PETER GRAY - Dr Dennis Jensen MP

Dr JENSEN» (Tangney) (7:50 PM) —I rise to express grave concern at the government’s gross neglect of one of my constituents, an Australian national who has effectively been detained without trial in Mauritius for the last four years. Peter Gray was arrested in 2005 after flying to Mauritius. He met a woman on the plane who was later found to be smuggling heroin into the country. She allegedly implicated him, but withdrew her claim after she was convicted. But Mr Gray’s detention continued. He denies all charges, and since his arrest, for the last four years, he has been in prison or forced to stay in Mauritius.

Australia’s most significant contribution to the matter seems to be its cancellation of Mr Gray’s passport. Consider that for a moment. An Australian national is arrested in another country and then charged with a serious offence, which he denies, and then he is detained for several years without a trial. Australia does not raise a hue and cry about this grave injustice, does not protest and does not apply any pressure to at least have the matter dealt with in the courts. No, the members opposite cancelled this man’s passport. He needed help and you, the so-called government, delivered what was effectively a presumption of guilt.

The Minister for Foreign Affairs does not want to talk about this case publicly. He has not responded to repeated and sometimes daily questions from the media. He replied just last week to a letter I sent him on 2 July, saying that the cancellation of Mr Gray’s passport was justified. He said it would be ‘inappropriate’ for Australia to make representations to Mauritius as long as legal action was continuing.

The question here is not one of innocence or guilt. I make no judgement as to Mr Gray’s culpability, though on balance the facts as they are known would tend to support his denials. The issue is one of justice. Four years is an unreasonable delay. To hold someone in such limbo is a terrible cruelty. The government has demonstrated in other cases that it is able to act when Australian nationals are arrested overseas. Recent examples include the mother detained in Thailand for stealing a bar mat and young Australians held over drugs in Indonesia. But Mr Gray, a middle-aged, average Australian, apparently does not fall into this category warranting attention. How many other Peter Grays are out there?

In 2007-08 DFAT reported it had contact with 1,249 Australians arrested or imprisoned overseas and believed there were many more cases in which Australia was not notified. Whatever the circumstances of the case, Mr Gray deserves to have the matter resolved. The delays are a gross infringement of Mr Gray’s rights. To deny him his liberty and to effectively detain him for so long without ever being convicted of an offence is a disgraceful abuse of state power. All Australians would expect that if they were ever detained in another country their government would step in to ensure they were treated reasonably. Four years is not a reasonable period to resolve a criminal matter. This could happen to you, it could happen to me and it is completely unacceptable.

It is also very disturbing that Australia has apparently cancelled Mr Gray’s passport simply on the basis that he has been charged with a criminal offence. The assumption of innocence is the bedrock of our judicial system and must not be sacrificed. If the concern was one of flight risk when considering whether Mr Gray could be released from prison pending trial, other measures could have been implemented, such as simply surrendering his passport to local authorities. On the surface of it, Australia’s cancellation of Mr Gray’s passport makes our country and all of us complicit in this travesty of justice. Australians have a right to expect that the government will do something other than cancel their passports and then wait for the outcome of legal proceedings, no matter how many years it takes. The foreign minister needs to act on Mr Gray’s case. To do anything less is a dereliction of duty.