At last we agree on something Jo. Well done Julia, absolute masterful negotiating skills on show here.

Now all you have to do Jo is agree that off shore processing with mandatory detention at Nauru, along with Temporary Protection Visas and an open and sincere approach to working with our neighbours in the region are likely to discourage people from putting themselves and their children in the hands of people smugglers and onto dangerously unseaworthy boats with incompetent masters and crews.

I think we'd also agree on upping the number of refugees allowed here annually. Four thousand from Malaysia is a good start... without any trading in people, and particularly kids, of course.

Well that was a waste of space Jo. No sense filling the net with what you reckon can't be done. If you want to go into print, at least try to give an answer of what can be done.

I for one think it's about time we told the legal eagles to pull their collective heads in. We don't need unelected judges, or academics second guessing the decisions of the government, who are at least some what answerable to the people.

Oh, & don't bother with one like nutter's, we're not interested in that rubbish. All to many of the people I know are struggling to get by themselves, & want our humanitarian efforts a bit closer to home. A 50% cut in numbers would be more suitable.

As if we could ever satisfy the desire, for access to our welfare system, of all the bludgers in the world. The current statistics on unemployment of "refugees" shows that most of them are quite happy with the life style provided by public housing, & a welfare cheque. They've never had it so good, while those paying for it all are loosing their houses

Time to get the boats stopped, what ever it takes.

I agree Hasbeen. And why the fuss about Malaysia? They are after all a 'Muslim' country and we all know the Muslims look after each other don't we? I mean they are such a moral lot that they don't go killing, raping, ripping off or otherwise causing grief to their Muslim neighbours. They save that for the infidel ...
Surely our ambitious boat people illegal immigrants will be very comfortable and safe there while their claims are properly investigated ...
That is all!

This is all very nicely argued, but like Gillard Labour’s justification of its ‘Malaysian’ solution, it misses the point. We don’t need the High Court to tell us that unaccompanied minor children arriving as asylum-seekers are better off in Australia. No doubt it’s also in the best interests of such children that they be re-united with their parents as soon as possible. Thus, legal logic tells us that the foolproof way for an asylum-seeker to obtain Australian citizenship is to buy passage for unaccompanied children on a dangerous voyage to Christmas Island, then get David Manne to apply for citizenship on behalf of their parents; it’s in nobody’s interest to permanently divide families. If the High Court finds against the government, the effects will transcend Labour’s Malaysian solution. Uyghurs, Tibetans, Afghans, Syrians and Somalians could organise to get their children to Australia, and the imperative for family unification would require that the parents be accepted as immigrants. Granted, we have a moral imperative to accept refugees in reasonable numbers. Six thousand in a year isn’t excessive, but once we’re perceived as a soft target, people-smugglers could easily traffick ten times that (as they do elsewhere in the world). Repatriating illegal arrivals whose claims fail is problematic at best, and usually impractical. Losing control of our borders isn’t a conservative bogeyman; it’s happened in the US, is happening in the EU. The Malaysian ‘solution’ was badly thought through, and it’s implementation has been pathetic. Yet history shows that, once people-smuggling is out of the picture, Australia is quite willing to accept refugees and asylum seekers in extraordinary numbers. A return to offshore refugee processing and TPV’s is the price we must pay for much higher numbers of legal immigrants. And we don’t need the High Court to tell us -- been there, done that. I say, let’s do it again.

As the refugees have no trouble living in Malaysia for extended periods before jumping the next boat to Indonesia, and then Australia; the claim that to make them stay in those other countries will in any way cause problems for them in any way but to impair their economic prospects is one I have difficulty taking seriously.
Especially considering they didn't even have to go as far as Malaysia to be out of danger.

But I'm for simply assessing asylum seekers here- but with far stricter migration criteria- and deporting people who fall short (including by being a little too religious, or a little to unlikely to integrate by Australian standards).