Submissions close tomorrow on a government immigration bill that critics say borrows from the playbook of the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, with an Auckland immigration lawyer warning the legislation strips appeal rights and concentrates power in ministerial hands.
The Immigration (Enhanced Risk Management) Amendment Bill, introduced by Immigration Minister Erica Stanford on 18 March, would extend the period during which a permanent resident can be deported for serious crimes from 10 years of residence to 20 years, remove appeal rights to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal for several categories of migrant, and expand the powers of immigration officers to demand identity documents in homes and workplaces.
Asylum claimants who withdraw their claim would lose the ability to later apply for a visa, children without residence would lose recourse to the tribunal to challenge deportation, and the bill would authorise the sharing of sensitive personal information with a wider range of government and private agencies.
Speaking to RNZ, Auckland-based immigration lawyer Stewart Dalley said the proposed regime sidelined an independent decision-maker in favour of the minister’s discretion.
“[The bill] says, we don’t trust the immigration and protection tribunal to make these decisions. I want to make the decision, but I want to make the decision behind closed doors without anybody being able to effectively challenge me,” Dalley said.
He compared the tone of the legislation to the aggressive enforcement style of the United States agency that has drawn international criticism for raids and detentions over the past year.
“It invokes images of ICE and invokes images of, you know, blaming asylum seekers for the other problems in society,” he told RNZ.
The Asylum Seekers Support Trust, which works with people who claim refugee status after arriving in New Zealand, used its submission to push back on the framing that asylum seekers were a source of criminality. The trust said the public picture of who actually claimed asylum was at odds with the political language around the bill.
“Overwhelmingly the people and families seeking asylum are ordinary people like you or me – teachers, engineers, shopkeepers, students,” the trust told RNZ.
Stanford has said the bill is aimed at a small group of people who abuse the system rather than at the wider migrant population. Announcing the legislation in March, she said the changes were proportionate and targeted.
“The changes aim to help address serious criminal offending by a small number of asylum seekers so that they cannot get refugee status,” Stanford said.
She has said that 14 refugee claimants currently have serious crime convictions in New Zealand, including for murder, sexual offending, drug offences, and arson, and that current law prevents Immigration New Zealand from taking those convictions into account when determining refugee status. The bill would amend the way Article 1F(b) of the Refugee Convention is applied so that crimes committed after arrival in New Zealand could be considered alongside crimes committed before.
“Immigration is important for New Zealand, and we are committed to ensuring we continue to attract the skilled people we need, while making it easier to address migrant exploitation, serious criminals, and immigration breaches,” Stanford said in the Beehive announcement.
She added that “New Zealanders want us to do our part to provide refuge to people who are genuinely fleeing conflict and persecution,” but argued that conviction for a serious offence after arrival should disqualify a person from that protection.
The bill is one strand of a wider tightening of the immigration regime under the coalition government, which has confirmed plans to harden the rules around birthright citizenship and which has previously signalled a more aggressive posture on overstayers. Officials at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment have been working through a separate set of proposed amendments alongside the bill.
Critics have focused not only on the deportation provisions but on the procedural changes around tribunal access. Removing the right to argue a deportation case before the Immigration and Protection Tribunal would, in effect, leave the minister and immigration officials with the final word in cases that currently sit with an independent body, and several legal commentators have flagged that as the most significant change buried in the bill.
The Sensible Sentencing Trust has also weighed in on the bill from a victims’ rights perspective, supporting the deportation extensions for serious offenders. Their position contrasts with that of the Asylum Seekers Support Trust, illustrating the tension Stanford has tried to navigate between law-and-order voters and human rights advocates.
The opposition has yet to land a clear unified line on the bill, with Labour and the Greens criticising specific provisions but not the overall direction, given the political difficulty of opposing measures aimed at people convicted of serious crimes. The government holds a majority in the House and will be able to pass the legislation in some form regardless, but the select committee process is expected to produce amendments before the bill returns for its second reading.
The public submissions window has been short, with the bill open for written feedback for about six weeks since first reading. Refugee advocates have complained that the timeline gives community organisations limited room to consult with affected communities, many of whom have English as a second language and are reluctant to draw attention to themselves. The Refugee Status Unit, which sits within Immigration New Zealand, processes a small number of claims each year, with most applicants going on to receive protected status.
Submissions on the bill close on Wednesday and can be lodged through Parliament’s website. The select committee is then expected to report back later this year.
What do you make of the bill — proportionate response or overreach? Have your say in the comments below.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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