A WANGI Wangi man said he was being forced to leave Australia and his extended family because a document he posted to immigration officials went missing in the mail for five months.
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Dan Hall, 45, said the Department of Immigration and Border Protection had given him until May 30 to leave Australia.
He said the department had rejected his application for permanent residency because he failed to produce a national police check within the required 28 days.
“It looks like I’m going to have to leave, otherwise they’ll handcuff me and put me in a detention centre until I fly out,” Mr Hall said.
The Irish citizen has been living in Australia since 2007.
He met his now wife, Virginia, over the side fence, and the couple married within a year.
They have three children - including two with special needs – and live with Virginia’s mother in a modest two-bedroom home on Puna Road.
Mr Hall said the government decision to send him packing would impact on five lives. He is distraught, but tries not to show it in front of the children.
“I can’t eat or sleep properly since I’ve received this news. It’s ripping me apart,” he said.
Mr Hall said as soon as the Department of Immigration and Border Protection requested that he supply a police check in 2015, Mrs Hall sent away for it.
“That police check arrived on June 10, 2015. We kept the envelope so that we could prove that the police check came here to the house,” he said.
“Virginia put the police check in an envelope and sent it to Immigration the same day.”
Mr Hall said he regretted not sending the document by registered post.
“That police report didn’t surface on the Immigration department case officer’s desk until November 15.
“But why should we be held responsible for that? Once we put it in the post box we’ve got no control over it.”
Mr Hall said once the 28 days elapsed, he received no correspondence from the department to say that the document hadn’t arrived.
He said a simple phone call or email from the department could have alerted him to the problem, and he could have quickly resent a copy of the police check.
Mr Hall subsequently appealed for ministerial intervention under Section 351 of the Migration Act 1958 “as there was not another single option available”.
But on May 9 he received a letter from the department to say that Minister Peter Dutton would not intervene.
The letter, from a department official representing the minister, said Mr Dutton had “personally considered this request and has decided that it would not be in the public interest to intervene. The minister has, therefore, not exercised his power under section 351 of the Act in your case. The request is now finalised”.
Mrs Hall said her husband was a loving and caring father, an essential provider for their extended family, a popular and respected member of their local community, and the sort of man Australia needed more of.
A qualified carpenter, cabinet maker and aircraft maintenance technician, Mr Hall has mentored work experience students from Morisset High School, and worked extensively inside the Wangi RSL Club where he installed a kitchen and upgraded the Anzac Room.
Mr Hall said his dealings with the Department of Immigration and Border Protection had not tainted his view of Australia.
“I still love Australia. I love the country and I love the people,” he said.
“I’ve never once taken a hand-out from the Australian government in the 11 years I’ve been here. And every dollar that I earn goes back into the NSW economy.”
Mrs Hall said her husband’s love for Australia, and for supporting the “little guy”, ran so deep that he only ever chose Australian-grown fruit at the supermarket.
Mr Hall said he was making preparations to return to Ireland, although he remained hopeful of an 11th-hour reprieve. Once in Ireland he would apply to return to Australia, a process that would take at least four months and cost $7000 – not including airfares.
“My concern is that my family is going to hit the rocks. That’s what happens when you take the captain off the ship, and I just cannot accept that there’s nothing that can be done.”
The Halls have petitions at the local newsagency, RSL and bowling clubs. There is an online petition at change.org (search ‘3 Aussie kids to be left without their Dad’).
Mr Hall urged anyone who could offer advice on his matter to email him at eire32counties@gmail.com
