I forgot to mention that my ancestors came from Prussia and settled in S.A. around 150 years ago.

"Policy-makers and politicians":

"Have a lick of sense"

" a decent slice of humanity left in them"

"a dollop of courage to argue this case in the public arena"

What planet are you living on?

This is planet earth - the only humans who matter are wealthy and (preferably) white - although exceptions will be made if you are powerful enough.

Anything else is simply whining poor people who have no-one else to blame but themselves for having the arrant stupidity to be born into war-zones.

Ah Ms Art ...

I know that's how it looks ... and having had a passing connection with politicians in my working life I can assure you that yes that is indeed how some of them are ... just seething pots of craving and ambition.

But not all.

There are members of the Parliamentary Liberal Party and I suspect even the Nats who are most uncomfortable with the opportunist hate position adopted by Abbott, Morrison et al. Folks like Mal Wacher and even, depending on prevailing weather conditions, Malcolm Turnbull. I am absolutely sure that there are many in the Government party room who feel serious anguish over this issue but cannot see a way out.

Maybe this considered set of views from the Conversation panel will help. Let's hope so.

But in the end it is a Government decision and Gillard and the other decent folks in her Cabinet and leadership team will just have to kick a few heads and browbeat the more nervous nelly poll-watching knuckle scrapers to get them into line.

It will not be easy. Nothing worthwhile and important ever is. Rudd should have had the cahonas to fix this without discussion on Day One in 2007. Like Whitlam did with Vietnam. But Rudd just listened to DIAC boss Ian Metcalfe (Howard's favoured son) and kept ploughing on with the Howard's policies pretty much. Totally gutless.

Meanwhile Ms Art, spend a bit of time over the weekend sending a few of your local MPs a link to the Conversation article and tell them to read it... that it offers a solution.... if they have the cahonas for it. Never know one's luck.

Mr O

I thank you for your reply. And I agree that not all pollies are the spawn of satan.

However, while the Palmers, the Rineharts, the Bolts and Joneses are given all the latitude one could wish for, even praised for their selfish single minded pursuit of more, more, more, I will continue with the level of disgust to which I have become accustomed.

Here, I will let you in on a little secret (and this is one that is rarely uttered, even in sound-proof rooms late at night) I support economic immigration as well. I see poverty as equally damaging to people as war and other forms of persecution. But that confession was just between you and me. If anyone else gets wind of my opinion I will be persecuted to the point where I may feel that I have to flee for my life. (Look out New Zealand).

Ms Art,

Thank you for sharing you innermosts. I'm sure that by now the NZ border police are on high alert and have launched the tinny.

Now if you read my previous post carefully you'll see I made no such rash claim regarding Satan - and I'd be most cautious about the paternity of our politicians ... all of them I suspect are the Babies of Beelzebub but a few take after their mothers.

The comforting thing about your list of industrial strength uglies above is that none are in parliament, none are politicians, none will actually get a vote when it comes to the crunch.

On the downside we do not get to vote for our billionaires or frothing shock jocks ... would that we did ... I'd nominate myself (at least in the former category).

Many with a purported concern for the environment should be aware of strategy since mid 90s whereby anti immigration and racist lobbies have made concerted efforts to co opt parts of the environment movement in the US.

Then again many don't need to be duped, just provided with cherry picked research and plausible reasons....... see "Conserving Racism: The Greening of Hate from Home and Abroad http://www.coloursofresistance.org/361/conserving-racism-the-greening-of-hate-at-home-and-abroad/

The only problem with deterrence Justin is that to actually deter folks you have to be meaner and nastier than what they are trying to get away from. And that just isn't acceptable to me or anyone else with a shred of humanity in them.

As for your parents well there will always be some who can manage to slip in I guess - but it depends where they were coming from. Where did they come from Justin?

Peter, I am from Chinese background. One of my parents' friend from Viet Nam told the UN official that the police abused and arrested him when he burned paper money to offer the dead in public place before he tried to escape, and the UN accepted it.

We don't have to be nasty to people with deterrence policy, there are ways to do it without being nasty.

We have to acknowledge the truth is at the moment only those who come directly from Sri Lanka are people who are escaping from immediate danger, although many are found to be economic migrants also, and they admitted to it. Whereas people who are already in Malaysia and Indonesia are not under immediate threat and can be processed there without the need to get on boats to risk their lives to reach Australia.

But it is not as simple as one might think that if we provide offshore processing then it will sove the problem whter it is in Malaysia or Nauru. We are living in the digital age now. If people think we can use strategy 5 years ago or 20 years ago they are mistaken. Good luck to everyone on this.

Justin,
In case you haven't noticed there is a large waiting list for public housing in Australia. There are thousands of homeless sleeping in the outdoors each night.
Sydney has a major shortage of rental accommodation. Extra numbers will cause rents to soar as private renters compete with the Government.

Philip, your understanding of Sydney's rental issues is one-dimensional and appears based on the assumption that the problem is in social housing - which would be the market into which asylum seekers would most likely move. Sydney's rental market is multi-layered and complex with surpluses in some segments and stresses from high demand in others with further issues in the low to mid range market resulting from rental stress from those nthe workforce but unable to afford rental rates from investors.

However, none of thwt really matters since Sydney is one market and there are other areas in Australia who could use an influx. So no, not really an issue at all.

As for the NDIS, why do you think thwt would need to be on hold? The higher cost comes from holding people in confinement, not from getting them out into the community where they can start to contribute to the economy.

I will just repeat what I have already written in response to John Robert Davidson below. I also agree with his comments.

If we allow anyone in to live and work here while their claims are being assessed - and if the time to assess the claims starts to blow out - don't we run the risk of hundreds of thousands of people abusing the system simply to allow them to live and work in Australia for a time.

If you think I'm exaggerating - look at Germany - 600000 asylum seekers (and their policies aren't nearly as liberal as what is being proposed by the Greens).

To simply say that deterrence can't be done humanely is simplistic nonsense. And if we don't have deterrence we will end up with unsustainable numbers of asylum seekers.

In short - I still don't think the Greens policy is workable or sustainable.

I look forward to your response on my legitimate concerns.

13 million people cross our borders every year, 60,000 of them forget to go home because they like the weather.

They live and work in the community without anyone giving a toss.

Thousands of other asylum seekers fly here every year and live and work in the community without anyone noticing.

Precisely why would you want to waste $180,000 per person to jail innocent people when they could work and save everyone money and time.

Hundreds of thousands, give it a rest - that is the scare mongering nonsense of the politicians and has never had any basis in fact.

So the asylum seekers who fly here are not put in detention camps but the boat arrivals are? Is that true?

"scare mongering nonsense" - well just do a quick survey of some of the refugee camps in Pakistan and Iran to see how many would like to live in Australia. The numbers are huge - you know it. That is why we need an orderly system of determining who we take instead of simply rewarding those who have the resources to find their own way here.

Rewarding?? sticking them in jail is a reward ! oh yeah I see giving them food and accommodation is a reward from persecution and the refugee camps in asia. Reward indeed !

I was right there with you until:

"I want to see how and/or why the current policy initiate is failing us"

You can't see what is wrong with the current policy?

Try drownings at sea.
Endless detention with no hope.
The huge cost of maintaining off shore processing.
The hypocritical use made by both major parties of this issue to gain the votes of people who do not accept that Australia has any obligation towards disenfranchised people fleeing by any means possible for their lives.

The use of the word "processing".

And "solution".

I do however agree with the overuse of "should" - sets off alarm bells with me also.

As for "motherhood statements", maybe that's how you read the article. I saw practical suggestions as to what we could be doing instead of what we are doing about asylum seekers.

Dianna

I don't disagree with your view.

I too hold similar sentiments.

However, that is not the point.

I believe that if one is to propose a different policy model - or components thereof - one ought explain what it is that is wrong (even though that may be patently obvious) in order to explain why the proposal will help.

Motherhood statements and wish lists alone just don't cut it. As I tried to explain, they need to be argued.

Cheers

The expert panel's submission is excellent. The only problem is the negativity which comes with the comments. The problem will never be solved until those who are interested in solving the problem are more dominant than the nay-sayers.
Firstly: we must devise a system whereby the voters in elections also select the candidates for whom they wish to vote. The current system of having candidates selected by political parties is obviously untenable in regard to governance of this country and the necessary discussion that must be held on major issues. Flat negativity is not governance.
Secondly: This new forward-looking government would need to devise one or more large-scale infrastructure programmes in order to absorb the desired number of migrants seeking protection. We did it with the Snowy Scheme and could well do it again with a transference of water from North to South in a manner which would create huge amounts of hydro-electricity.
There are roads to be built, rail lines to construct, hospitals, schools and footpaths. It is only that we have such poorly assessed parliamentarians which prohibits us from actually governing this country to the benefit of all its peoples, current and future.
Thirdly: Allied to my second point, is the need to provide permanent accommodation to the seekers of protection. Not detention camps - they are not criminals or lowly animals. Villages permanently created to absorb they continuing flow of people as they come to Australia, are given work immediately (along with a wage), are assessed for citizenship, their children schooled along with professional help to the adults in learning the language of their new country. The major building in these villages would be the "Citizenship Centre" where each applicant's case is speedily assessed and the new citizen permitted to move to whichever part of Australia he/she desires - and their place is taken by a new protection-seeker so that the cycle becomes permanent.

There is no reason - logical or humanitarian or economic - why Australia should not be able to create a suitable environment for persons seeking protection from oppression. We have enough projects to employ them, we have space to house them, we have infrastructure to support them.

What we do not have are Governments which are composed of persons dedicated to governing.

So are you going to stand as a candidate? Or are you the type of person who is very good at simply telling other people what they should do?

Yeah - thanks for the massive guilt trip. But I don't think we created the Taliban or had much to do with the Sri Lankan situation.

"We have enough projects to employ them, we have space to house them, we have infrastructure to support them."
You do know there are about 4 million refugees in the world? Not to mention all of the non-genuine cases who might try and abuse the system to try and improve their lives. No - we can't take them all - there are simply too many.

There are 43 million refugees and displaced people in a world of 7 billion.

I reckon the rest of the world could cope with them if they wanted to and not even notice.

AS for us, we seem to think we can keep a cap on how many want our help and we are prepared to spend vast billions on keeping people out rather than helping them.

And wars have little to do with being refugees under the convention. Persecution is the key word.

Yep, Spain should take two million. Italy one million. Greece three million. Ireland 1 million. Portugal 1 million. After all their populations are reducing as their population is fleeing overseas seeking jobs.
You have such a wicked subtle sense of humour, Marilyn.

No, we didn't 'create' the Taliban. It was born from the Mujahideen, the freedom fighters of Afghanistan, towards the end of the Soviet occupation, as was Alquaida. It is however true that the US military and the CIA were heavilly involved in backing, training and supplying the Mujahideen as part of the US's cold war strategy. I cannot speculate about the depths or longevity of the US involvement in both groups as this was never public information.

In many ways we are now a state of the USA, or at best a client state, so their acts are ours as well?

The SriLankan situation is not nice and although we had no direct involvement, we did spend many years (and still do, I think) supporting a government there that marginalises a large sector of the population based on ethnicity and prejudice. Our hands have never been clean.

Marilyn, I note that you can give a history of The Taliban without mentioning Pakistan, ISI, and Pashtun and madrassas and fundamentalism and public execution of women.

Yes, Pakistan was a base for the Mujahideen and they got established and recruited there, as did the Taliban.
Peshawar, on the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan was the first place the Mujahideen resourced their weapons, which were made to order by the gunsmiths of the bazaar. Initially this was traditional long barelled rifles for long-distance sniping but it moved toward production of copies of the old 303 rifle and some Kalashnikov copies. The gunsmiths of Peshawar Bazaar were/are ingenious craftsmen who could make a working copy of any gun they had seen and pulled apart, using traditional metal working skills, with no electricity or modern tooling. It was also considered to be one of the most remote places in the World, a true lawless frontier.

It took the USA some time to establish weapons supplies for the Mujahideen and get trainers into place. As far as I know, at that time the government of Pakistan had the role of host for the Mujahideen and the mountainous region we are talking about was not a region that they really controlled anyway.

Yes, the Taliban in government did many bad things, like executing men, women and children, banning education in anything except scripture, destroying the giant buddhas of Bamiyan (and many other ancient relics) and ruling force and violence. In truth they never controlled the entire country of Afghanistan. That requires the agreement of the local populations and their warlords. They ruled with fundamentalist zeal, which didn't originate in Pakistan or Afghanistan but came out of the region we call "the Middle East" in the form of fighters come to join the Mujahideen in their fight for freedom. Osama bin Laden was a preacher of fundamentalist Islam and came from Saudi Arabia. He wasn't the only one. He and others would move from camp to camp of the Mujahideen, preaching and recruiting as they went. Hatred of the West and USA's imperialism was a core message. Islamic fundamentalism was seen as the antidote to western imperialism.
It all get's a bit crazy, because by now there were American advisors and trainers in those same camps and the USA was supplying advanced weapons systems that allowed the Taliban to go from a minor annoyance to the Soviets to a major problem that caused their withdrawal from Afghanistan and a major factor in the ultimate demise of the Soviet Union. Also, the bin Laden family was very rich from engineering the big oil projects of the Middle East (in partnership with international 'big oil') and many members of the family (including Osama) had travelled to the USA and beeen wined and dined at the highest levels. Some family members were living in the USA on 9/11 and the aircraft that flew them out and back to Saudi Arabia was one of very, very few flights allowed into the air on that day, after the attacks. That permission came from the White House. Crazy stuff, right?

Pashtun is just the largest ethnic group in the local population of Afghanistan. They have been hard put upon for hundreds of years, having very little say in who runs their country. The ISI, the Pakistan equivallent of the CIA probably had less presence and less affect in the region at the time than the CIA. At that time, border skirmishes with India were the major issue for the Pakistan military as open warfare erupted along the border in places like Kashmir. (This is a direct result of British imposed partition) The North-Western border was too isolated, too insignificant to feature much in Pakistani political goals at the time.

The USA has spent a lot of time and effort to demonise their Pakistan allies, either as justification for carrying out strikes in their country, revenge for closing the supply line through the Khyber Pass (after many US attacks in Pakistan), or for some future operation that has not been revealed yet.

Madrassas are primarilly Islamic religious schools which teach the Koran (or Qu'ran) by rote to young men, although the word (semitic in origin) literally translates as "school" and can be applied to any educational facility. "Unquestionably, there has been a rise in the number of religious schools in the Islamic world, and particularly of schools dominated by the more fundamentalist Deobandi, Wahhabi, and Salafi strains of Islam. Pakistan reported that between Independence in 1947 and 2001, the number of religiously based madrassas increased from 245 to 6,870.

The schools are often funded by Saudi Arabia. A few schools have produced militants, especially in Pakistan, where the government in the 1980s actively supported the formation of Islamic militias to fight in Kashmir and Afghanistan." - http://middleeast.about.com/od/glossary/g/me071202b.htm

ISI ? Client state?

I agree.

Also - if we allow anyone in to live and work here while their claims are being assessed - and if the time to assess the claims starts to blow out - don't we run the risk of hundreds of thousands of people abusing the system simply to allow them to live and work in Australia for a time.

If you think I'm exaggerating - look at Germany - 600000 asylum seekers.

To simply say that deterrence can't be done humanely is simplistic nonsense. And if we don't have deterrence we will end up with unsustainable numbers of asylum seekers.

"To atone for the crimes of the Third Reich, Article 16/2 of West Germany's Basic Law offers liberal asylum rights to those suffering political persecution."

Your example is rather flawed geographically (its would remain easier to get to Germany, even if we did open up), plus Germany is obligated as part of its atonement for WWII to accept such refugees where we can use their lessons to better create and apply the laws.

However you are correct on the point that you will get those abusing the system, only 5% of Asylum Seekers actually succeed in Germany.

Put another way, it's a mark of success that countries like Australia attract interest from asylum seekers, economic, political or otherwise?

However, like immigration etc., without a (relatively) healthy economy and future, many prospective entrants would not bother with Australia....Like in the USA where border crossings from Mexico have droppe not due to tough or (in)effective border security but USA's weakened economy.

Doesn't everybody in Australia, reputedly a comfortable first world nation, become tired of obsessing about refugees etc.? Then again refugees and border security are the next best thing for our "leaders" short of war......

From the outside it looks a bit xenophobic, insecure and uninformed with more important issues at hand, or is that the idea, keeps us distracted between shopping, footy, work and mortgages?

Libertarian Doug Stanhope from Mexican border in US has his own view on refugees, immigration etc. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW20EMJr6o4

Shorn,

Did you listen to that radio piece about the fates of repatriated asylum seekers? Or just not worth the effort.

Sure - an outbreak of world peace, tolerance and prosperity would be the most sensible outcome and would do a lot to stop the boats. Your suggestions in that regard are most welcome. What have got that can have it sorted by Xmas?

This is not about resolving the world's problems, wars and crises Shorn, it's about what to do to stop people drowning on leaky boats trying to get here from somewhere horrible. It is an immediate problem and it needs real answers now. Or at least by Xmas.

F.

I have already given it.
1. Set up partner agreements with the regions of major sources of refugees for the automatic return of boat arrivals. For Iran that would be an agreement with Pakistan, for Afghanistan that would be setting up a secure facility within Afghanistan, for Sri Lanka that would be India. In exchange offer development aid (where appropriate), educational scholarships for the host country's nationals and a promise to take a quota of UNHCR process refugees well in excess of any we returned there.

2. Allow these returned refugees to apply through the UNHCR and/or offer assistance packages to reestablish themselves in their country of origin.

3. Increase our intake of refugees with preference given to UNHCR processed and those processed closest to countries of origin.

4. A bridging measure that allows those already in Malaysia or Indonesia to register immediately with an Australian consulate or UNHCR office before the date of the commencement of the Sean Lamb Solution to also be favorably considered.

So you are talking about setting up a network of "secure facilities" all over the place, sending boat arrivals back there to poor places closer to home, form an orderly line and then paying the host nations for running these prison camps by building them schools or selling them cheap wheat and powdered milk.

See that's the problem Shorn, that would cost an absolute packet and would not stop anyone I'm afraid. Save for sending boat arrivals back that is pretty much what happens now.

You also seem to be making an implicit assertion that "going back home" is an option for these folks... that they are "economic migrants" rather than genuine refugees and would return to Afghanistan or Sri Lanka or Iran if we bought them a new colour telly.

I'm also hoping that you'd be a volunteer when it comes to taking people back to where they came from.

More work and reading required. D

Yes I am saying going back home is an option. Sri Lanka, although it may have escaped your attention, is full of Sri Lankans. The country is world renown for being an excellent place to find Sri Lankans. It follows, therefore, that Sri Lankans are able to live in Sri Lanka. Similarly with Afghanistan, it is jam packed with Afghanis, you can hardly walk down a street without tripping over one.

Running facilities in Pakistan and Afghanistan would be hell of a lot cheaper than running them in Australia. Besides people are unlikely to spend thousands on air tickets and boat berths if the only outcome is a flight back to a camp outside Quetta. There are much cheaper ways to get to Quetta.

Shorn,

I can see that your superior grasp of this global issue is not going to be contaminated by facts or research, or even listening to radio reports when they are spoon-fed to you.

We are not getting Sri Lankans - we are getting Tamils. They just lost a civil war over there. They are getting a hard time - as they have done for decades.

We are not getting Afghans either - we are getting in the main Hazaras - a group with asian ancestry that the Taliban doesn't like in a major way. We are also getting folks who foolishly believed we were there to help, would stay and protect them in a new democratic state. Now the Taliban are coming back - scores will be settled. What would you be doing?

What a great shame it is that Australian academia has failed to take up your offer of assistance to lift them out of this mire of understanding and fact.

I note you have devoted yourself to professional mockery. Now mocking requires by definition some assumption of a superior knowledge or viewpoint. Can't see any evidence of that whatsoever Shorn (that's mockery). So no, not mockery, let's call it fact-free stupidity, arrogance and indifference.

Actually we are getting Sri Lankans. Sri Lanka is the name of a country, citizens of that country are called Sri Lankans. Sri Lanka, derived from Sanskrit, means approximately "venerable island". The venerable islanders are made of two main ethnicities, Tamil and Sinhalese. There are approximately 3 million Tamils in Sri Lanka. Unless you are proposing to resettle the lot. The solution to the civil war is not, in my view, to depopulate the entire Northern provinces.

Similarly with Afghanistan, there is no ethnicity called Afghani, it refers to citizens of Afghanistan which include Hazaras. There is around 3 million Hazaras in Afghanistan, we are not going to depopulate Afghanistan of Hazaras either.
If there is a genuine problem with security in either case we need a solution that provides protection to the entire group and not the handful that can afford air tickets to Indonesia.

It is hard to call oneself a mocker when people so continuously offer up material to me

So based on that definition - everyone is a citizen of where they were born and they just jolly well have to put up with it. That about right?

There are no real refugees. This whole UNHCR camps business is just a do-gooder, liberal wail. If people are having their kids killed, being murdered or being denied work then that's just stiff for them innit?

Those Turks should be shooting those Syrian whiners off back home where they belong. They're Syrians aren't they?

Don't pretend to care about anything or anyone other than yourself Shorn - and that is who you really mock.

Seriously, I reckon we should start sending folks like you home myself - a failure to adapt to Australian social norms and values.... spawn of John Howard.

The "Sean Lamb Solution" LOL

Looks a bit like the Malaysia solution. Basically it means that people who make their own way to Australia are returned to camps where they will be safe from persecution - so it is NOT inhumane. It is NOT refoulement.

It then means that we take the neediest refugees in order to maximise the humanitarian effectiveness of our program. Instead of just taking the ones who can make their own way here.

It will reduce the incentive for people to find their own way here - thus reducing deaths at sea.

It is workable, humane deterrence.

But refugees assessed by the UNHCR in other countries have zero right to come here.

What is wrong with you? The convention covers the right to asylum, it says nothing at all about the voluntary resettlement scheme we use to keep people out.

http://www.judimoylan.com.au/LatestNews/Speeches/tabid/71/ArticleType/ArticleView/ArticleID/859/Default.aspx

In regard to this specific motion, I appreciate and share many of the concerns outlined by my colleague the member for Cook in bringing this motion to this place. In particular, I share the concern about the many women who daily face life-threatening situations in refugee camps. Of the 10.4 million refugees currently in the world, according to the UN, Australia’s generous resettlement program will take less than 0.0001 per cent per annum. This is the number that will find their way to our shores each year, and it would therefore be reasonable to craft policy in proportion to the dimension of the challenge faced in Australia—not to ramp it up with political rhetoric.
The real deficiency, though, of the current system is that in 1996, by a deliberate decision of the government, the number of onshore protection visas and the number of visas available under the Special Humanitarian Program were linked, so there is now a shortfall of places for special humanitarian visas. However, this motion intimates that somehow onshore applicants are less entitled to and less worthy of permanent protection than offshore applicants. It seeks to allot 3,750 visas to onshore applicants, or 787 fewer visas than the number granted to onshore applicants in 2009-10. This presupposes that asylum seekers would again be held in indefinite detention, or that temporary protection visas would be reinstated.
This would create the situation which in the past prolonged the pain and prevented the resettlement of asylum seekers. Apart from the obvious human trauma this policy engendered, it was administratively demanding and costly. The logical solution would be to delink the two programs and to allocate specific numbers for each of those programs. The fact is that once an asylum seeker reaches our shores we have a legal, social and moral obligation to assess the claim and then provide asylum. This obligation must be separated from our++++++++ voluntary+++++++++++ commitment to offshore resettlement programs.""

We don't get to ignore an obligation for a non-obligation.

We are actively paying for so-called queue jumping and that is the fact of the matter.

Marilyn,
Congratulations on putting so many disconnected non sequiturs.
Incidentally Judy Moylan was talking about women refugees.
You on the other hand seem to be obsessed with much younger single men who arrive in designer clothes, and bling and laptops.
I suppose we all have our fantasies.

But we have zero right to send anyone to Quetta, many have already fled from Quetta because they are being subjected to ethnic cleansing.

I find it amazing that Shorn thinks we own the world and that we can do what we like with human beings and that we can dump them in any country we feel like.

What if Pakistan decides to dump 3 million Afghans here? What will you say then Shorn.

Oh I see so you'll accept temporary asylum when Syrians are fleeing a war but not when Hazaras are fleeing the Taliban or the Tamils are fleeing the Singhalese death squads.

Shorn you are all over the place on this stuff mate.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your brilliance. Based on your earlier comments - there are no true asylum seekers - they are and they must remain citizens of the place they were born. Sri Lankans, Afghans, Sudanese the lot. (Except for Syrians who can get to Turkey) (For a bit, till everything returns to normal when they should be sent back) Or did I misunderstand?

The poor Tamils - the Tamils who are relocating to continue a war from a foreign base.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104391493

http://www.lankaweb.com/news/items/2011/08/16/the-alleged-mass-scale-identiy-fraud-in-australia-by-organised-tamil-gangs-%E2%80%93australia-must-ban-the-tamil-tigers-and-their-affliated-organisations-at-least-now-quite-belatedly/
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/half-of-sri-lankan-arrivals-have-ties-to-tigers/story-e6frg6nf-1225891388934
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/9907483

A story from 2009, before the end of the civil war, a story from a source so biased I am surprised even you would bother, a story in the Australian quoting almost solely from a member of right-libertarian think-tank CIS and an entirely unrelated story from the Nethlands.

Full of win eh?

Yeah - that is a pretty despicable comment Phillip. I am sure an IT teacher is a pretty big authority on what is courageous in the face of persecution.

It's always wonderful to see people reveal the true extent of their belief in freedom of speech and openness to others' ideas.
Would you like to be nominated for a Nobel Peace prize for your contribution to the intellectual life of humanity, Peter?

Speech? Ideas? I see none of this here Mr Dowling ...

Snorts, grunts, snarls, bigoted hatred and venom.

And you expect people to tolerate your "thoughts" and "words" - while you tolerate nothing and no one with whom you disagree.

No tolerance for bigots and haters from me Mr Dowling.

You are consistent as you share the 'expert pannel' view Peter Ormonde that: .."this place was built on refugees and migrants. And the refugees are tops when it comes to grasping whatever opportunity is on offer with both hands."

But also claim to understand the "hole" those who are "already aboard" have "dug" for themselves ..for "US".

Before lecturing us all on morality and good sense, recognise 'the Australia as cookie jar' paradigm is smashed. Face the reality your advocacy is equivalent to that of Campbell Newman, now seeking to pile 'still more bush on the barbie' ..or that of the Marius Kloppers who views large holes as a "growth" that enhances.

(Bauxite mining and expanded pastoralism on Cape York. Rare earths under the Greenland icecap. There is as yet no end to this idiocy. And it is through projects such as these that Your Australia continues to project the illusion of economic good health. The "affluence" ..that is the magnet ..for new arrival.)

And you are saying this from the arid rangelands where magically you have learned to live "sustainably" John?

You know how we live is unsustainable. You know how you live is unsustainable. And for this fig-leaf of "our need to remain sustainable" or "if we are ever to achieve a sustainable carrying capacity" you would be turning away men women and children fleeing god knows what.

Just excellent. I hope you'll volunteer for the job of actually hauling them back where they came from John. Easy to say. Not so simple to actually do... requires a cold dead heart indeed that.

Actually I suspect that these refugees - coming from the places they do - might actually be able to teach us a few things about "living more sustainably" - or at least causing less damage. If we have the smarts to listen.

But for some - not for all - there is no listening. Nothing to be heard but the silken words of self-interest and the soft caress of harsh judgement on others.

You know how we live is unsustainable Peter Ormonde
As a farmer, you know the arid and semi-arid northern cattle industry is both unsustainable and unprofitable (at contemporary "valuations") - provided YOU read YOUR MLA.literature (as example - the July 2010 Terry McCosker et al northern cattle industry economic analysis.
Yet YOU seek still to heap coal upon the inferno?

As for me? I am about to take a lunch break - after a morning of hand irrigating collapsed river channel bank vegetation re-plant & this afternoon will be removing exotic tamarisk weed that threatens to block the said channel with sand accumulation; thereby prompting an aggravation to the erosion that has now for some time degraded the soil resource of the nearby floodplain.
Small, even tokenistic activities that are indeed destined to fail if the "other" of the mainstream persists in follow your example of denial. It is past time for YOU to wake up!

John grazing arid and semi arid country has always been unsustainable... not always unprofitable however. Arguably the less sustainable it is the more profitable it becomes.

My point is John that even living out there - in a house, with a roof and electricity and a diesel ute is unsustainable... no matter how much worthy work undoing the damage of previous profit extraction you immerse yourself in. You bring stuff in, you ship stuff out...You might try and minimise the damage, even try and fix some of the erosion problems - but please don't pretend any amount of good work will transform your lifestyle into anything resembling sustainable. It is essentially an oxymoron this sustainable level of exploitation and comfort.

Meanwhile the grass growers around me are having the best year they've struck for over 20 years.. new utes, hay stacked like the Great Wall of China, paddocks bursting at the seams with horrid black angus whingers...

A few hundred thousands more will make no difference to our "sustainability" John - provided they have more sense than to live in red dirt country. 30,000kms of razor wire is a long way from sustainable too.

So when the oceans become toxic, the low lands flood anbd the weahter gets more unstable and catastrophic, how will you keep these newcomers out John? When the Nauru option is no longer big enough do we try a New Zealand solution, the antarctic approach?

"..grazing arid and semi arid country has always been unsustainable... not always unprofitable however."

Easy to make a "profit" Peter: when you don't pay wages.

You and I know this discussion has never been about "a few hundred thousand". Instead the senario is those hundreds of millions ..indeed those thousands of millions that will doubtless seek any boat in the storms that lie ahead ..and the imperative that this nation and all nations begin to plan resolutely ..for the long term.

Mr Stretch,

I have no idea what you are talking about to be honest ... but I think talking around might be the more accurate description.

Try and explain what you mean.

No Mr Stretch, sending me off to a Time interactive graphic on climate change isn't much of an eye opener ... know that stuff full well.

What I'm curious about is this business about "nations planning for the long term" and what you have in mind.

The way it reads at the moment is that you think somehow we can keep the masses of people who will be displaced by climate change out of Australia. That right?

How?

And all this so you can live a comfortable life in arid rangelands pretending to be sustainable.

I'm getting these visions of a crackpot in a grey uniform wandering about in the spinifex giving curious stiff arm salutes to mirages. Tell me I'm wrong.

That's right, Mr Phillip.

Both men and women appear to be frightened of shadows regarding the plight of refugees.

Thanks Ms Art. I dont know if 'shadows' is the correct word. People may not be so concerned if they were told how many refugees Australia could accommodate and how much that would cost. An earlier discussion bandied about increases in Australia's intake of between 20000 and 170000. Such figures are pretty pointless because of their range and the resultant inability to predict the impact of such influxes on our country.
I don't know whether or nor Marilyn favours an open border policy, but I gather that she leans towards that view. If I am mistaken, Marilyn, please correct me. She seems terribly informed about the minutae of the law but, being an average punter, I struggle to keep up and interpret what she's trying to say. I do object, however, to her sexist rants.

Yes - she is a little hard to get a handle on.
I think her position is that Australia is bound by the refugee convention and she thinks what is being proposed by the major parties is in breach of the convention. That we are legally bound to deal with the ones that come here and there is nothing we can do about it.

I don't know much about the specific detail of the Malaysia solution legislation and how it plans to get around the recent High Court decision - maybe she can inform us.

Ta Gary. It still baffles me (I'm a bit simple I guess.) that, as a sovereign nation, we can't decide on, or amend, our own laws. I hoped that we were able to elect a government and have them represent us - oh my goodness that even sounds childishly naive and funny to me. Cheers :)

One of the interesting things about asylum seekers - at least on the recent historical evidence is how quickly they settle into the place and start making a positive cultural, economic and often culinary contribution.

I haven't got the energy now to go looking them up - I am frankly too disgusted by some of the contributions from Mr Dowling to have much enthusiasm.

But I shall perk up by tomorrow and find you the numbers regarding the speed at which asylum seekers hit the ground running - you'll be surprised. I was.

No drain on the economy whatsoever actually - from memory they actually contribute to GDP to the tune of $400 per head within the first year. I'll track it down tomorrow - but don't forget this place was built on refugees and migrants. And the refugees are tops when it comes to grasping whatever opportunity is on offer with both hands.

And Peter that is exactly the point I am making. If you can do a napkin calculation in 24 hours why can't these so called experts have done the same?
I lived in San Francisco for ten years. An American State that is built on immigrant labour (largely illegal) and they have made CA the great place it is.
(putting aside the complexities that the GFC had on the current unemployment figures)... But first hand I was able to employ immigrant labor albeit at the lowest rate but I like to think I helped make a difference.
What I see as the biggest barrier to entry for asylum seekers is Australia's hourly wage rate. If that rate was more flexible Australia could quadruple the number of immigrants in a heartbeat! ... And those are the issues I was hoping that this panel would address.

Meagan,

Here's a bit of gear on migration and the effects on the economy from the Productivity Commission. The report itself has some useful information, the press release on the other hand is the product of spin from Peter Costello's office and bear little relationship to the actual report since it concentrates exclusively on skilled migration. The actual report itself is far broader in scope and less a reflection of the self interest of employers.

http://www.pc.gov.au/projects/study/migration-population/docs/finalreport

Here's another from UNSW that has a decent discussion of the economic impact of refugees - and highlights the gaps in our knowledge - but it highlights the fact that there is scant evidence that asylum seekers place any drain on the economy whatsoever. The good bit is about half way through.

http://www.crr.unsw.edu.au/media/File/Refugees_and_Economic_Contributions.pdf

And here's one taking a longer term historical perspective ... particulary interesting are the higher rates of entrepreneurial success from refugees - their small businesses tend to survive at a higher rate than the locals... the restaurant effect I reckon. http://www.refugeecouncil.org.au/docs/resources/Contributions_of_refugees.pdf

The critical factors in determining the success of newly arrived refugees (and migrants generally) are firstly the overall economic conditions prevailing at the time, the locations in which new arrivals are settled, and the skills they are able to obtain - most particularly English but also building on any established skills or experience held.

By and large though I'd reckon it would be a safe bet to assume that people who make a choice to come here - people with some get up and go - make excellent Australians, lacking the whining sense of entitlement that seems to characterise those who would rather they went somewhere else or went back home.

For once the Yanks got it right:

"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free;
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless,
Tempest-tossed to me
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Not a bad way to build a country at all apparently.

Nothing at all about give me your doctors, engineers and dentists. Some good cooks would be nice though.

I totally agree with the idea that the people who do something about their situation and get on a boat are by and large the people Australia needs rather than those who stay in the camps waiting for someone to do something for them. those without the wherewithal $$ to help themselves excepted.

I have thought for a long time that it would totally smash the "people smugglers model" if Australia encouraged those with the dollars to spend on a boat journey to pay for an air fare.
There is precedence for this in Australian history as my father was apparently the first disabled (blind) 10 pound pom to be allowed in. The rational being he had substantial funds and two healthy teenagers who would contribute to the workforce.

For what its worth Clive Palmer is an advocate of flying prospective boat people in.

Hi Bob ... I agree with Clive Palmer about this (but very little else). It makes economic sense to fly QANTAS into a metro airport with $10K (one year's dole payment) in your pocket to stable & forage for 12 months among previous refugee communities than risk death at sea.

However, the present xenophobic paranoia is being played by the Abbott faction of the Liberal Party to distract voters from their lack of any policies.

Anglophile Aussies appear to have Asian xenophobia flowing in their veins except when Chinese visas are overstayed without media comment.

C'mon Jack - "Anglophile Aussies appear to have Asian xenophobia flowing in their veins except when Chinese visas are overstayed without media comment." Doesn't this sentence make its own argument against the response being due to some form of Asian xenophobia? Isn't the issue more about fear of change and fear of unknown impacts rather than racism/xenophobia?

Why are modest numbers of refugees such a dynamite issue in Australia?

I would tend to agree with "Anglophile Aussies appear to have Asian xenophobia flowing in their veins...." (with too many yearning for a return to "White Australia")

If they didn't it would be highly unlikely that our media and politicians would focus upon the issue to point of overkill.....

Much of the anti refugee debate, political strategy, language, conflating with perceived environment and population issues, fairness, values, taxes etc. are straight out of the US nativist, anti immigration and /or racist movements' instruction book.....helped along by media (although ironically the GOP are in knots as those looking to the future realise they are attacking their own future constituency i.e. Latinos).

As an American/Oz journalist friend said, John Howard was a very smart political operator understanding (or the audacity) to know race had resonance with many in Australia and using directly in campaigns (1980/90s) then more nuanced or socially acceptable refugee etc. debates to transcend political boundaries, because we are not racist......

However, white middle class Australians can feel good about themselves and be "comfortable" as the racist politicians are appealing to "Bogans" in marginal electorates, not educated middle class who actually work in the media and inform Australians.....

When Australian leaders, politicians, demographers and media offer a smorgasboard of excuses and proxy issues, it unfortunately makes Australians look like a bunch of paranoid losers..... while in (generally developing) countries with serious refugee numbers it barely rates a mention in media?

The subject of protection-seekers attempting to access Australia as a 'country of destination' seems to default to a question of citizenship being granted to them. Is it possible to offer 'protection' on a long or short term basis without waiting for citizenship to be granted? I know we have temporary visas, but these do not allow the recipient to work or earn money or go to school or buy a house. Could not 'protection' be better defined so that those who are stateless remain stateless until such time as they apply for citizenship. They would, of course, be ineligible to vote in our elections and they may not be permitted to take out loans, but otherwise....?
Is there another view or definition applicable to 'asylum seekers' which would at the very least be humanitarian?