Nope - it implies nothing, one way or the other, about the validity of the visa or whether the minister might have good grounds to cancel it.
So far as I can glean from new reports, this judgment is about process, not substance. The Minister went the wrong way about making this decision - he failed to allow Djokovic time to respond to the objections to his visa, and/or misled Djokovic about how much time he had to respond. That implies nothing about whether Djokovic might have had good ground for any objections he might have made, if allowed the time to do so.
The Minister can start again, review the visa properly, and cancel it after considering any objections Djokovic may raise. Whether he will or not is another matter, but the judgment leaves that possibility open.
But surely if the judge thought that the visa itself was valid, he would have said so and ended the matter, rather than just ruling on the process?
Anyway, it seems that regardless of anything else, the minister can still arbitrarily decide to cancel the visa any time. He’s thinking about it…
Guardian Australia understands the immigration minister, Alex Hawke, will not make a call on whether to re-cancel Novak Djokovic’s visa tonight Australian time.
A spokesman for Hawke said: “ Following today’s Federal Circuit … determination on a procedural ground, it remains within immigration minister Hawke’s discretion to consider cancelling Mr Djokovic’s visa under his personal power of cancellation within section 133C(3) of the Migration Act. The minister is currently considering the matter and the process remains ongoing.”
Earlier this evening other outlets speculated that Hawke would need to make such a decision within four hours. The four hour window is only relevant if the government had decided to re-detain Djokovic for questioning, which has not occurred.
There is no time limit on Hawke’s power to cancel the visa – it can be done whenever he reaches the requisite satisfaction that there is a ground to do so and it is in the public interest.
Another point that’s come up recently is that on the day after No-vax Jokervic claims he tested positive, he was photographed without a mask, shaking hands and hugging children at a tennis function.
What a fucking asshole. So, either he got some doctor to lie about his positive test or he was intentionally transmitting it to kids and others at that function.
Two other little wrinkles in this tale, firstly, it seems like his QR code was giving a negative result when accessed a few days ago by journalists. Apparently it now reads positive.
Also, though on his visa application he declared he wasn’t travelling, nor had travelled, prior to setting off for Australia.
It now seems as though he was in Spain before flying to Oz.
Not sure what sanctions are available for false claims on a visa application but I can’t imagine the authorities would be happy about it if Joe Shmo did it.
Djokovic has issued a statement conceding that he did travel internationally in the 14 days before coming to Australia, and that his visa application incorrectly said that he did not. He says that this misstatement was an error on his part (or on the part of his staff).
It seems to me that the Minister could go one of two ways on this:
Cancel his visa on the basis that his visa application contained false information.
Cancel his visa if, and only if, it would have been refused, had the visa application contained the correct information.
I don’t know what the normal practice would be in an analogous case involving a visa applicant who is not a multimillionaire sportsman and who has not already successfully challenged one attempted cancellation of his visa.
I’m pretty sure that, legally, the Minister can cancel on the basis of the false information, without considering whether the information concerned would have been material to the initial grant. But it might look vindictive or politically motivated to do that in the circumstances of this case.
It is hard to know for sure but I can’t imagine that a lowly citizen making a false visa declaration whilst showing a public and willful disregard for public health restrictions would get too much benefit of the doubt.
That doesn’t even get into the intrigue over the validity of the testing in the first place.
I dunno. The Aussies haven’t exactly covered themselves with glory in the handling of this matter so far. If they now ban Djokovic for an error on the form which (let’s assume) wouldn’t ordinarily lead to visa cancellation, there must be influential people in the world of Bat-And-Ball who will ask themselves whetehr countries that will vindictively bar the world’s no. 1 male player of Bat-And-Ball for domestic political advantage are really the best ones to host Grand Slam tournaments. There’s a reputational issue for Australia here.
My understanding is that Australian people were (in general) pissed off that he got an exemption at all. There’s no issue for nearly all tennis players, because they aren’t anti-vax, COVID-spreading assholes. Most tennis players are probably happy to play by the rules of the country they are looking to play in.
Not only that, not only the travel error on the visa but there is also the clear evidence that he doesn’t think the Covid regulations apply to him, or they only do when he decides they do.
It seems he can’t be trusted to get vaccinated, can’t be trusted to be honest about his movements and can’t be trusted to take reasonable (and legal) precautions when he knows he is infected.
Other than that, I’m sure he’s a model example of how to conduct yourself.
Right! I just looked up his false statement – “I haven’t traveled to any other countries in the last few weeks.” What about Spain? “Oh, right! Is that another country? I’m not really a geographer.”
