For educators, the plight of children in detention centres is like an open wound. It goes on, never healing and always hurting. The facts are known and the judgements made. Only the cure is missing.

by Rob Durbridge, AEU Federal Secretary

The government-appointed Human Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission (HREOC) found in Feburary that children were suffering harm in Woomera Detention Centre. HREOC interviewed 11 families and 20 of the 236 children in the centre. The report said, "That children are suffering psychological trauma from these experiences would seem beyond doubt," the Commission reported.

HREOC said that Australia was in breach of the Convention on the Rights of the Child because of a failure to protect children from "all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation" while in our government's care. How does that make you feel?

The AEU and many others have called for children to be allowed to attend public schools and to live peacefully in the community with their parents while their cases are assessed. Currently they get some classes, sometimes two hours per day, delivered by employees of the US Wackenhut Corporation which runs the centres for the Department of Immigration. Secondary-school age children rarely attend classes and never outside the centres. Can you imagine their state of mind?

By mixing freely with their peers in schools and receiving the expert assistance they require through counselling as well as intensive language and literacy courses, their chances of recovery and integration into Australian society are maximised. By attending public schools which have generations of experience integrating new arrivals, they have the best chance of redressing the hostility they have faced. Our state education systems need to offer their resources and skills, as we will.

HREOC is conducting an extensive inquiry into detention centres and children to which the AEU is making a submission. The inquiry will look at education policies, programs and practices, the access to and scope and content of programs and how those provided compare to those in the community and internationally.

Minister Ruddock's instant response to calls for education was to say they couldn't attend school because they had missed out on years of education in the camps. He demonises refugees as criminals and this stains our national reputation. Their crime is to come to Australia without permission. Our forbears who did the same got statues and landmarks to remember them.