All of Australia's early settlers were
boat people. And many who came after.
We tend to forget that.

I recently saw a cartoon on the web that
depicted Aborigines standing on the
shore while John Howard, Philip Ruddock,
et cetera (dressed in British naval
uniforms) sit in a boat waiting to come ashore.
One of the
Aborigines makes the statement:

"We shall decide who comes to this country,
and under what circumstances they come!."

And Mr Howard (dressed in British Naval uniform) exclaims:
"But, But, But, that's inhumane!"

the policy is not to use arms on the high sea to stop or turn back unsafe boatloads of people who we know have no intent but to seek asylum by reaching Australian waters.
Luciferase,
I must admit I got confused with your earlier post & my reply in hindsight now seems out of place.
However, regarding the above quote I'd like to ask another question. How sure are you that many boat people are genuine refugees. Why do you think they scuttle the boats as soon as it becomes obvious that they have been spotted by australian surveillance. Why weren't the facts in your link re the Siev-4 publicised as much as the children overboard fiasco ?

"We shall decide who comes to this country,
and under what circumstances they come!."
Lexi,
Cast your mind back even further when the Aborigines arrived here & what the original inhabitants might have said ?

Dear Individual,

You asked me what the original inhabitants -
PRIOR to the Aborigines said?
Ok. I think it went something
like this:

"kuk-ack-kook-uk-ack-cukack," making
the most extraordinary cacophony of sounds and
rattling cries.

"How sure are you that many boat people are genuine refugees?" Again, thanks for asking, individual

The answer is, I don't know. What Australia did a decade ago was to act on the prejudgement that boat people were not asylum seekers but somebody else trying to enter Australian waters, a third reason Howard's policy was wrong (adding to its inhumanity and compromising of the navy).

Once they're here, we're bound by UN convention to assess their claims, so we tried to stop them from getting here, by force. What the Malaysian swap involves is to shifting the assessment process back to Malaysia and joining a camp queue. Reaching Nauru meant avoiding a camp queue, which is why people were so happy to be taken there.

Like I said, the Greens had the opportunity to choose between a guaranteed 4% death rate and people being looked after and processed in Malaysia before joining a queue to be safely resettled here or elsewhere. Also, they could have sued for a large increase in the immigration cap to accommodate more such refugees. But no, the pious principle that Malaysia must be a signatory to the UN convention when refugees are coming from countries that already are (!) must be adhered to so they can lie straight in bed while people die !!

cont'

Oh Joe Hockey, such a deep display of passionate concern for a 13 year-old girl from someone who would turn unsafe boats with women and children on-board back out to sea under a reinstatement of Howard's legislation !! That girl's welfare will be looked after in Malaysia under the agreement and any attempt to use children as beach-heads to shoe-horn family groups in will thus be be dissuaded.(Is it possible we feel more concern for children of refugees than they do, or is sending unaccompanied minors an indication of how desperate they are?)

As for the sentimental,soppy Sarah Hansen-Young, her tears were useless is in dealing with such an issue. She bawled through what should have been a pragmatic attempt by the Greens to achieve something for those they're supposedly concerned about, All we got was a misty attack of the vapours and a disregard for life so Greens can remain warm in the glow of their self-righteousness. Sheer puke!

As is continually pointed out, Gillard as PM is charged with brokering a successful, sustainable solution to stopping death. The Malaysian swap is the only chance of that and she should not be deflected from it.

This has been the most disgusting day in politics since the dismissal.