FIVE refugee children in the care of Centacare in Adelaide face further upheaval amid more legal wrangling, despite having been freed from the Baxter Immigration Detention Centre eight months ago.
The children, aged six to 15, were released from the South Australian detention centre into the care of Centacare last August.
The High Court ruled on April 29 that the Family Court had no power to release the children from detention, leaving open the possibility they could be returned to Baxter.
The Federal Government had appealed the Family Court decision.
Following the High Court decision, lawyers for the two brothers and three sisters sought a Federal Court injunction to prevent them from being returned to detention until their case could be re-heard.
Centacare’s executive director in Adelaide, Dale West, said the Federal Court on May 4 granted an adjournment to allow a case to be prepared to show the children should not be held in detention.
The case will return to the Federal Court on May 26.
For the past eight months, the children have lived with carers in a suburban house, attending school like other children, but that had changed since the latest court ruling, with the Immigration Department requiring the children to be under 24-hour surveillance.
Mr West said Centacare was waiting to negotiate with the department on what was required under the new conditions.
