Banjo,
(Psst! a whisper in your ear)

Lexi is up to her usual tricks. The publication she is pointing you to--is not some departmental report, or bipartisan govt study --it is by Janet Phillips (Social Policy Section) of Australian Policy online. A group supposedly set up to provide "RESEARCH AND RESOURCES IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST"! And from my reading of some of their other publications it tends to take a left-leaning view on most issues.

It can make has no special claim to authority. And it reads like another of the thousands of activist website question & answer briefs for activists.

'SN' above should read 'SL'.

Psst, calling all conspiracy theorists - OLO is where it's happening.

Lexi,
That paper is propaganda put out after the Rudd Government came to office and they were about introducing their softer (stupid) policy on the illegal boat people. This policy is what has caused the current problem for them.

Australian Law is that all non citizens must have a valid visa to enter the country legally.

Not to have a valid visa contravenes OUR LAW and no matter which way you put it that is an unlawfill act. i.e. illegal.

If what I say is not true, you may explain just how is it we can detain these persons if they have not contravened our law? Is the government acting outside our own law in detaining them? We also pack those without valid visas, that arrive by air, off back to where they came from. They are unlawfull arrivals that is why.

These 'unlawfull arrivals' are breaking OUR LAW, nobody elses. The refugee convention that we signed states that asylum seekers must obey our law. A potential asylum seeker cannot simply disregard any countries laws. Because we are very nice people we do not prosecute them if they claim asylum.

Banjo,

The link Lexi provided is an attempt at "sanitizing" the terminology.

"‘illegal immigrants’ are people who enter a country without meeting the legal requirements for entry (without a valid visa, for example)" These boat people are now called ‘unlawful non-citizens’ which means exactly the same thing.

This is a complete joke.

Lexi

The documents provided by the Department of Immigration and on the professional advice from their Counsel clearly state:

"There is no offence under Australian law that criminalises the act of arriving in Australia or the seeking of asylum without a valid visa."

Your link (and the embedded references) reaffirms that fact.

It appears Banjo and his cheer-squad are either misrepresenting or misinterpreting what the Department of Immigration says and/or are very confused about the legislation.

For example, if you fly into Australia without a valid Visa, or in fact over-stay your time in Australia with a valid Visa - then yes, it is illegal and unlawful.

What this current band of naysayers are saying does not apply to asylum seekers arriving by the so called 'boats' – and it is patently obvious that none of these naysayers have read/understood the relevant documents, or are deliberately distorting and misrepresenting them.

This is not unusual. Tony Abbott, on a number of occasions, has sought and been given expert advice on various issues. Typically however, he has rejected their professional dissertation and counsel – deferring instead to saying whatever it takes to sway the public opinion to his own ideological ends, power and control of the masses.

In other words; rather than defer to Treasury economists, Immigration lawyers, or CSIRO scientists, etc – he makes up his own facts and spins them with aplomb to an electorate that wouldn’t know any better.

In another thread, I said that this type of behaviour is known as ‘cognitive dissonance’ – I am sure you know what this means and if not, you certainly have the resources to check the references. Unless of course you are part of the world wide conspiracy of librarians marching against the truth ;)