Leigh:
"The over stayers who at least arrive legally, have been found of suitable character to be issued with an Australian visa. If they don't go home after their visa has expired, then of course they should be detained, and then deported - which many of them are. But they are not always easy to find."

That's really funny - How can they be of "suitable" character if they've deliberately overstayed their visas, are living in the country illegally, and hiding from the deportation police?

How can they be of suitable character if they're taking under the counter payment for work, pay no taxes, and live on the run?

Compared with boat people who openly ask for asylum, who want to work and make a life in which they contribute to the country as fully as everyone else?

It seems to me that the refugee issue is whipped up by the media (for its own ends) and taken up by the pollies (for their own ends) - the general public are merely carried along for the ride.

"The increase in Australia’s population must be reduced and controlled," says Leigh.

Struth, Big Brother is here already. 1984 is just around the corner. There is one good benefit. When the boat people hear of this they'll head in the opposite direction to Australia.

Perhaps I'll join them! Having a caged rat put on my face doesn't appeal to me at all.

EXACTLY Poirot!

Judging by the comments here, it is obvious we have to stop the boats
one way or another.
What I find interesting is that there is a predominance of men in the boats.
Where are their women ? Have they left them behind ? Cowards ?
As someone said put them to military training and send them back to
the Afghan army.

Look at the situation from a people traffickers point of view.
You have a good business going here, how could we increase our income
and reduce the risk ?

Simple increase the turnover by buying larger ships. By doing that
we could turn up anywhere around the Australian or New Zealand coast.
Each ships carrying capacity increases to the cube of its length.
Therefore a ship three times the length could carry at least 10,000
illegal immigrants and could sail direct from Pakistan and save all
that hassle getting to Indonesia.

Why wouldn't they be thinking like that ? They did in Europe.

>>> Judging by the comments here, it is obvious we have to stop the boats one way or another.>>>

QUE? ? ?

Which comment did you read? Yabby's?

Of all people seeking asylum in Australia 90% arrive by plane and, as others have pointed overstay their visas and disappear into our cities.

10% arrive in leaking boats. Of that paltry 10%, 90% are found to be genuine refugees.

This means of the last 5000 people who arrived by boats 4,500 were found to be genuine, the others are sent back. This is not the case with people who arrive at our airports. We can't always locate them to process them. DUH!

Boat people do not have documents either because they had to flee for their lives, or have had their documents taken from them during their travels to safety. Indonesia does not treat refugees with the same level of humanity that Australia, in comparison, does. The reason more men are on the boats is because it is very risky and families will pool what money they have to get a family member to safety who can then apply for help for their families, far from cowardly, these men are very brave.

The arrival of boat people on our shores is not a crisis.