*But if they were not really needy why did they bother to come? Adjusting to life in Australia is not easy, it can be a lonely country without family, and jobs are hard to find.*

What a lot of tosh! I remind the author that tens of thousands
of Africans from Ghana, Nigeria and similar countries are taking
far larger risks to get to Europe, for one good reason - money.

Yes, life in the third world is tough, hundreds of millions would
love our cushy lifestyle, they are willing to risk life and limb
for that lifestyle.

Millions of Mexicans stream over the US border for the same thing,
money.

There is no way to ascertain whether these illegals are genuine refugees or economic migrants.

Note that the Government has never revealed to the public just how they make a decision.(that includes the previous Government) People with no documents can and do say anything to get themselves a cosy berth on the dole - if they never get a job, they will still be better off than they were where they came from.

Anyone who thinks that we are not allowing opportunist bludgers into the country with our non-existent border protection is a fool.

Gee Susan whats going on? Remember the Liberals lost the last election? We now have a Labour Government, remember!
Your shrill diatribe sounds just like the ABC who spend hours a day endlessly discussing the Liberal opposition rather than directing analysis on the Government of Australia.
Is this just another lefty, labour rant or do you have a point? If so you have to address it to the Government.
By the way do not take your views out into the outside world as you will really get upset.

Australia had an effective policy when the current opposition were in government.

The reasonably disciplined line of offshore detention centres did what it was intended to do – protect Australia’s security from attempted illegal landings, intended to circumvent Australia’s legal migration laws.

It is the ambivalence of the incumbent government swill which has presented the sense of opportunism to those who pretend to be refugees and embark on perilous journeys, in inadequate craft supplied by people smugglers, risking their own lives and those of Australian defense personnel.

The sooner the vacillating whimps who parade as the current federal government restate the policies of the previous coalition government, the sooner we will see the demise of this obscene traffic

John Howard and his policies were thrown out in the last election and most of the community has moved on from the name calling. The dinosaurs on this forum should move on too. Can anyone really defend the ridiculous comments the Opposition has been making? Or are you defending your own prejudice. Go and meet a refugee who has come by boat, imagine yourself in that situation and then check how you feel. Maybe nothing, but it's worth a try.

"Australia is not being 'flooded' with asylum seekers from the north and the numbers are still nowhere near the thousands who arrived by boat under the Coalition’s watch"

The key word being 'still'!

The absurd dilution of border-protection policy by Rudd has seen a considerable increase in the number of arrivals, which is apparently expected to increase considerably further.

The reason for this is predominantly the weakening of the policy, NOT the push factors!

What about our offshore refugee efforts Susan?

They don't rate a mention in you article. What about advocating that Australia put a whole lot more effort into helping the most needy refugees come to this country, and into addressing the causal factors of refugeeism....and into STOPPING the currently small but potentially large ad-hoc movement of asylum seekers / less needy refugees / illegal economic migrants or would-be migrants!

This policy of facilitating a small trickle of boat people coming to our northern shores, and treating them in a manner that will lead to a large increase in the number of arrivals, is just crackers.

CLEARLY, the best thing to do is to close it down and divert our energies and monies to where it is really needed and where it will be a whole lot more efficiently spent.

We should be doubling our refugee intake and increasing our international aid expenditure to at least 0.7% of GDP. This is the sort of thing that really counts.