australia's media market has become more concentrated. APN News & Media was bought by NewsCorp in 2016 (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) 2016), and Fairfax Media and Nine were consolidated in 2018 (ACCC, 2018). NewsCorp is currently the largest media syndication in Australia, owning 59% of metropolitan and national print media markets, with Nine Entertainment the second with a 23% readership share (Brevini and Ward, 2021). This media landscape often reflects the policy context, responding to political actors and legal changes.

Policy context

Australia's approach to immigration is complex, evolving in response to political, social and economic factors. Immigration to Australia is governed by the Migration Act 1958 (Cth) (the Act) and the Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth), which together create a comprehensive framework for managing immigration and visa processes. Those arriving in Australia without a visa are classified under the Act as unlawful non-citizens and placed in mandatory detention until their immigration status is resolved; a process that can take months or years (DHA, 2024).

In 1992, Australia implemented mandatory non-reviewable immigration detention for unauthorised arrivals, including asylum seekers awaiting a decision and individuals whose visas were revoked (Gordon, 2024). Such individuals were held in immigration detention until they could acquire an Australian visa or be repatriated to their home country. If neither were possible, they could be indefinitely detained. Individuals unable to be repatriated to their country of origin fall into two categories: stateless individuals who lack a country to return to; and those who face severe persecution, such as the threat of torture or death if they were to return (Gordon, 2024). These regulatory measures are typically employed as an alternative to incarceration, rather than for individuals who have served their sentences or committed no offense. However, many argue that immigration detention is similar to incarceration (Aitken, 2024; Groves, 2004; Saadi et al., 2020).

The case of Al-Kateb v Godwin [2004] HCA 37 (Al-Kateb v. Godwin) set the precedent for indefinite detention (Gordon, 2024). Al-Kateb challenged the Australian government's right to detain him after arriving in Australia in 2000. Born in Kuwait to Palestinian parents, Al-Kateb was considered stateless, as Kuwait does not grant citizenship by birth. Al-Kateb, like many Palestinians, was pressured to leave the country. With no visa or passport, he was taken into Australian immigration detention under the Act. In 2001, he was unsuccessful in gaining a protection visa in Australia and was further denied his attempt at appeal. Al-Kateb was unable to be repatriated and, despite wanting to leave Australia, because he was stateless other countries would not accept him. In Al-Kateb v Godwin, the High Court found immigration detention to be non-punitive and therefore Al-Kateb could be detained indefinitely under the policy of mandatory detention. This ruling found the indefinite detention of a stateless person to be lawful.

The 2023 High Court ruling

On 8 November 2023, Australia's High Court announced the ruling that Australia's decades-long system of indefinite immigration detention was unlawful. A stateless Rohingya man (referred to as NZYQ) was detained indefinitely in Australia as no other country was willing to offer resettlement and the government was unwilling to allow him to live in the community (Gordon, 2024). Lawyers for NZYQ argued in the High Court that his confinement violated constitutional restrictions on detention, serving as punishment rather than facilitating their removal (NZYQ v Minister for Immigration).

Originally from Myanmar, NZYQ arrived in Australia by boat in 2012 and was detained under the Act. He received a bridging visa in 2014 but returned to detention after serving a five-year sentence for a child sexual offence in 2016. In 2020, the Minister's delegate recognised his justified fear of persecution in Myanmar, classifying him as a refugee. Despite this, his protection visa was denied due to his criminal record and he faced potential removal from Australia (Gordon, 2024).

Whilst the Act provides a framework for detention, it must be implemented in compliance with specific legal standards and international obligations. NZYQ's detention was found to be unlawful because it did not meet the Migration Act's standards (Gordon, 2024). As such, the High Court justified its decision on a fundamental rule of law in Australia: the separation of powers. The government has no right to enforce the law, only to create it; it is the responsibility of the courts to enforce the law (Billings and Vogl, 2023). According to the High Court, indefinite detention where the government has no prospect of removing individuals is a punishment imposed by the government and is therefore unconstitutional (Billings and Vogl, 2023; Gordon, 2024). This ruling overturned the Al-Kateb v Godwin finding, resulting in the end of indefinite detention in Australia.

Political response to the High Court ruling: the bills

Following the High Court's decision, the government introduced two new pieces of legislation. The first was passed on 17 November 2023, and enacted 12 h later. This Bill, the Migration Amendment (Bridging Visa Conditions) Bill (2023), amended the Act and the Migration Regulations 1994 by placing new visa conditions on bridging visas for the 80 non-citizens released from immigration detention. The second, the Migration and Other Legislation Amendment (Bridging Visas, Serious Offenders and Other Measures) Bill (2023), was introduced on 27 November 2023, and passed 9 days later, stipulating additional conditions. These measures, which included work restrictions, curfews, and monitoring, sparked criticism from multiple advocacy groups who argue that such conditions are punitive and violate human rights principles (Refugee Council of Australia (RCOA) 2023).

Australia's Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, stated that the government was doing what it could to put community safety measures in place due to the possibility of further detainees being released (Ireland, 2024). The opposition leader Peter Dutton was vocal at the time, accusing the government of being weak and failing to plan for the ruling (Dutton, 2023). The subsequent safety measures raised concerns about Australia's compliance with international human rights obligations, which safeguard against arbitrary detention and excessive restrictions on individual freedoms. The directives issued by the High Court in this instance imply that any individual who has previously committed a crime and completed their prison term could not face additional punishment through endless administrative detention. Any repercussions for prior actions must be adjudicated by a court of law (Australian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) 2023).

By responding with new legislative measures quickly, the government was perceived as reacting to public fears surrounding the released asylum seekers (Amnesty International, 2023). It is within this context this study aimed to understand how asylum seekers were portrayed by the Australian news media.

Data collection

Data included Australian media articles published between 8 November 2023 (the day of the High Court decision) and 29 February 2024 to capture the media's response to the ruling over the subsequent four months. This period was chosen to ensure all reporting on the ruling was captured. Data were collected through Factiva, the online news database, using the following search terms: ‘high court’ AND ‘detention’ AND ‘asylum seek*’ (with * truncation used at the end to retrieve all suffix variation).

The search included any article reporting on the High Court ruling. Articles were excluded if they were unrelated to the High Court case or fell outside the scope of news publications, such as government publications, front page excerpts, or summaries of podcast/radio/video. Articles that centred on other topics such as the dual-citizenship-stripping law, politician performance, political party performance, or by-elections were also excluded. All identified articles were uploaded into the Covidence systematic review software (Veritas Health Innovation, 2024) for independent screening by two reviewers. Authors discussed any conflicts, with consensus reached for inclusion. Figure 1 summarises the inclusion process.

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Figure 1.

Flow chart of news article selection.

Data analysis

Data were imported into NVivo (Lumivero, 2024) and analysed through the thematic analysis method described by Braun and Clarke (2006). In line with Braun and Clarke (2006), each article was read and re-read, utilising line-by-line coding to identify themes and categories. For example, articles with titles ‘Criminals among us’ and ‘Court releases “violent crims”’ were coded into a theme titled ‘criminality’. This inductive coding approach allowed for the identification of categories from the data (Hayes, 2023). Each code was consolidated into a broader category such as ‘a threat to the nation’, which led to the formation of themes such as ‘criminalisation verses victimisation’ described below.

Criminalisation versus victimisation

The first theme was that of criminalisation versus victimisation. This theme emerged from the labelling of asylum seekers by the media: either as criminals posing as a threat to Australia or as victims in need of assistance.

The criminalisation of asylum seekers was identified in 115 (63%) of articles, with some directly referring to asylum seekers as criminals or crims. This framing was more common in NewsCorp publications, which commonly used the language of criminality, with limited reporting on the human rights reason behind the High Court ruling. Criminalisation occurred through the discursive construction of asylum seekers as a threat to the community. This was observed in articles that labelled asylum seekers as criminals and emphasising the danger posed by asylum seekers.

The term criminal was often used to describe the asylum seekers. For example, one article said ‘the release of more than 100 criminals from immigration detention is hard to fathom’ (Onselen, 2023) whilst another said ‘we have warned about this for some time, releasing the 149 criminals’ (Kelly et al., 2024). Other articles were more equivocal and used stronger and emotive language to demonstrate the potential risk; for example, ‘releasing dangerous criminals into the community’ (Maiden, 2023), and ‘some being hardened criminals’ (Shanahan, 2023). The criminal label was employed most frequently by journalist Clare Armstrong in the NewsCorp owned Daily Telegraph, contributing 63% of published articles that directly refer to asylum seekers as criminals. These articles were characterised by titles such as ‘Criminals among us’ (Armstrong, 2023c) and ‘Chasing after the criminals’ (Armstrong, 2023a). Armstrong published three articles (two in the Daily Telegraph and one in the Courier Mail) that quoted the leader of the opposition, Peter Dutton, stating that ‘we will see more victims falling prey to their evil minds’ when referring to the community being victims of the released asylum seekers. ‘Evil minds’ was a focal point in all three articles, and no other journalist published this quote. In these articles, Armstrong commonly used ‘criminal(s)’ in place of ‘asylum seeker(s)’ (Armstrong, 2023d, 2023e, 2023h).

Members of parliament, both from the government and the opposition, were directly quoted within the articles, characterising asylum seekers as criminals. Opposition leader, Peter Dutton, declared that asylum seekers were ‘the worst criminals you could imagine walking the streets’, and blamed the government for deliberately releasing dangerous non-citizens into the community (Armstrong, 2023e). The Home Affairs Minister, Clare O’Neil, whose portfolio included asylum seekers and immigration issues, highlighted the criminal aspect, remarking, ‘If I had any legal power to do it, I would keep every one of those people in detention. Some of those people have committed deplorable, disgusting crimes’ (O'Neil, 2023). This statement, which appeared in four separate articles, underscores the significant influence of O’Neil as Home Affairs Minister in shaping public opinion and policy concerning asylum seekers. Whilst Education Minister, Jason Clare was quoted saying ‘If we had our way, these people would still be locked up. But that's not an option’ (Maiden, 2023).

Articles also constructed asylum seekers as dangerous and an imminent threat to the community. This was identified through labelling asylum seekers as killers and rapists, with calls for asylum seekers to be added to the terrorist list. This was found in NewsCorp articles, including from The Australian ‘Sex fiends, killers on the streets’ (Lewis and Taylor, 2023) and The Daily Telegraph ‘Rapists, drug smugglers: Crimes of released detainees revealed’ (Armstrong, 2023g). Articles titled ‘Terrorist rules in play for detainees’ (Armstrong, 2023j) and ‘Terrorism offender option for Labor’ (Armstrong, 2023i), published in the Daily Telegraph and Courier Mail, respectively, linked asylum seekers to terrorists and framing them as Australia's greatest threat: terrorism. These articles reported on the opposition urging the government to consider placing the released detainees on the high-risk terrorist offenders list, often including a list of previous crimes committed by released asylum seekers.

The portrayal of asylum seekers as victims was identified in 27 articles and within 12 publications. The victimisation of asylum seekers was found in articles that highlighted the unfair treatment of asylum seekers and the suffering of asylum seekers and characterised their detention as cruel and inhumane treatment.

Articles that highlighted the unfair treatment of asylum seekers focused on the discrepancy between asylum seekers and Australian citizens with similar criminal records. The narrative of these articles depicted asylum seekers as more responsible than Australian citizens, but subject to harsher treatment. For example, an article titled ‘Human rights warning over detention laws crack down’ (Farid, 2023b), published by the AAP, reported expert criticism of a preventative detention regime aimed at jailing the freed immigration detainees with serious offences. The article quoted Sarah Jones, a human rights law professor, who labelled the preventative detention order targeting non-citizens as ‘inherent racism’, stating:

I do not know of any evidence that non-nationals in that respect are more likely to reoffend or worse, or more of a danger to our society than Australian people … aliens (non-Australians) are somehow more dangerous when they’ve committed a crime compared to an Australian. (Farid, 2023b)

The vulnerability of asylum seekers was identified in a small number of articles (n = 6) which reported on those who turn to people smugglers to reach Australia. For example, the article ‘News travels fast in Southeast Asia's smuggler community’ (Hodge and Septiari, 2024), published in The Australian, focused on the mechanics of people smuggling and how asylum seekers are taken advantage of. These articles focused on people smugglers, who described asylum seekers as animals, emphasising the degrading and commodifying way in which they are treated. An article published in The Sydney Morning Herald titled ‘WA arrivals in detention as Dutton takes aim’ (Massola et al., 2024), included concern over how asylum seekers are becoming increasingly vulnerable in Indonesia after the UNHCR and International Organisation for Migration cut support, leaving them stranded with no right to work, and no access to education or health care (Massola et al., 2024).

The dichotomy between the criminalisation and victimisation of asylum seekers highlights the disparate media construction of asylum seekers in Australia. Media outlets labelling asylum seekers as criminals emphasise their threat to national security, use fear-inducing language, and focus on asylum seekers’ past crimes or potential danger. Such articles featured government officials lending legitimacy to this narrative. In contrast, articles portraying asylum seekers as victims emphasised the harsh policies they faced, such as indefinite detention and human rights abuses. Whilst sympathetic, this victim narrative may also unintentionally undermine the agency of asylum seekers by depicting them primarily as passive subjects rather than autonomous and resilient individuals. Both constructions simplify a complex issue.

Punishment and human rights

The second theme identified is that of a distinction between deserving punishment and breaching human rights. The conditions placed on the released asylum seekers were discussed across all publishers, either: advocating for further punishment or claiming the conditions were a further breach of human rights. Across all publications was the reporting that the government rushed new laws through to mandate the conditions.

Reporting on the punishment of asylum seekers was identified in 93 (51%) articles. These articles referred to the emergency laws that the Australian government introduced through amendments to the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth). These laws included ankle monitors, curfews, and reporting conditions, with offenders imprisoned for up to 5 years. For example, the ABC published ‘Strict conditions set down for detainees released by High Court order, as government strikes quick deal with Coalition’ (Evans, 2023) and the AAP published an article titled ‘Freed detainee fearful as advocates pan emergency laws’ (Farid, 2023a), both highlighting the reaction of the Government in response to the High Court decision.

Placing further restrictions on asylum seekers was often depicted as necessary for community safety. Many articles (n = 75, 41%) listed the conditions imposed on released asylum seekers. For example, The Advertiser published an article titled ‘Criminal letting them go’ (Armstrong, 2023b), blaming the government for the release of asylum seekers that could result in community safety concerns. Articles also highlighted asylum seekers past crimes to justify harsh punishments such as preventative detention. For example, the article ‘Perverts, spies and killers’ (Armstrong, 2023f), also published in The Advertiser, identified asylum seekers as ‘paedophiles and rapists, murderers’.

Members of parliament were quoted in several articles that framed asylum seekers as deserving of such punishment. For example, articles quoted Peter Dutton; ‘I just can’t believe that this government has let these people out … the government should have been designing a preventive detention regime before the court ruling was even handed down’, placing the blame on the government rather than the High Court's ruling, and diminishing those released into a group of ‘these people’ (Armstrong, 2023f).

A small number of articles addressed the human rights implications of the new measures (n = 17, 9%). These articles focused on the lives of asylum seekers, the right to seek asylum, and past international criticism for human rights violations in Australia, highlighting the human rights breaches for detainees. For example, Crikey published ‘Australians need to better understand the reality of detainees’ lives’ (Reinecke, 2023), describing the lives of asylum seekers before their detention in Australia and the current conditions they live under. The article highlighted the complex challenges asylum seekers face, including trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder, and stating ‘the harmful use of restraints on people in immigration detention has long been condemned by medical professionals and human rights experts’. The article stated ‘we should be offering them a fair, fighting chance to rebuild their lives’ and emphasised that fearmongering distorts the issue (Reinecke, 2023).

The theme of human rights was characterised by the inclusion of quotes from legal experts, advocates, and politicians. Those quoted condemned the governments’ emergency laws as an overreach that penalised non-citizens (Wong et al., 2023). ‘Ex-detainees face tough penalties under new laws’ (Ikonomou and Brown, 2023), published by AAP, reported on the opposition to the legislation. They quoted critics who stated that the emergency laws are ‘a way to circumvent the court's ruling’, and characterised the rushed laws as an ‘absolute disgrace’ (Ikonomou and Brown, 2023). ‘Everyone has the right to seek asylum: NSWCCL [New South Wales Council for Civil Liberties] speaks out on preventative detention’ (Johnson, 2023) published in City Hub National News quoted Lydia Shelly, president of the NSWCCL:

The Council had expected the Albanese Government to abolish the decades long practice of politicians politicising and demonising refugees. We are saddened that there appears no difference in the Albanese Government and the Opposition, both parties are seeking to reinforce regimes that we know to be expensive and cruel. (Johnson, 2023)

This theme highlights the polarising debate on the treatment of asylum seekers following their release. Media outlets portrayed the government's response from two perspectives: those advocating and justifying the harsh conditions on asylum seekers for the sake of community safety and those who criticise the measures as breachers of human rights. In line with the dominate negative construction of asylum seekers, both major political parties supported the approach of further punishing asylum seekers. In emphasising the need for community safety, the major parties ignored important human rights considerations.

The Australian media landscape: the impact of negative framing

Australia's concentrated media market was reflected in the articles included in this research, with just under half published by a NewsCorp subsidiary and almost a quarter by a Nine Publishing subsidiary. Brevini and Ward (2021: 3) argue that ‘unchecked media concentration in Australia has allowed big media corporations to accumulate vast amounts of wealth, influence, and power with negative consequences for our democracy’. This concentration has enabled media corporations ‘to set the public agenda, determine political decision-making, public policy, and media policy’ (Brevini and Ward, 2021: 3).

The lack of media diversity impacts democracy in Australia by restricting citizen participation in public discourse (Brevini and Ward, 2021). The lack of diverse reporting and the privileging of political voices is evident within the Australian media landscape and was a clear finding of this research. For example, articles published by NewsCorp subsidiaries more commonly used the language of criminality in reporting on asylum seekers and, across all articles, both members of the government and opposition were found to use similar language. Despite the High Court ruling, the bipartisan rhetoric centred on the notion that the nation was in danger from the release of asylum seekers. This legitimised an urgent legislative response from the government, who sought to place further restrictive measures on the cohort. Lacking a human rights-based approach or an attempt to facilitate a discussion, the media chose to amplify the government's stance, reinforcing a policy status quo in which control and surveillance of people was still publicly defensible.

Regardless of where publishers sit on the political spectrum, the similar language used across articles, such as labelling asylum seekers as criminals, further impacts the divide between us and them. Leroy (2022) argues the concept of the divide eliminates the humanitarian and moral aspects one might have from the debate of asylum seekers, and targets an appeal to nationalism, making it easier to digest and agree with the securitisation narrative. News articles employing these discursive tactics fail to keep the public informed, and instead, utilise the uncertainty of the public and the unknown danger of asylum seekers to further instil fear within the public (Esses et al., 2013; Haw, 2023; McKay et al., 2011).

Us versus them and othering

The second key finding of this research was the role of the media in creating and perpetrating an othering and us versus them paradigm. This research found the construction of asylum seekers as a threat to Australia and, more precisely, a catalyst of paranoia and uncertainty. This narrative has been identified in past research. Esses et al. (2013) concluded that the uncertainty shared by Australians surrounding immigration, paired with the media's proclivity for negative discourse, can lead to the dehumanisation of asylum seekers and, according to Leroy (2022), the perpetuation of a paranoid nation. These portrayals by the media can be seen as responses to shared insecurities and uncertainties about citizenship and national identity within societies (Esses et al., 2013). This can be explained through the process of othering, where discrimination goes beyond simply emphasising differences, but creating division through the use of labels, and exploiting the division between us and them with us representing the Australian population, and them representing asylum seekers who are portrayed as anonymous, deviant and alien to the host society (Akbulut and Razum, 2022; Greussing and Boomgaarden, 2017). For example, in this research, the media's reporting of asylum seekers is dominated by labelling, fearmongering, and othering discourse. A minority of articles recognise asylum seekers as human beings.

What is common across negative media portrayals of asylum seekers is the tendency of the media to dehumanise and create a picture of what or who an asylum seeker is to combat the uncertainty held by the community. This can result in extreme negative reactions and an intolerance of otherness, in which asylum seekers are not permitted access to the human ingroup (Esses et al., 2013). Molla (2023) argues that when people are perceived as other, xenophobic reactions are fostered, reinforcing populist political movements. Negative coverage contributes to the securitisation of asylum seekers, where they are constructed as threats to national security, cultural identity, economic stability, and public health (Haw, 2023; McCann et al., 2023; McKay et al., 2011). In contrast, sympathetic coverage portrays asylum seekers as victims of conflict and emphasizes the benefits of community integration (Cooper et al., 2017; McCann et al., 2023). This research found the media employed othering by labelling asylum seekers as a threat or as evil, a discursive tactic which was used to legitimise implementation of exceptional measures such as curfews and ankle monitors. Saikia and Haines (2024) suggest that labelling serves not only as a psychological tool but also as a political and social weapon, fragmenting the human community and dividing individuals into numerous factionalised groups.

Politicians who continue to fuel a denigrating rhetoric from the media further marginalise and discriminate asylum seekers who already face dehumanising government policies (Allotey et al., 2019; Every and Augoustinos, 2008a; Weber and Pickering, 2011). Those facing marginalisation experience physical and mental health problems and can begin to feel worthless, anxious, and depressed, leading to self-harm and suicide (Choy et al., 2021; Weber and Pickering, 2011). These symptoms are further exacerbated for those who experience detention (AHRC, 2023).

Othering and discrimination contribute to shorter life expectancy, higher infant mortality, and increased rates of hypertension (Akbulut and Razum, 2022). It is therefore important to research the relationship between the Australian media and government, and the narratives they present, which may play a role in further stereotyping, fear mongering, and dehumanising an already vulnerable population. As asylum seekers are already a minoritised group, Molla (2023: 3) considers this a ‘double act’, or ‘portraying the other as “essentially different” and translating the difference into stigma’. The stigma associated with seeking asylum and the social position held by these individuals diminishes their sense of belonging and wellbeing (Molla, 2023), whilst enduring racial discrimination undermines their ability to engage in cultural, social and economic domains within society (Brubaker, 2015; Lilly et al., 2018; Loury, 2021).

Ongoing changes to the treatment of asylum seekers in Australia

The finding of this study that the Australian media represents asylum seekers as criminals deserving of further punishment, is the latest in a long line of research finding this narrative in the media (Cameron, 2013; Klocker and Dunn, 2003; Mayne-Davis et al., 2020). The marked consistency over time enables politicians and policy makers to continue to implement dehumanising and degrading policies. Rather than celebrating the end of indefinite detention in Australia, the media and the major political parties responded by focusing on ways that this cohort could continue to be punished for their status as asylum seekers.

In October 2024, 224 individuals were in the community on Bridging Visa R, known as the NZYQ cohort, with 150 subjected to electronic monitoring and 130 under curfew arrangements (DHA, 2024). In November 2024, the High Court ruled the curfew and ankle bracelet conditions were invalid for the plaintiff, YBFZ (YBFZ v. Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs [2024] HCA 40). The High Court ‘has made clear that the Government cannot punish an entire group of people, merely because of their visa status’ and the curfew and ankle bracelet conditions constitute ‘a form of extra-judicial collective punishment’ based on membership of the NZYQ cohort (Human Rights Law Centre (HRLC) 2024: para. 5).

Despite this ruling, over 20 restrictive visa conditions continue to limit the freedoms of former detainees in the cohort (HRLC, 2024). The government's initial emergency laws introduced in November 2023, and more recently, the government's policy to pay third countries to accept unlawful non-citizens (McKay, 2025), demonstrate the continuing punishment of asylum seekers by the government. Boat arrivals increased between November 2023 and November 2024 (RCOA, 2025), with the number of people in immigration detention rising during the same period (DHA, 2025). The media used this opportunity of increased arrivals to further perpetuate fear of asylum seekers (Workman, 2025).

In January 2025, the United Nations Human Rights Committee (Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, 2025) ruled that Australia was responsible for asylum seekers in the Nauru's detention facilities and related human rights violations, with longstanding advice that the rights of asylum seekers on Nauru are in breach (Freyer and McKay, 2021). However, in February 2025, it was announced that the first individuals from the NZYQ cohort were to be removed to Nauru (Burke, 2025). More recently in November 2025, the President of Nauru, David Adeang, refuted the claim that those in NZYQ cohort are refugees (McKay, 2025). Thus, those removed from Australia to Nauru could be returned to a country where they face persecution (refoulement). These latest developments highlight the ongoing punishment of asylum seekers and the role of the media in enabling such treatment.

Limitations

Several limitations need to be considered when interpreting the results of this study. First, the sample was contained to data from a specific timeframe, as such, a sample from a longer timeframe may yield different results. Second, the research relied on print and online articles from traditional media outlets. Broadening the data to other forms of communication, for example, social media, may allow for an analysis of public reaction. Visual elements from television could also play an important role on the impact on the public, potentially eliciting a more emotional response. Lastly, given the subjective nature of the analysis, there may be other research teams who analyse the data in different ways and consequently reach different conclusions.