Bronwyn Dendle & Angela Fredericks

Biloela, QLD, February 2024

Bronwyn: I met Priya and Nades through my role as the hospital social worker. Myself and some other community nurses started advocating on their behalf to the department [of immigration] because they were having to constantly renew their visa. We wrote to the immigration minister and started to really put their case forward that needed to stay in Biloela, that they were doing important roles in our community. Then on 5th March 2028 they were taken without any warning.

Angela: We thought they were going to be put on a plane the next day and sent back to Sri Lanka with no witnesses. So we did a press release and started a petition and within 24 hours, we amassed something like 10,000 signatures.

Bronwyn: I think my phone number had been on the press release and it started running hot. But I couldn’t talk publicly. I was getting in trouble for taking calls at work. My team leader told my team not to encourage me in the advocacy, to not give it any air time. But it was my role as a community member and as a social worker to keep going, ethically and morally. That is part of the fabric of who we are. So I contacted Angela who accepted to be the spokesperson for the campaign.

Angela: Before we knew it, we had to assemble a legal team, we were stopping deportations, organising rallies, I was flying down to Melbourne to stand outside the court. And we genuinely thought that it would only be a few weeks because the government would realise the error of their ways. But then it became a four year long fight.
Bronwyn ended up leaving the hospital and then all of a sudden she could start doing interviews as well.

Bronwyn: As much as I missed the work that I did in that role, we needed to share the weight because it would have burnt Angela out even more than what it did. I don't think I would have had the ability, to do what she did anyway, headlining this campaign. I mean, it was so much effort and so much time and so much of your finances.

Angela: We were doing crowdfunding for legal expenses but I have a very, very kind and supportive and understanding husband who supported all my trips to Melbourne, Canberra, Christmas Island, Perth. I had just started my private practice but my business never really had a chance. But Bron was advocating and doing work for this family before it became a public show.

Bronwyn: I’ve had people asking me "were you involved? Were you?”. Yeah, I was, actually. But looking back, during that phase where I was having to be more silent, I really didn't want your job.
All of us involved in the campaign hoped that everyday Australians would shift the way they thought about asylum seekers and that this case would result in some systemic change. That hasn't quite happened. But I genuinely believe that in 50 years time, people will look back on the way we treat asylum seekers in this country and be disgusted.

Angela: There's still around 19000 refugees who are exactly how this family were. They’re still in limbo.

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