^^^^^
Thankfully the high court is putting a stop to this bizarre policy of shipping asylum seekers overseas and swapping them for others. We have to wonder at what legal advice the Gillard government takes when it decided upon this course of action. You also have to wonder about the policy ability of this government.
How long would the policy last when video is broadcast of women and children forced onto aeroplanes and then into Malaysian concentration camps?
This is a no win situation for the government. Its a win situation for the people working in the asylum processing industry. Its a total loss for the people who pay for these government F*ckups.
FFS, Mobydisc. Just one page back you were advocating an open door policy where refugees could just turn, up get a job and .............. well that was your policy
And then you get all misty eyed when the nasty government sends the refugees off to Malaysia to be housed in a "concentration camp" BUT, not one page ago your idea for dealing with refugees is to let them starve or "die in the desert" . yes....... well, no
"This is the "Lucky Country" people. If you're unfortunate **** off." Awesome evlpanda, that has to go onto a bumper sticker.
I am advocating the government to get out of an area like this. They can't handle it. Its wastes money. Despite what socialists may think, wealth does not appear out of thin air. It usually takes brains, persistence and hard work to get a bit of wealth. Then someone from the government comes along and takes it to piss it up the wall. When that isn't enough it borrows some more so the workers of the future can pay for it.
Its not just this area. Our governments seem to waste so much wealth in so many areas. We waste the wealth of our soldiers' lives in stupid Middle Eastern wars. We waste billions on policies that do nothing but harm to Aboriginal people. Subsidies are paid to businesses that should be forced to stand on their own two feet. An army of public servants is needed to run all this.
As time goes on, governments and the state becomes more invasive and intrusive. Their powers grow. Their need for revenue grow. Their need for power grows. The two party system gives the illusion of choice while both parties basically say the same thing.
A bit of history will show it wasn't always like this. Taxes were quite modest and mild up until quite recent times. Though the government has always played an important part in Australia life, especially in colonial times, as Australia becomes a more prosperous nation we really should consider whether we need large governments to rule over us, or whether we can be trusted to look after ourselves a bit more.
on xmas island about to be transported to Malaysia
Restarting this discussion as the words are coming back to roost.
As I wrote earlier, the ALP has no idea of what to do with boat people. The High Court have overwhelmingly rejected the idea to send boat people to Malaysia.
However for some reason we still are accepting all those asylum seekers from Malaysia. It looks like they got a good deal. Maybe we should be hiring Malaysian lawyers.
Its absolutely insane to ship people who have arrived here to some other country thousands of kilometers away to be processed. The only thing the ALP have going for it is the opposition have basically the same policy.
Having read this forum and the vast array of comments I couldnt help but join to put another view on this rather hot topic.
Why not let struggling country towns tender for the refugee's. If they want to stay in Australia they would have to agree to stay in towns for say a minimum 5 years.
Rebuilds population in towns, provides investment and income to town and I bet most would end up staying in towns once they had built support base.
I would love to hear what the original australian's say about some of the comments here given most of us descend from boat people !
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My Solution... (its cheap too)
Assume there are 2 possibly 3 boat launching centres - Main island Indo' possibly Sri-Lanka and one other.
Provide a no frills commonwealth run ferry service which is priced to undercut the boat providers.
To be able to get on you have to have the $, you have to have sufficient paperwork / identity information for a first cut but basic immigration check - like an airport.
At entry port (mainland) say Perth or Darwin or a labor intensive mining zone(!!) complete the processing (some can be done on the boat trip??) and provide visas with allowances for a level of social support (at the airport U need to prove the ability to support yourself) with conditions attached - but none the less the ability to move into society and earn. If the conditions are not met - i.e. 100% lack of effort to integrate, socialise, train / get employment then up for review.
Any remainder who take the boat smuggler route are then to be handled as hard cases so into detention. The zone of pick-up does not start until landfall on the main-land so Xmas island is out as an easy target.
A publicity campaign to co-inside with the two methods of boat arrival.
Given the current approach grants entry to over 90% of boat people, this would defuse a pathetic minority lead fear campaign (back-up by mindless elements in the Murdoch and the same cut of cloth right wing press).which has had a massive distorting and corrupting influence on our governments for too long.
The issue is for me is not one of a few thousand boat people but the level of overall immigration (100's of thousands) - our ability to assimilate this volume culturally, and our ability to keep up with the infra-structure needs this imposes.
Need to post a joke or funny pik' as penance for posting a rant!!
BFN
AP
Got to remember we take in fark all refugees, European countries are being flooded by them compared to the trickle we take.
If the government really wants to stop the boats get the navy to start sinking them out at sea, couple of times should deter anymore boats from coming, in saying that we need these immigrants because work is for immigrants
Disagree with you there Dinsdale. I used to live up in Coffs Harbour about 8 years ago. Many people from Sudan were settled there. After some time I saw quite a few of them working, doing jobs new migrants normally do coz Aussies are not interested in doing it, they would rather be on the dole. Jobs like cleaning.
The government should not employ people to lie or mislead people. The government should not force people to live where they don't want to live. Governments are the cause of these problems. Government policies lead to war, genocide, hatred and murder. This is the case in Sudan, North East African countries, Middle Eastern countries, all over the world.
If people were allowed to get on with their lives without someone in power telling what to do while taking their money away, perhaps we would have fewer refugees.
Ok, my idea- Australia should sell Christmas Island to the Indos!
Take a look on the map and calculate the distance from the Australian mainland to Christmas Island. Its close to Jakarta.... It's like 350km
To the Australian coastline its 10 times further!
Who wants to take a trip that far?
