Detention centre workers dare Abbott to arrest them for speaking out

More than 40 current and former detention centre workers are calling on the prime minister to have them arrested after new secrecy laws governing the disclosure of information about Nauru and Manus Island came into effect today.

The signatories have challenged Prime Minister Tony Abbott and Immigration Minister Peter Dutton to prosecute them under the new Border Force Act which criminalises blowing the whistle about Australian detention centres.

Under the new laws which passed earlier this year with Labor's support it would be illegal to disclose details about abuses perpetrated against refugees in Australia's care.

"Today the Border Force Act comes into force," the open letter published by The Guardian states, signed by the defiant nurses, doctors, educational, social and humanitarian workers.

"It includes provision for a two-year jail sentence for 'entrusted persons' such as ourselves if we continue to speak out about the deplorable state of human rights in immigration detention without the express permission of the minister for immigration and border protection.

"This strengthens the wall of secrecy which prevents proper public scrutiny."

The group state they will continue to take a stand for the health and safety of those who they care for because "standing by and watching sub-standard and harmful care, child abuse and gross violations of human rights is not ethically justifiable".

There are scant details about the conditions in which refugees live in while incarcerated in Australia's off-shore detention centres, but stories of violence and the sexual abuse of women and children are among some of the issues that have come to light.

The open letter concludes by calling on the Abbott government and the immigration department "to prosecute so that these issues may be discussed in open court and in the full view of the Australian public".