Andrew,

I didn't say you said anything wrong! I said you had bias in your article and it favoured Rudds position by emphasis and blame on the former Liberal government and the current Liberal opposition.

Here is something else I masked I said.

'Care to relate the current position and detail past actions of India, Burma, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore.'

Where did I ask you to relate current conditions in Indonesia?

But overall all your articles point out is that Australia has always had a more humane treatment regime of asylum seekers. And that would be the drawing factor, note not push factor, that ensures asylum seekers target to Australia rather than other countries in our region. And that totally contradicts Rudd's inconsistant approaches and re-inforces the effectiveness of Howards solution ?

Do you seriously think Rudd's government can bring enough presure to bear on these regimes to change their approach. They have been made to look silly in Indonesia by a provincial governor.

Now what about India and Singapore?

Try googling Immigration humanitarian India. Guess where you finish up?

DIMIA Australia.

You seem to have not read my post, misunderstood my point, set up a straw man argument or answered like a prospective politician seeking labor pre-selection.

keith, geoffrey, horus: perhaps your obsession with trying to put this into some Labor vs Liberal combat explains your inability to actually look at the issue on its own merits. But as someone who's never been in either party, I'm not in the least interested. I'm interested in looking at the pros and cons of different approaches & assessing what's most likely to work best over time.

Keith says I didn't saying anything that was wrong, but it's still biased. So to be unbiased, I'm supposed to write stuff that is false like you guys?

Horus thinks it was wrong for me to go inspect the conditions which refugees were being kept in on Nauru for up to five years at the expense of Australian taxpayers. If you're keen on value for money, you should appreciate someone going there to see how it was spent & try to stop further spending by getting the refugees out of there - as eventually happened. Its far cheaper for the public to get refugees out of detention, than it is to keep paying their "upkeep". If you folks had had your way, we'd still be paying millions for their detention - much more than the cost of a few plane trips.

& apparently the 'children overboard' lie was "milked by refugee advocates" for "more than it was worth"? I could has sworn it was very heavily "milked" by Mr Howard & some senior Ministers right before an election. But you seem to think "milking an issue" involves holding politicians to account when they wrongly smear people and mislead the public.

Rudd "has been made to look silly by a provincial Indonesian governor" because he was stupid enough to grandstand & turn a rescue at sea into an example of him being "tough". The same with the other boat, which could have been stopped as so many others have been, without needing the "I told the Indonesian President to stop it" grandstanding. Rudd turned them into political issues because he thought he'd score points & its blown up in his face.

I'm sorry you have so little faith in Australia & our governments Keith. I actually think we do have the capacity to improve the way asylum seekers are handled in Indonesia, especially now there is more scrutiny. The Howard government (in conjunction with the UNHCR) made some advances in this area & the pressure is now on the current government to go much further.

It’ll take many years, but the only realistic long-term solution to people seeking asylum in our region is through a cooperative regional approach.

The other big (& much harder) task is to reduce the amount of persecution perpetrated by countries in our region - Burma being by far the worst, along with Sri Lanka at present, but there’s also many dangers for asylum seekers in Malaysia & Thailand.

Finally, I’m astonished anyone would need convincing of the travesties inflicted on Cornelia Rau at both Qld & federal government level, but here's excerpts from the Palmer Report. (Mick Palmer served for 35 in the NT & Federal Police – unlikely to be part of some ‘left wing’ conspiracy to discredit the Coalition, especially as they appointed him)

“There is a serious cultural problem within DIMIA’s immigration compliance and detention areas: urgent reform is necessary.”

“Ms Rau was detained in Brisbane Women’s prison for six months…... because of a failure in DIMIA processes. She was not a prisoner, had done nothing wrong & was put there for administrative convenience.”

Her “mental health assessment at the PA Hospital Brisbane was inadequate” - “the mental health care delivered while she was at Baxter was inadequate”

“there are serious problems with the handling of immigration detention cases – they stem from deep seated cultural & attitudinal problems within DIMIA & a failure of executive leadership."

Minister Vanstone stated the case involved “pre-existing mental health conditions”

Finally, Liberal frontbencher George Brandis in the Senate – 10/8/2005:
“The core fact of this case is that in the administrative processes of the department of immigration two very grave errors were made, which had terrible consequences for two particular people: Ms Rau and Ms Solon.

AndrewBartlett: "keith, geoffrey, horus: perhaps your obsession with trying to put this into some Labor vs Liberal combat explains your inability to actually look at the issue on its own merits."

I think it is a tribal thing. They say the first thing that pops into their head that proves their tribal credentials. The facts, balanced reasoning and good outcomes are all sacrificed on the alter of tribal politics. Discussing something with them is like banging your head into a brick wall. It seems like the same brick wall you hit in a religious discussion as the tone of the debate is no different. I have largely given it up as a waste of time.

You efforts here show why it isn't always a waste of time. It has been singularly the most informative and persuasive discussions I have seen on the topic. Thank you again.

I guess I should also thank keith, geoffrey, horus for providing the wonderfully intransigent brick wall you bounced off.

Andrew,
Re---“your obsession with trying to put this into some Labor vs Liberal combat”
This issue is too important to be masked by traditional lib/lab/class rivalries.

Re ---“Its far cheaper for the public to get refugees out of detention”
If (short-term) -cheapness- was the determiner . Then why not also extend it to drug enforcement;
no border checks, no prosecutions – big savings in money and personnel!

Re---“But you seem to think ‘milking an issue’ involves holding politicians to account when they wrongly smear people.”
It is only a smear if it was i) false, & ii) there was a reputation to smear.
On balance of probabilities the charge is credible -- except technically, according to you, no one can testify they saw A throw B into the sea,
though B was found in the sea. For persons who’ve systematically lied, cheated, bribed and sabotaged, what reputation is there left to be smeared!
Refugee advocates showed their true colours by preferring to accept any half baked charge against OZ border personnel, just so long as it exonerated the asylum seekers – and not for the first or last time .

Re ---“ the only realistic long-term solution to people seeking asylum in our region is through a cooperative regional approach”
Balderdash! you clearly do NOT understand the nature of the problem.
There are millions trying to scheme , bribe & elbow their way into practically every affluent country.
It’s little to do with fear of persecution but lots to do with economic aspiration.
No amount of “ regional cooperation” to moderate persecution will eliminate refugeeism – persecution is just the pretext!
There are thousands of groups, even in the most liberal of states, who could claim a well founded fear of persecution.
And more pretexts’ are being manufactured weekly – goers for the future will be “climate refugees” & spouses escaping abusive partners.
The driver is opportunists seeking to trade-up to a better life style –and niche politicians seeking to profit politically from it.
The best move for OZ would be to scrap membership of the refugee convention altogether.

On old mate of mine used to reckon we're all boat people.
But then he (a Birpai) used to say the Bunya were illegal immigrants.
"They've only been here 40,000 years. My people been here 60,000".
Bloody immigrants.