Highlights:
- Due to the Covid-19 related travel ban, only the immediate family of an Australian citizen or permanent resident is allowed to enter into Australia.
- However, parents are not considered immediate family members.
- The petition appeals to change the rules.
Ms Celia Hammond MP, Member for Curtin, Western Australia speaks on the plight of separated migrant families, listen:
LISTEN TO
Petition to consider parents as 'immediate family members' presented in Parliament
SBS Hindi
04:17
"It was a petition that had been signed by over 11,000 people who are Australian citizens or permanent residents, who have their parents living overseas,' Ms Celina Hammond MP told SBS Hindi.
"And, under current covid-restrictions, the definition of immediate family for Australian citizens and permanent residents to bring people into Australia, does not include parents.
"And there are an enormous amount of people in Australia, who were born overseas, whose parents still live overseas, who are suffering enormous emotional and mental health stress because of this."
The petition signed by over 11,000 people appeals to the Federal Government to change the definition of immediate family members to include parents.
Source: Supplied by Mandy Bindal
Due to the Covid-19 related travel ban, only the immediate family of an Australian citizen or permanent resident is allowed to enter into Australia. However, parents are not considered as immediate family.
Therefore many people are not able to bring their parents to Australia.
Melbourne-resident Harjot Singh is taking care of his sick father in India after his mother's death.
He wants to bring his father to Australia, but the 'Immediate family member' rule does not allow him.
Harjot Singh Source: Supplied by Harjot Singh
"It is not just me," he says.
"There are thousands of people who need their parents in Australia due to various reasons but they cannot for this rule which needs to be changed."
The petition reads, "We know this pandemic is going to last long and not able to meet or grief or celebrate events together is causing mental and emotional stress.
Parents separated due to travel restrictions are waiting eagerly to be with their children in Australia. Source: Supplied by Mandy Bindal
"The separation is now having an impact on people's emotions and mental health. Other countries, like the US, UK, Canada, are allowing parents of citizens to join them in the country and spend time together during this pandemic."
"This is inhuman to separate parents from children. So many of my close friends lost their one parent and struggling to get left alone parent here to take care of them," says Mandy Bindal, one of the campaigners.
Mandy's mother passed away three years ago, and her father is alone in India.
"He supposed to come here, but due to the pandemic, he is not allowed. Australian Border Force is exempting parents if there is an extreme emergency. Why there has to be an emergency to prove they need us or we need them? This rule is impacting our mental health to the extreme," Ms Bindal told SBS Hindi.
Ms Hammond hopes for a positive outcome.
Many parents are alone in their home countries as they cannot travel to Australia. Source: Supplied by Mandy Bindal
"I think that there's always hope. And I think that as we are moving into the next stage of managing our responses to Covid, both on an economic and the health front where different measures of different things are being considered.
"We just had our third day straight of no new cases in Australia. It has been fantastic, but six months down we can be looking at different ways of managing quarantine, of managing the people coming back into Australia. And so, yes I do think that there is hope."
The petition will now be referred to the Department of Home Affairs, and the minister will have to respond within a certain time period.
