Adjudication No. 1242  (June 2004)

The Australian Press Council has upheld a complaint brought by Mira Wroblewski and others against The Sydney Morning Herald concerning the terminology used in a headline to describe people without the requisite migration documents or authority, who arrive seeking asylum in Australia.

Ms Wroblewski complained to the Council about the headline Illegal immigrant children may not be sent home which appeared on 30 April 2004 which headed an article about the High Court's overruling of a previous Family Court decision to release children from the Baxter detention centre.

She argued that the paper has been factually inaccurate. The family were known asylum seekers.

In this instance, the paper acknowledged that "illegal immigrants" was an incorrect description of the asylum seekers and conceded that it should have used its preferred term "asylum seekers".

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