YOUTH worker Said Dileri, 35, says he is failing in his duty as a father and fears his marriage won't survive. The last time he saw his six-year-old daughter in a Pakistan refugee camp, she told him: ''We don't need food, money or anything. We just need you.''
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The Afghan refugee, an Australian resident, is distraught that the application he lodged in 2010 to bring his three children and wife to Melbourne is stuck in a backlog of 20,500 special humanitarian visa applications. This year, only 10 more will be granted.
''My wife thinks I am not doing enough to bring her here,'' he says. ''I have a job and regular income.''
Mr Dileri arrived by plane and won't endanger his children by putting them on a people-smuggler's boat. But he knows other refugees who now say they will take the boat route in desperation to bring family here because the lawful channel has, in effect, dried up.
The Salvation Army has been told only 10 special humanitarian visa places are left until July, as the Immigration Department strips away places to reallocate them to the influx of boat arrivals.
Migration agents and church groups have joined calls for the federal government to stop linking places in this visa class, used by residents to sponsor persecuted family, with the allocation of visas to boat arrivals.
The Spectrum Migrant Resource Centre, in a submission to a government review, has said linking the two programs is ''exacerbating racism'' , as people unable to sponsor family members blame asylum seekers arriving at Christmas Island.
One Melbourne family was distraught to be told last week their Ethiopian brother, languishing in Kenya, would not be granted a visa as expected because of the sudden shortage of places. ''He had finished the medical checks and even the air ticket had been paid,'' the man's brother-in-law, who arrived in Australia 15 years ago, said. His pregnant wife, an Australian citizen for seven years, collapsed when she received the bad news.
A Salvation Army officer, Simon Hartley, who is working with the family, says: ''Australia has a legal obligation to deal with asylum seekers at its border. If they are found to be in need of protection, they should be allowed to stay. But it is unfair for people offshore to suddenly be made victims because of these boat arrivals.''
Mr Hartley said the number of special humanitarian places should be boosted and the two programs ''completely delinked''.
The federal government is considering private sponsorship to expand the number of special humanitarian places without hitting the federal budget.
Spectrum believes a payment model could offer an alternative option for refugees prepared to pay a people smuggler, but cautioned this would be unaffordable for many and that the government should consider no-interest loans.
The opposition immigration spokesman, Scott Morrison, said it was Coalition policy to hold a trial of private sponsorship, allowing organisations such as church groups to sponsor refugees above the official quota.
Mr Morrison said this would not be offered to families because of the financial burden. The Coalition would continue to link the two programs, but special humanitarian visas would be given priority over boat arrivals, he said.
