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The Department of Immigration and Border Protection (DIBP) latest statistics are dated 30 September 2014 . These show:
  • 603 children locked in Australia’s secure immigration detention facilities, 
  • 144 of these children are detained on Christmas Island 
  • An additional 186 children are detained in Nauru
  • 1586 are detained in the community under residence determinations, a system referrred to as Community Detetnion.

2029 children are living in the community on Bridging Visas which mean their parents have no work rights and very limited access to any Government support.

The statistics do not give a breakdown of how many children are unaccompanied vs how many are with adult family members. We continue to ask the Department and Government for this as well as a breakdown of numbers in each mainland detention facility. Instead ‘mainland APODs‘ (alternative places of detention) are grouped together, currently 338 children are held in mainland APODs. The APOD facilities at Leonora (WA) and Port Augusta (SA) and the Darwin Airport Lodge (DAL) are now closed, this means the vast majority of children in these facilities are in two prison like facilities in Darwin, a fairly high number in Melbourne and some in Adelaide at the Inverbrackie facility which is set to close by end of 2014 (and is recognised as the most physically humane environment amidst an inhumane system).
This map shows where Australia’s detention centres are located. Figures in the map are based on those released by DIBP, therefore accurate as of 30 September 2014. Here is an explanation of the different forms of detention and why we state there is nothing ‘alternate’ about a so called ‘alternative place of detention’.
Incidents in detention are logged by the private company, Serco who manage the facilities. This comprehensive website charts ‘incidents’ by date, by facility, by type. A day-to-day insight in to what happens in our detention facilities.