How Djokovic’s detention-deportation shines a light on the mistreatment of refugees in Australia

Peter Billings

The recent visa cancellation, detention and deportation of tennis superstar Novak Djokovic provides a timely and striking illustration of the application of Australia’s immigration detention regime and broad (or hyper-political) “public interest” powers vested in the Immigration Minister.

This lecture will examine how the Djokovic saga inadvertently, but importantly, brought focus to the plight of asylum seekers and refugees subject to indefinite detention in Australia. The lecture will also critique the use/abuse of ministerial powers that are a significant feature of Australia’s approach to border policing and the regulation of non-citizens.

The lecutre will be presented by Peter Billings,  a professor at the School of Law at The University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, and a fellow of the Higher Education Academy. In 2014 he was a Senior Visiting Research Fellow at the School of Law at the University of Warwick. His research interests are in particular areas of public law: administrative law, immigration and refugee law, social welfare law and human rights law.