In order to make Australia a sustainable country we must cap and then commence to reduce our ever increasing population.
Hence a balance must be struck between natural births, immigration and refugee intake.
Personally I would prefer adoptions and refugee intake to be the ones that increase. The other options decrease.

The author wants to cut through the confusion but then adds to it, by not distinguishing properly between boat people and refugees, and seeming to imply that it has something to do with refugee quotas. I have no objection to taking more refugees but I do object to taking more boat people, a subset of refugees.

Australia has a refugee quota and there is never any trouble with filling it. Of the boat people that get here the majority seem to get residency, but there is more than a suspicion that they deliberately destroy any documentation they might have and lie in order to meet the criteria. So they get onto the quota. Meanwhile those stuck in refugee camps without the money to pay people smugglers to get here can't get onto the quotas. It isn't fair and, as people die trying to get here, no-one but the greens now support encouraging boat people - a point the author should have made

Henry Lebovic: Learn, too, that it is not illegal to seek asylum, no matter how you travel to a place to seek it.

UNCHR. Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees.

Article 31:
1. The Contracting States shall not impose penalties, on account of their illegal entry or presence, on refugees who, COMING DIRECTLY FROM A TERRITORY WHERE THEIR LIFE OR FREEDOM WAS THREATENED IN THE SENSE OF ARTICLE 1, enter or are present in their territory without authorization, provided they present themselves without delay to the authorities and show good cause for their illegal entry or presence.

Meaning that crossing multiple boarders negates the Asylum Seeker claim. They then become Economic Refugees.

Also: Page 40. SCHEDULE. Paragraph 9. 1. The Contracting States undertake to issue transit visas to refugees who have obtained visas for a territory of final destination.
2. The issue of such visas may be refused on grounds which would justify refusal of a visa to any alien.

Note: No Visa issued to enter Australia from the Country the Refugee fled to originally.

Note UNCHR Handbook:

G. Asylum and the treatment of refugees
24. The Handbook does not deal with questions closely related to the determination of refugee status e.g. the granting of asylum to refugees or the legal treatment of refugees after they have been recognized as such.
25. Although there are references to asylum in the Final Act of the Conference of Plenipotentiaries as well as in the Preamble to the Convention, the granting of asylum is not dealt with in the 1951 Convention or the 1967 Protocol. The High Commissioner has always pleaded for a generous asylum policy in the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Declaration on Territorial Asylum, adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 10 December 1948 and on 14 December 1967 respectively.

HL: It turns out that a generation ago, we had another asylum seeker crisis in our region. Yet we managed to demonstrate genuine human compassion towards refugees while participating in an orderly process which helped resolved the crisis fairly quickly.

True. It turns out that these Asian Refugees were, in most part, coming DIRECTLY. They tried very hard to assimilate into Australian Culture. They did not demand that Australia change to suit their Culture & religion, as is happening with Middle Easterners.

HL: the current situation is not exactly the same as the one during Fraser's time. There are notable differences,

True, see above.

HL: Dunning and Kruger explained, you're too ignorant to know you are ignorant, you will tend to think you know all there is to know. Perhaps it's the fear of admitting that Australia has acted stupidly, arrogantly and callously for more than a decade.

I interpret this as suggesting that Most Australians, that don't agree with you, are ignorant fools. Typical of a bleeding heart, Greenie, Politically Correct Nutcase & you should be treated with the contempt you deserve.

This article, with some others seen recently, is one of the best bits of evidence of why we must shut down the humanities departments in our universities.

Henry shows no interest in the people of Oz, the ones paying for his so called education, or their well being, only in que jumping illegals. To him the opinion of 30 parliamentarians in Afghanistan has much more standing that of the people of Oz.

I guess there is no doubt of that when he quotes [if] "you're too ignorant to know you are ignorant, you will tend to think you know all there is to know. In which case, there is next to no chance you'll ever engage with this issue, let alone any other." Have you ever read anything more ignorant that that? Talk about pot, kettle & shades of black.

Surely we can be excused for suggesting he leave these ignorant shores forthwith, for somewhere more enlightened? As he appears to value Afghan opinion, a 6 month stint with the SAS in Afghanistan just might be a start to him gaining a real education.

I can't imagine why anyone would want to "engage with this arrogant twit, if you got too close you would drown in the bile.

This bloke has missed his calling, he should be giving the new subject, "hate Ozzies 101", he has all the attributes for it.

No Jay it does not. The fact is well known that to apply for true protection under the refugee convention one has to reach a signatory country and if they have to cross the world to do so that is perfectly legal and does not make people economic anything.

Why make that claim only for those from Afghanistan who reach Indonesia thinking they can make claims only to find out they are not allowed to but ignore the fact that more Chinese, Indians, Malaysians and people from Peru and Lebanon, JOrdan and Egpyt, Syria and other countries fly half way around the world as well without the same nonsense being spouted. The very fact that not one person ever has been denied protection because of their travel arrangements shows that you are talking nonsense.

Henry should have indeed stated that the resettlement program is voluntary and outside the provsions of the refugee convention. The only people we have an obligation to are those who arrive here and ask.

Just like hospital emergency rooms can't claim they won't treat those who arrive just because others might be sick somewhere else and they want the beds empty, we cannot deny the rights of asylum seekers just because of how they get here.

Stop cherry picking bits of the convention and then misusing them.

The fact in law is that everyone has the right to seek asylum from persecution without fear of being punished for not having papers.

It's not hard.