DIMA's Tastan deportation, 28-4-06
Letter to the Editor - Australian Financial Review
28 April 2006
Dear Sir/Madam
There is no doubt Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs is on the move to improve but Julie Macken's picture ("Payback time for detainees", April 12) is inaccurate.
Macken says detainee Ali Tastan was "secretly flown back to Australia from Turkey". The implication is DIMA concocted the arrangement. This is wrong.
Tastan's medical service provider (engaged by his legal representative) - and not DIMA - made all the flight arrangements. She continues "DIMA bought out the entire first-class section of a Qantas flight" - wrong. The provider arranged three business-class seats for Tastan, his doctor and his psychiatrist.
She also asserts, based on misinformation from her source, that taxpayers paid $93,000 for all this. Wrong. DIMA received an invoice from the provider for airfares (including Tastan's father), ambulance (Ankara to Istanbul), professional fees, medical equipment, telecommunications, administration and hospital expenses (in Istanbul) totalling $78,000.
Sandi Logan
National Communications Manager,
Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs