Labor plans to reopen detention centres for visa overstayers

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke announced on 17 September 2026 a plan to reopen detention centres for visa overstayers. He said 100 compliance officers would be hired and 250 beds freed, plus a possible 100-bed quarantine facility in Victoria, to hold around 77,000 unlawful non-citizens for weeks and encourage voluntary departure. He called it a return to pre-2015 practice.