The voices of the detained

But none of this is new. And yet, nothing seems to change.

The Asylum Seeker Resource Centre (ASCR) claims that, "the detention system in Australia is broken," - fragmented like the attitudes of the Australian people that once underpinned the spirit of Advance Australia Fair.

The recent Four Corners program exposed how Australia's current detention policy is damaging people's mental health and detention provides a re-traumatising environment.

"The fact is that detention makes people sick, it destroys the spirit and destroys the fabric of Australia through fear," says Pamela Curr, Campaign Coordinator at the ASCR.

She believes that "this is particularly the case for long term, indefinite, arbitrary detention, which is what we have in Australia."

The Hazaras protesting in Darwin detention centre have been there for more than a year, and some up to 22 months.

"We see the fences and the situation which makes the people so much disappointed. We now became fed up [with these] daily circumstances. We now want to be free. We now want to be in the community with others," said the Hazara detainees.

Some of them have been waiting for their Independent Merits Review (IMR) outcomes for over six months.

Many of them have been waiting for their security clearance to be issued, after their successful claim for asylum, so that they can be released into the community. There is no time limit or timeframe by which ASIO needs to deliver an answer on an applicant's security clearance.

"Many people in Darwin Detention Centre are not just asylum seekers, they are now genuine refugees as determined by the Australian government and they are just waiting on health and security checks. They sit and languish for up to 18 months for ASIO to make a determination," says Ms Curr.

ASIO revealed to Lateline that the security checks now take an average of 66 days to complete. The Greens say that some detainees have been waiting for security checks for 18 months, with their children also detained.

According to the ASCR, there are currently: