I am totally opposed to off shore processing in Malaysia, Nauru or anywhere else. It is a problem for Australia and Australia needs to deal with it. Not mask the problem by hiding people in another country. We also need to do much more work with governments of both the countries of origin and of the countries where asylum seekers set out from, to find a humanitarian solution to the problem. People smugglers need to be dealt with under the law.

Hahahaha. Trust you to put a negative spin on it Peri-o.

I’m also an eco and a geo, or rocko if you prefer-o.

But most of all I’m a susso!! (a sustainabilityist-o!)

People? Oh…no…that would be just too much for my poor brain to handle….o!

SPQR,

You have more numbers that the million dollar lottery. I particularly like this one:
"By 2010 the number of environmental refugees could grow to 50 million, the UNU-EHS predicts" What are their predictions for the year 1990?
Seems these people don't know what year it is little own what day it is.
If I am assuming correctly you are a climate change skeptic and do not believe the world is going through a man made or natural process of climate change. Therefore you have noting to worry about, there will be no climate change refugees.
Esmat Adine, a 24 year old Afghan, I'm sorry for Mr Adine and his harrowing experience but it does not make him an expert on asylum seekers. I'm sure he would have little knowledge of Australia's policies on immigration. He may well have been fed a litany of lies on the subject led to believe Australia has an open door policy when clearly that is not the case.
You say "If we take a firm stand that anyone who elects to self–select themselves and boat-in will NOT be accepted --few will give it a try."
So you want Australia to repudiate our undertakings we have given in relation to asylum seekers and refugees.
SPQR, you seem to ignore these questions, as your answer would show your true colours.

With your "real world experience", what is your view on immigration to Australia? Increase, decrease, none at all, chop out the Asians, reintroduce the White Australia Policy, blow up 'boat people' what should we do?. I did ask if you were in control what would you have done in 2010/11? No answer, can I assume then the 169.000 migrants was all right by you.

Paul, I appreciate you explaining your position on asylum seekers.

My views are very different. The major problem with your position as I see it is that it creates an enormous pull factor. It just keeps onshore asylum seeking happening indefinitely and seriously risks causing it to greatly escalate.

This has a number of big negative factors: People spending their life savings paying people-smugglers and then undertaking treacherous journeys of uncertain outcome, more deaths at sea, ongoing and increased discontent in Australian society, huge cost to the taxpayer which is money that should be being spent on health, education, social security, roads, etc, etc, and displacement of more needy refugees that would have been brought here through the refugee category of our immigration program.

If it continues as it is, let alone escalates, we WILL get a government that will take a much harder line. Then many hundreds if not thousands of people will be caught in the middle of it.

continued

As far as the legal situation goes, Australia as a sovereign country has every right to protect its borders and to not allow people into the country that have come unsolicited. All refugees that come here simply must come through formal channels, surely!

Australia’s obligations under international agreements are all well and good, but they’ve got to be in line with this basic premise, not at odds with it.

And Australia should have every right to determine how many refugees it will take and be able to plan and budget well ahead for it… and not have it open-ended and at the whim asylum seekers and people smugglers.

The 1951 Refugee Convention and presumably all other related agreements have the huge problem of being open-ended in terms of the numbers of people involved.

It is all well and good to work with Indonesia to tackle people smuggling, but I doubt whether it will work in isolation. And it is contradictory to do this while at the same exerting a strong pull factor.

There is a lot of work to do to straighten all this out and revise all our agreements. But the most important thing in the short term is to strive to stop onshore asylum seeking.

Howard achieved this and quite frankly the way he did it was a very good balance between doing what was necessary and treating those involved pretty damn well.

So I’m all for a return to Nauru, Manus Island and onshore detention centres if needed on top of those…. and most definitely NOT free movement of asylum seekers in our society.

Don’t get me wrong: it would be great if there were no negative consequences to just accepting all asylum seekers with open arms. But that’s not the case. I have nothing against those people seeking asylum in this country or those who are found to be refugees. I’m just trying to see the whole picture and advocate what is necessary to greatly improve a currently highly unsatisfactory situation.

Paul 1405,

You say in response to the expert sources predicting the climate refugee numbers:
<< Seems these people don't know what year it is little own what day it is>>
And I agree with you.

They are by the way, part of the same fraternity who brought us the prediction that the sea would quickly rise by six metres.
And the same group that at another time told us the dams in the Sydney region would all be dry by now!

But please –for your own good and welfare --don’t go expressing such “skepticism” too loudly at your Green party meetings – since to the Green’s hierarchy those sources and predictions are sacrosanct!

<< If I am assuming correctly you are a climate change skeptic and do not believe the world is going through a man made or natural process of climate change. Therefore you have noting to worry about, there will be no climate change refugees.>>
I agree with you, again.
Ay, but here's the rub—IT DOES NOT HAVE TO HAPPEN—for us to start receiving “hoardes” of “climate refugees”.
Many of the “refugees” we “process” now are not real refugees –it does not stop them from coming –and it does not precluded them from being pronounced “genuine” . If we create a pretext people will find a way to exploit it.
If your Green party comrades push through a bill accepting climate refugees today, by next week we will be getting boat loads of “climate refugees”.

<< Mr Adine …may well have been fed a litany of lies on the subject led to believe Australia has an open door policy when clearly that is not the case.>>
Mr Adine is likely to know the loopholes in Australian immigration law better than you.