Bronwyn’s fantasy :

“All asylum-seekers who end up in Australian waters should be brought to the mainland …After that initial period, they should be released into the community to await the decision on their application for asylum…Experience elsewhere indicates little or no risk of absconding”

The reality :

The department says in the five years to June this year there were 13,739 people liable for detention and expulsion hiding in the community…Most of them are people who have been out in the community on various substantive or bridging visas and have gone into hiding when their protection visa claims failed," she said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200212/s747159.htm

“In Britain, France and the United States, 90 per cent of those who are rejected for asylum status go underground. Britain alone has "lost" more than 200,000 people who were rejected for asylum status.”
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/10/06/1033538845706.html

Recently, my oldest daughter had a party with friends and co workers (she works part time as a checkout chick, while she studies). I was confronted with the almost unanimous opinion that we needed stronger laws to protect us from the thousands of boat people invading our shores, and threatening the fabric of our society.
When I asked how many knew the number of legal immigrants to our country every year, no one knew; and all were amazed to learn we expected (at that time) around 300, 000. They were also surprised to find out in comparison, we took in about 13,000 refugees.
When I suggested that “as a nation we apparently quite liked immigrants, provided they were rich or had skills; it was only the poor or needy ones we didn't like”, they were strangely silent.
In a world where the greatest threat to Humanity is quite clearly Humanity itself, paying people to have babies is fatally absurd. We could -and should- triple our refugee intake and halve our immigrant intake, and then have some right to claim we are the 'land of the fair go'.
In a community, country or world with strictly finite resources, suggesting the road to wealth is encouraging more people to share the one pie is manifestly stupid.

"The deaths I'm talking about in the implementation of any 'Stop-the-boats' policy are threefold:"

So Bronwyn, the number of deaths would be greater if there was a tight border-protection policy in place, compared to the loose policy we now have, would it?

Obviously if it was known around the world that this sort of entry strategy into Australia was just not on, to the point that neither potential asylum seekers nor people-smugglers would see any point in trying to come, then the number of arrivals and people running into difficulty along the way would be tiny, compared to the much greater number of people and boats that are now on their way thanks to Krudd.

The scale of ongoing onshore asylum seeking movement has a whole lot more to do with the scale of mishap and tragedy than any action taken to close it down would have.

Now I don't for one moment condone the turning around of any boats or the refoulement of asylum seekers before they have had their claims assessed. So all those people who have now mobilised beyond a point where they cannot stop their trip or turn around without great hardship should be accommodated and assessed.

But.... a very strong deterrence factor MUST be implemented as well. I suggest that this vitally important deterrence has to, through necessity, include considerable inconvenience for those caught up in this Krudd-induced dilemma. So this means offshore detention for long periods, with the reasoning being clearly explained to those involved.

That presents us with a very difficult balancing act; to make the lives of those who are caught up in the middle of the malaise bearable while upholding strong deterrence to further arrivals.

"This is how we create death and misery when we 'stop-the-boats' as you simplistically claim we should do."

You're inventing things Bronwyn. I have never 'simplistically' claimed that we should just stop the boats, without a thought for those stuck in the middle.

more later

"<< ... What deaths and misery was created by Howard's policies? >> All of the above..."

It would have been very interesting to have observed the whole deal if Beazley had been in power in 2001 and the about-to-greatly-escalate asylum seeker movement had been allowed to proceed to its full extent. How much death and misery, and civil and political unrest, do you think there would have been then?

August 2001, the time of the Tampa incident, was a watershed moment. If hard action hadn't been taken at that point, we would have really been in the poo...along with many thousands more asylum seekers.

I put it to you that Howard's policy PREVENTED death and misery that would would have occurred on a much greater scale if a weak-kneed Beazley had ruled the roost at the time. (I don't know what big Kimbo might have done. I'm just presenting the very real possibility that things could very easily have got MUCH worse if he'd been in power, or if Howard hadn't acted at the time of the Tampa)

Howard did the right thing. The only criticism I have of him is that he didn't take action a lot earlier, before the word had spread around the world that Australia was a soft target destination.

Some quotes from your earlier posts:

"The problem is, Ludwig, that 'stopping' this movement of people in effect means either turning back unsafe boats and risking drownings, warehousing asylum seekers in appalling limbo conditions in Indonesia or Malaysia, or returning them back home to danger and likely death in Sri Lanka or Afghanistan." Wednesday, 23 September 2009

"You could begin by explaining how we can stop the boats coming without condemning people to danger and death." Thursday, 24 September 2009

I hope this major concern of yours has now been adequately addressed.

continued

So then, no we don't turn boats around. We fairly and reasonably deal with those caught en route by any policy changes, as those caught en route by policy changes were dealt with under Howard's offshore detention 'Pacific Solution', or in a similar manner that upholds the strong deterrence imperative.

So how do we best deal with asylum seekers caught in the middle while deterring others from making the same journey? How do we treat them in the best manner possible while enforcing the deterrence factor?

How do we do this so that we can close down this path of access to Australia.....or at least so that the numbers don't escalate to the extent of the whole deal becoming a major ugly scene for many thousands of people....with the inevitable consequence of a much harder line being taken with all involved?

With respect Bronwyn, your desire to bring them all to the mainland and allow them to move freely in society after a short period is a recipe for spurring an enormous increase in the number of arrivals, which as I keep saying would be a recipe for the development of a much harder line being demanded by the Australian citizenry and acceded to by the decision-makers, on fear of being kicked out of office at the subsequent election.

Spurring a much larger arrival rate would be a sure-fire way of engendering a brickwall 'fortress Australia' turn-the-boats-around-regardless-of-the-risk-to-their-lives type of policy.

Bazz

<< The Law of the Sea required the Tampa to take the passengers and crew to Indonesia because they were in the Indonesian search and rescue area. >>

As I stated before, maritime law dictated that the Tampa go to the nearest port to where the rescue occurred which was Christmas Island a few hours away. Indonesia was over twelve hours away. Your comments indicate a complete misunderstanding of the Tampa incident and suggest to me your grasp of asylum seeker issues more widely is similarly limited.

Yabby

<< Hellhole? ROFL Bronnie, you make my point for me, you need to get out of Melbourne and see the real world out there. >>

I can't see why the 'hellhole' description would have any sane person rolling on the floor laughing. That's exactly what it was. The conditions were appalling. The isolation, the unbearable heat and the interminable waiting with little or nothing to do for months and years on end resulted in many detainees becoming pyhsically and mentally ill. What exactly would you know about Nauru, Yabby, or any other detention centre for that matter? Very little, I'd suggest.

BTW, I don't live in Melbourne or any other city, and I have no more need than you do, dear Yabby, to get out there and see the real world.

Ludwig

<< I implore not to use rubbish terms like that, that are specifically designed to be blunt, rude or outrightly offensive. >>

I repeat, dear Ludwig, the term was applicable. Maybe if you'd been more circumspect in your initial choice of language << But I believe that if something's rotten, then you've got to keep at it and not just let stinking dogs lie! >>, I might have been too. :)