The argument that until recently most of the arrivals of asylum seekers was by air is a self defeating one, considering that this was because the pacific solution had stopped the boats. The air arrivals is constant but now about 50%. The stark difference is that only 45% of air arrivals get approved, compared to about 95% of boat arrivals (despite original assessments being far lower), simply because with no documentation, verifying boat arrival stories is nearly impossible, and the court in the absence of evidence grants asylum. Compare this to the 70% approval at Nauru.

The Pacific solution worked, and will work again. The only reason that the government can't implement it, is that they would have to admit that their policy for the last decade was a pile of dung.

SM, Pacific solution = !guns! The present Gov't stopped using guns because it was WRONG, which is also why it won't reintroduce them. You think it's fine to use guns, OK, you're in the minority for now at least. Mr Abbott is trying to build a majority by sitting on his hands, so we seem to be stuck with seeing how his putrid, stinking strategy to become PM goes. I'm hoping Australians won't roll.

SPOR wrote "...and Luciferase who think that by giving away our citizenship to every Tom, Dick & Ali who cry's poor they are and doing something noble and making <<Australia...a better nation>>"

look me up as a user and read my posts on border control topics, I am not about giving citizenship away and The Malaysian solution is not about that either.

SPQR,

Debunked, eh.....

579,

Just to reassure you regarding "...what they are doing to this country.". I attended an Aussie Christmas carnival yesterday afternoon. It abounded with overweight Anglo-Saxon types partaking of Australian cuisine. All sorts of fat an sugar laden delicacies were on offer ranging from sausage in a bun to the scintillating sensation of a multi-flavour "slushie"......and to top off the cultural experience, the place was awash with kiosks selling cheap Chinese crap.

Culcha - we've got it all wrapped up in OZ.

I noted Poirot slash at our culture and week end habits, bit of a joke, are we to force billy tea and damper?
While singing bush Ballards? give me the Chinese tucker and long black mates!
SM you will know, the boat people is a separate issue, and that it again and again is invaded with the one about other illegals.
Fact remains, most Australians want the boats stopped.
And like it or not right or not, more of us than the total protesters, would vote to deport the protesters too.
In a battle, if victory is impossible, try for the achievable outcome.
OFFSHORE processing, increase migration.
And define, true, who is a refugee and who is not.

I have just re-read Ludwig's opening post, and the linked news item therein.

I think you have misread what Minister Bowen has in fact said or been credited with, Ludwig. The proposed increased intake from 13,200 to 20,000 per year does not represent an additional 6,800 accredited-by-UNHCR refugees from camps of the like of Kakuma in Kenya. Reading between the lines, what it represents is a means of re-classifying the existing and anticipated-as-continuing boat-people traffic, taking them out of the asylum-seeker category and henceforth referring to them in the statistics as 'refugees'.

This little bit of statistical prestidigitation is presumably intended as the basis for some yet-to-be made claim as to Labor's having 'solved' the problem of the boat traffic.

Bowens actual words:

"We want to give more people a life in Australia
but we need to tackle the dangerous boats coming
to Australia, ..."

and;

"Then we can have that conversation with the people
of Australia to increase our refugee intake further."

First, note not all the boats are to be 'tackled', just the 'dangerous' ones.

Second, note the outcome of the Minister's foreshadowed future conversation between the Labor government and the people of Australia is already pre-determined as being one of "increasing our refugee intake further". Of course it has to be, for the boat traffic will only increase if it is not totally stopped. That the present Labor government sees itself as either unable or unwilling to halt this traffic is witnessed to by its retention as policy, at its just-concluded national conference, of offshore processing of asylum seekers.

All of which only emphasises the 'unfair dismissal' nature of the recent forcing of the resignation of the Ombudsman in both breach of privilege, and usurpation of the prerogative of the Parliament, by the PM. The accelerated releasing of boat people from detention is a defacto admission that the Ombudsman's investigations and findings were consistent with the government having not applied its established policies.

When is Allan Asher being reinstated?

SPQR, I fully share your concerns. I doubt there are many who would be more cynical than me about Labor’s performance.

It seems that Labor has already shifted its position from the news as I understood it when I started this thread.

Although… I find it hard to know just what to believe, due in part to poor journalism.

Check this out:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/half-a-win-for-refugee-advocates/story-e6freuy9-1226213210089

From this article:

< LABOR has agreed to double the intake of refugees so long as they are processed overseas. >

and

< The motion, put forward by Immigration Minister Chris Bowen, means the party supports an aspirational refugee intake from 13,750 to 20,000. >

From 13 750 to 20 000 is not double the intake!

Am I missing something here or has the author just got no idea at all about basic mathematics….or does she think that a ~50% increase is close enough to double for it not to matter!

Just the same sort of thing has appeared in The Age:

http://www.theage.com.au/national/double-or-nothing-on-refugee-intake-20111203-1ocp9.html

What else have these authors bent, omitted or perhaps even invented??

Anyway, I support Chris Bowen’s concept as outlined in the opening post. Nothing else.

I most certainly DON’T support an increase in our 20 000 refugee intake unless onshore asylum seeking is decisively curtailed. And even though fly-in asylum seeking hasn’t been mentioned by Bowen, it should most definitely be clamped right down on as well…..before we increase the formal refugee intake at all.