Tampa documentary is a ‘gripping retelling’ of one of the nation’s biggest turning points

It’s been 25 years since 433 Afghan refugees were picked up from a broken down fishing boat by the Norwegian freighter MV Tampa. A generation later and the whole idea of ‘illegal immigrants’ and ‘queue jumpers’ remains a live wire in Australian politics. Which makes the new documentary series Tampa: The Turning Point an essential window into our national character.

Just don’t expect to like everything you see.

Australia rejects the ‘soft touch’

In August 2001, the refugees on board the Tampa dominated news headlines. The Federal Government refused to allow the ship to take them to the nearest Australian port at Christmas Island. Then Prime Minister John Howard announced that Australia would not be accepting them, and was not a ‘soft touch’.

The Tampa’s captain – and international law – said otherwise. The ship stayed moored off Christmas Island, the refugees stuck on board while diplomatic and legal attempts were made to break the impasse. The Howard Government had their own ideas about resolving the issue, calling in the SAS to board the Tampa while trying to push through legislation to bar the refugees from being accepted here.

Further developments swung back and forth. Howard announced the ‘Pacific Solution’, where refugees would instead be sent to the tiny island of Nauru before being shipped off anywhere that would take them (so, not Australia). That was also challenged in court. Meanwhile, August 2001 became September 2001, and things were about to change.

Main players return to tell their story

All the surviving major figures on the then-government side turn up to give their view of proceedings (that’d be John Howard and Alexander Downer), while the production team have tracked down a number of the Tampa refugees to get their experience of being treated as pawns in a much bigger game.

Throw in various legal figures and a couple of journalists, and this series has a strong cross-section of the main players – though the then-opposition, who seemed set for victory at the next election, are often left to the sidelines.

The mix of talking heads and extensive archival footage makes for pacey storytelling, and director Kriv Stenders keeps things moving at a rapid pace – even when, for the refugees, much of the story involves waiting for big decisions to be made far away.

For a history lesson, it’s often got the energy of a geopolitical thriller, while the human side of things remains just as compelling.

The Tampa was an explosive issue at the time, and it remains so to this day. In a slightly unusual move, this series – which debuts on ABC TV tonight – has been available to stream on iView for the past week. The iView date lined up with the actual anniversary and slotting series into TV schedules is complicated, but with such a sensitive subject a staggered release date probably doesn’t hurt if you don’t want to reopen old wounds.

The human impact of policy

What comes across through this series is that the story of the Tampa is about what happens when individual human beings come under the gaze of people who see the world as a place run by vast geopolitical forces.

Showing footage of 9/11 while journalist Marian Wilkinson says – with an ominous pause between every word – that ‘this… changes… everything’ is a reminder that for at least some of the people here, global events are just a pretext that allows them to do what they’ve always wanted to.

There’s the occasional shot of the major players looking pensive, but this largely takes John Howard and Alexander Downer at face value when it comes to their (limited) hand wringing over the need to make tough choices. It’s a reasonable approach. But there’s no denying that the hard decisions they reached after extensive soul-searching also happened to be ones that benefited them politically. And those lessons were learned globally.

International ripples

The third episode looks in part at the effect that Australia’s anti-refugee stance went on to have around the world. Locally, you had Tony Abbott talking about ‘economic’ refugees – the idea that people weren’t fleeing war or disaster, but just came here for a hand-out. In Europe the idea of turning back refugee boats would take hold, even as Downer, now High Commissioner to the UK, was telling anyone who’d listen that they needed to follow Australia’s lead and create an offshore solution.

The Tampa refugees were eventually settled in New Zealand, almost in secret. Meanwhile, the Howard Government claimed a different batch of refugees had thrown their children overboard to try and ensure they could stay in Australia. It was proven false on the eve of the election: the Howard government said it was a ‘bad lapse in communication’ and won with an increased majority.

Seeing Howard say ‘we will decide who comes to this country, and the circumstances in which they come’ to the applause of the Liberal Party faithful – and then have the line praised for its undeniable political impact – is merely recording historical fact. Tampa: The Turning Point is a gripping retelling of that history; what it says about Australia is up to the viewer to decide.

Tampa: The Turning Point airs on ABC TV from 1 September, with all three episodes available on iView