Category: Immigration

Forgive me for repeating myself, but you might be interested in a presentation I gave on this subject in February 2012 (see below).

We have talked a lot about the need for regional arrangements, but progress has been extremely slow. Our political system based on ministerial and departmental responsibility has failed us badly on refugee issues. A new approach  involving civil society – NGOs, academics and others is necessary to help us break out of the awful situation into which we have spiralled.

A Regional Cooperation Framework

International Association of Refugee Law Judges

Melbourne 3 February 2012

There are 33 million persons of concern to the UNHCR throughout the world. There are about 15 million refugees. With instability and failed states, numbers are likely to increase, including in transit countries such as Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia.

For our neighbourhood there will be no satisfactory arrangement concerning refugees and asylum seekers and particularly boat people without regional cooperation. It is so obvious, except for those who want to play politics with the lives of boat people.

I have chosen my words carefully in saying that there will be no ‘satisfactory arrangement’ rather than talking about ‘solutions’. For whatever we can accomplish together with our neighbours, asylum flows will remain chaotic and unpredictable. Desperate and vulnerable people will never abide by the ‘rules’ we seek to impose. But together with our neighbours we can do a lot better.

The successful resettlement of over 240,000 Indochinese in Australia, initiated by our acceptance of over 100,000 refugees followed by orderly departures and family reunion, could never have occurred without regional cooperation. The same is true today. Regional cooperation in the late seventies and eighties was not pretty at times, but it worked. Regional countries provided temporary protection for 1.4 million people who fled after the fall of Saigon. Resettlement countries were able to catch their breath and then generously respond. Just imagine if 50,000 of that 1.4 million had arrived by boat in northern Australia. The successful programs of the Fraser Government could not have succeeded in those circumstances.

But in dealing with our region we are often fair-weather friends, turning to them when we have a problem and then walking away. We also seem to have an unfortunate ability to project an air of superiority. Consider our record.

• In 1996 Australia, together with other resettlement countries terminated the Comprehensive Plan of Action for Indochinese which had been a model of regional burden sharing. We left regional countries with thousands of difficult cases.
• In Bali in 2002 we sought regional help over boat people. But when boat arrivals fell away, although the problem of asylum seekers who came by air remained, we lost interest. We revived the Bali process again in 2009 when the boat arrivals resumed.
• The countries of our region are often criticised for their toughness towards refugees. But our regional neighbours carry a much heavier burden than we do. The number of refugees in Australia is minimal – 22,000 in 2010. But the countries of our region who have not signed the Convention put our performance to shame. Pakistan has 1.9 million refugees, Malaysia has 82,000 refugees with another 130,000 people of concern to UNHCR, India has 185,000 refugees, Nepal 90,000. In Bangladesh there are 229,000 people of concern to the UNHCR. Thailand has 97,000 refugees and another 550,000 people of concern to the UNHCR.
• The High Court and others declare that we should not cooperate in processing in a country that has not adopted certain legal obligations, either under international or domestic law. This narrow view makes sensible policy extremely difficult considering that there is not a signatory country to the Refugee Convention in the arc from Yemen to Australia – the route used by almost all asylum seekers fleeing to Australia.
• But the High Court’s legalistic view becomes more difficult to understand when we consider the performance of countries that have signed the Convention. China has signed the Convention, but regularly refouls North Koreans back across the Tumen River. PNG, a signatory, regularly refouls Irian Jayans back into Indonesia. Nauru obviously signed the convention in June 2011 for financial benefit. Japan, a signatory, collaborated with North Korea and the Japanese Red Cross to ‘repatriate’ about 90,000 Korean residents in Japan back to North Korea between 1959 and 1984. Most of them disappeared or escaped back to Japan.
• We point to the plank in other people’s eyes, but ignore the brutality of our treatment of asylum seekers in detention centres in this country. By any reasonable interpretation our punishment and cruelty towards boat people in detention is a breach of the Refugee Convention. As the regional representative, UNHCR in Australia, put it before a Joint Parliamentary Committee on Australia’s Immigration Detention Network in August 2011, ‘Australia’s mandatory detention policy, that denies the right to lawful stay and any opportunities for self-reliance in community-based settings, and is punitive on the basis of the method of entry to Australia, is arguably in contravention of Article 31 of the Refugee Convention and would fall well short of these criteria. UNHCR’s concerns about the legal and severe and negative implications of long-term mandatory detention in Australia are long-standing and well-known.’ Australians seem much more vexed over what happens in Malaysia than how we punish and brutalise vulnerable and defenceless people in our detention centres.
• Malaysia has made considerable progress on human rights which we choose to ignore. Together with ASEAN, Malaysia has embarked on the development of a human rights instrument, something that we have refused to do. In noting the decision to develop a Political and Human Security Blueprint in 2009, ASEAN ministers declared “Many kinds of human rights violations take place in South East Asia and a regional mechanism can help address this problem. First, the mechanism will ensure that ASEAN member states all adhere to international human rights standards. Second, the mechanism provides a common platform where ASEAN member states, being socio-politically different from each other, can articulate their human rights-related concerns. Lastly, with a human rights mechanism, the region can cooperate to address violations and collectively show its stand on human rights-related issues.’
  The much criticised Australia/Malaysian agreement was described by the Regional Director of UNHCR in Australia to the Legal and Constitutional Committee of the Australian Parliament on 30 September 2011 in the following terms. ‘Many persons of concern to UNHCR stand to benefit from this Program by having their status regularised. It would mean all refugees in Malaysia would, in addition to their registration and ID documents from UNHCR, be registered within the government’s immigration data base and thus protected from arbitrary arrest and detention. It would also mean that all refugees in Malaysia would have the right to work on a par with legal migrants in the country. This would also entitle them to the same insurance and health schemes as documented for legal migrant workers.’ Importantly, Malaysia does not punish boat people in mandatory detention as we do. For Malaysia the Agreement was quite remarkable progress. This is in a country that has the burden of a large number of refugees, is much poorer than we are and has a history of communal tensions. But the arrangement is not enshrined in law and so is discounted. This Agreement is also consistent with a decision of the Executive Committee of UNHCR in 1998 that recognised that irregular migration, people-smuggling and asylum flows are complex matters but concluded that return to a transit country like Malaysia may occur provided there are appropriate safeguards, accepted international standards and effective protection against refoulement. While such conclusions are not binding in law, they do guide the work of the UNHCR and governments in what are acceptable international standards of behaviour towards asylum seekers.

With so few convention signatories in our region, any regional cooperation framework will have to be constructed with non-signatory countries. A regional framework cannot be conjured out of thin air. It must be built from materials available. In that regard, there is an instructive precedent in the 1984 Cartagena (Colombia) Declaration on Refugees. At that time, 150,000 central American refugees were being assisted in the region. There were another 1.8 million people who had fled across a border or were displaced in their own country by conflict.

The Cartagena Declaration was adopted by a group of ‘government experts and eminent jurists’ from Belize, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama and Venezuela.  Three of these countries were not signatories to the Refugee Convention in 1984 when the Declaration was agreed. The Declaration was a modest start, but it contained a number of important recommendations. Significantly the Declaration broadened the definition of a ‘refugee’ set out in the 1951 Convention to include those ‘who have fled their country because their lives, safety or freedom have been threatened by generalised violence, foreign aggression, internal conflicts, massive violation of human rights or other circumstances which have seriously disturbed public order’.

The Cartagena Declaration was further enhanced by the 1989 International Conference on Central American Refugees and the Mexican Declaration of 2004. Argentina (a non-signatory to the Refugee Convention) and Chile (a signatory) subsequently became parties.

Not surprisingly, these developments have not been straight-forward. There have been restrictive interpretations of the Declaration and exclusion of some clauses by some countries. But the progress has been clear.

There are also some lessons that we can learn about a regional cooperation framework in Africa where the numbers and the problems have been much greater than in Central America. In 2009, the African Union Convention for the protection and assistance of internally displaced persons in Africa was signed. This African Union Convention was the first legally binding instrument on internal displacement on a continent-wide basis. It provides a comprehensive regional framework setting out provisions for the protection and assistance of internally displaced persons.  

In our region we must work actively with Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia if we are ever to find an enduring arrangement. If the Malaysian agreement offered anything, it offered the chance of accelerating the process of developing sensible, practical and robust asylum policies in the region. We need to strengthen the Bali process. It could lead to common asylum policies and practices in the region and ultimately to a regional protection instrument. Bali was initially focused on enforcement and criminalisation of people-smuggling, but has progressively shifted to humanitarian issues and population flows.

Both UNHCR in its ‘10 Point Plan of Action for Refugee Protection and Mixed Migration (2007)’ and OXFAM in its ‘Asylum Seekers; The Way Forward’ have outlined the key elements of a regional framework, including effective screening systems, protection-sensitive reception arrangements, durable solutions including resettlement, alternative migration pathways and repatriation, together with targeted development assistance. A critical element in any regional protection framework is that countries who commit to action are not left to carry the burden of managing and maintaining irregular migrants for prolonged periods.

There will be important roles for international agencies, jurists, local and international NGOs, regional governments and the Australian Government. Our government would assist by supporting the establishment of a well-resourced policy unit within the Bali Process Secretariat. That secretariat is a collaborative effort of more than 50 countries and international agencies. More strategically, Australia should target its humanitarian development assistance programs to benefit asylum populations in areas such as housing, health, jobs and education.

If the Malaysian Agreement is viewed through a regional lens, it can become the catalyst together with Bali to start the process of building a durable protection system and delivering protection dividends for all asylum seekers as well as nationals in the transit countries and Australia.

Second-track Dialogue and the Role of Jurists

It is noteworthy that the Cartagena Declaration was adopted by a group of ‘government experts and eminent jurists’ from ten countries. The UNHCR described the inaugural meeting in 1984 as a ‘colloquium of experts’.

Whilst the Declaration was not a treaty, its provisions became respected across the region. In particular the new refugee definition was incorporated in the legislation of most of the countries of the Americas.

Could the International Association of Refugee Law Judges initiate a similar regional ‘colloquium’ of experts? I notice that your website states that your Chapter is keen to encourage judges and decision-makers from our region to join in biennial regional deliberations. You comment that it might be possible for your Chapter to develop into an Asian-Pacific Chapter. I could only encourage you to explore that as soon as possible. A regional colloquium could help break the log-jamb on regional cooperation and related refugee issues. I think it is clear that the current ministerial/departmental model, together with the politicisation of refugee issues has brought us to the present sorry position, where good policy outcomes are very difficult to achieve. We need to break out of the party-political prison.

We need a more broadly based ‘track 2 dialogue’ in our region that can promote confidence and resolution of seemingly intractable issues. Such a dialogue would bring together a broad cross section of key players outside government with policy-makers, in their personal capacity as experts, to start the process of building a new dialogue and approach to both regional and domestic refugee issues. My comments here of course refer only to the regional issues.

Such an approach as this is not something that Australian Governments have traditionally engaged in except at the periphery through ‘consultation’ or commissioning one-off enquiries into certain matters. However, if done well, this type of approach could be transformational in breaking down the misunderstandings and suspicions of different countries and groups. The lack of such an approach serves only to perpetuate and reinforce the current stalemate.

The objective of this type of dialogue is to develop a shared understanding and a shared knowledge of the role of various countries and players on refugee issues. It can break down barriers and facilitate the development of a common understanding and knowledge of each other’s issues and concerns. This approach requires a long-term and sustained commitment by all parties.

Ideally this approach should start modestly and then progressively bring together actors from a broad spectrum of regional interests including jurists and the UNHCR. It would include social policy and refugee and asylum experts as well as persons familiar with intelligence and border security issues. Such a wide span of interests can help create a less hostile environment and open the door to mutually beneficial policies without the suspicion that pervades the present approach. It would enable players outside government to influence new policy thinking and create the space for government officials to ‘think aloud’.

Such an approach would need to have the implicit backing of government to allow officials to participate in their personal capacities.

Would your Chapter be prepared to sponsor a regional ‘colloquium of experts’ in Kuala Lumpur?

As I said at the beginning, no satisfactory arrangement is possible without active regional cooperation. We cannot do this on our own and neither can our neighbours. We need a Regional Refugee Instrument which whilst based on the 1951/67 Convention, recognises the particular problems of our region, one of which is that few regional countries are signatories to the Refugee Convention.

Governments are strengthened when they work collaboratively with each other and with civil society organisations.  We must build trust in the region. Importantly it will mean working with countries, who almost without exception are not signatories to the Refugee Convention.

In my blog of July 5, I compared the March quarter 2013 primary refugee protection visa rate for various nationalities and the finally determined grant rate.

In the case of Iranian nationals the grant rate rose from 55% at the primary stage to 86% on appeal. That is 86% of Iranian boat arrivals were finally found to be genuine refugees in the March quarter 2013. Because of this I queried Foreign Minister Carr’s comments about Iranian boat people being mainly economic migrants.

I have had to rely on the March quarter 2013 figures as they are the latest available from the Department of Immigration and Citizenship. However it should be acknowledged that this March quarter Iranian cohort would be in respect of Iranians who had arrived six or twelve months before. The refugee determination process would normally take six to twelve months or more.

There could have been a significant change in the profile of Iranian asylum seekers over the last six to twelve months or so.  The first indication of this is that the Indonesian Government has apparently been persuaded of the changing profile of the Iranian boat people by the Australian Government and has now refused to grant visas on arrival to Iranians entering Indonesia. Iranian nationals wanting entry to Indonesia will now have to apply for a visa in Iran or in a third country.

The second factor is that Foreign Minister Carr has now been much more explicit about Iranian boat arrivals. He recently said ‘The advice I have got is that overwhelmingly the Iranians coming here are middle-class Iranians. They are from the majority ethnic and religious group in the country. And they are coming here as economic refugees. They are coming as economic migrants, not as refugees.’ He added later ‘The profile [of Iranian boat people] has changed’.

The third factor is that undoubtedly the proportion of Iranian boat arrivals has increase significantly. In the June quarter 2012 they represented about 10% of boat arrivals.  According to media reports they now represent close to 40 % of boat arrivals. The actual numbers tell the same story, up from 352 in the June quarter 2012 to an estimated 3600 in the June quarter this year

We will have to wait for further information on the refugee determination rates for Iranians and others. But I would not now dismiss completely, the comments by Foreign Minister Carr.

But there is another way to address this issue if the profile of Iranian asylum seekers is changing.

The population of Iran is increasing very rapidly. It has been referred to as a “population time bomb” The population is young. The middle class is also growing rapidly. It is well educated.

Iranians have a lot of “get up and go”. My observation is they make very good migrants. They are determined people and perhaps for that reason they get up the nose of Immigration officials.

They are repressed by the mullahs but probably more importantly the sanctions imposed by the west are biting hard. Not surprisingly with population and economic pressures at home many want to leave Iran.

It must be possible to open a different migration pathway for eligible Iranians through some type of skilled migration program, perhaps a 457 visa or sponsored migration. Surely we have Australian companies that would be supportive. Iran is an important market for Australian wheat

Perhaps the Government is considering this option if, as seems likely, the profile of Iranian boat arrivals is changing. Unfortunately the Government is so paralysed by boat arrivals it seems unable to focus on more creative and workable programs that would address an ever changing situation.

The saga proceeds in relation to people seeking refugee asylum in our country. The latest contribution in these last few days is that we should seek changes in the UN Refugee Convention because circumstances have changed since it was introduced after WWII. The label “economic migrants” is being resurrected as a reason for refusing refugee asylum to thousands of people protected by the Convention.

The idea that this situation can be dealt with by negotiating amendments to the Refugee Convention is fatuous. The chances of serious changes being achieved in the lifetimes of the currently displaced asylum seekers and their children, if ever, are non-existent. So is a new Convention. Many years of discussions in Geneva and elsewhere about the possible need to review the Convention in certain respects, in which I played a small part, actually produced proposals for its strengthening, not its weakening to relieve countries like Australia from its humanitarian obligations to provide rescue and relief of people fleeing terror and persecution, and yes, the consequent economic hardship that physical displacement always causes.

Have circumstances changed in fact since WW2? Once again people are being compelled to flee their homes by brutal, indiscriminate, often racially based armed force.  Because of the immense dangers of not fleeing, they have to leave behind virtually everything they own thus placing them of course at economic peril.

In western societies, people forced out of their homes by natural or even manmade disasters suffer danger and economic hardship but are supported by governments and public subscription until they can safely return and rebuild. Why should people in other countries fearing death or torture at the hands of armed gangs be any less worthy of support?

In many decades of assisting refugees and displaced people in some truly awful camps in Malawi, Bosnia, Palestine, Bangladesh and other places, I have hardly met one whose first choice was not returning to their own countries. Home is what they know and love. The request they invariably make is not transportation to Australia or Canada but for help to go home, and support in the meantime so they can keep their kids alive and safe. Many sit and wait for years in terrible conditions. Some cannot wait any longer, as is entirely understandable. In the same situation, would we not move to save our kids from persecution and penury, even death on unseaworthy boats over vast expanses of dangerous oceans?  Demonise them if you must but some people smugglers in history have been heroes, like Oskar Schindler, Raoul Wallenberg and the European priests and nuns and other ordinary citizens who hid Jews from the Nazis.

Our recent and current leaders know this story very well. Historically we have a proud record in refugee rescue and relief. They, like we, know that refugees have made towering contributions to Australia’s progress and achievements in many fields. Unfortunately too few are cricketers or footballers or this discussion might not even be necessary. But in recent years our leaders have consistently failed us, and those who suffer, by failing to explain publicly why we as a decent people must help people in need. As a wealthy country of 25 million people, we are simply not going to be adversely affected by taking 25,000 [0.1%] more people over 5 years or more [a tiny number in world terms] who have nowhere to go back to and will, as did their predecessors, make eminently successful migrants and contribute to the growth and success of our country.

No tidal wave is approaching, merely drips that can seamlessly be woven into our proud cultural tapestry. While ever the world is beset by violence, we cannot stop the boats, still less turn them around. Other solutions can and must be found. But that is another article.

Foreign Minister Carr is focusing on whether some asylum seekers are refugees or economic migrants. This is symptomatic of a government that is continually in crisis mode over boat arrivals. It should focus on the strategic issues such as orderly departure arrangements in source countries like Afghanistan and regional agreements with Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia.

In my blog of July 1 I expressed doubt about the arguments of Foreign Minister Carr that we needed to have a ‘tougher and more hard-edged assessment’ of asylum seekers. Understandably officials of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship don’t like their preliminary decisions on refugee status being overturned by the Refugee Review Tribunal.

It is clear that preliminary assessments by Immigration officials are being significantly changed.

The figures from DIAC show that the primary protection visa grant rate in the March quarter 2013 was 65%, but on review, the RRT lifted the finally determined grant rate for all boat arrivals to 91%. For a couple of countries the overturn rate by the RRT was spectacular. The primary protection visa grant rate for Iranians was lifted from 55% to 86%. For Sri Lankans the change was even more remarkable from 27% at the primary stage to 75% as finally determined by the RRT.

The Department seems to have a particular worry with Iranian and Sri Lankan asylum seekers. By all accounts the Iranian asylum seekers are middle class, professional, better-off and tough applicants. That should not prejudice their case. They are escaping a brutal theocracy. The civil war in Sri Lanka may have ended but the advice from several human rights agencies suggests that the persecution of Tamils is continuing. Three months ago Canada said that it will not attend the next Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting to be held in Sri Lanka in November this year unless the human rights situation improves.

The Government has announced that it will commission a review of Australia’s refugee status determination system to ensure that acceptance outcomes for asylum seeker claims are consistent with our international obligations and with final acceptance rates for comparable cohorts in other countries. It is to be hoped that this review is not designed to produce what Foreign Minister Carr is hinting at.

It should not be surprising that final decisions by the RRT will be more reliable than preliminary decisions by Immigration officials in the field. Newly arrived asylum seekers are likely to be confused and traumatised because of their escape and flight to safety. It is unlikely that they will have much helpful documentation. They are in an alien environment without much support. They will have to rely on an interpreter they do not know and who may not always be fully professional. The RRT does have the time and opportunity to more carefully and diligently review all the facts.

Denis O’Brien, a leading lawyer who headed the RRT for five years dismissed Foreign Minister Carr’s claim and asserted ‘Members of the RRT have to apply the definition … under the Refugee Convention. So I don’t see a lot of scope for tightening up without running foul of the United Nations Commission for Refugees”. Several senior and experienced refugee rights lawyers have commented that Foreign Minister Carr’s contention will not work and will be subject to challenge in the courts.

Comments by Foreign Minister Carr have diverted attention from the key issue, regional arrangements. This is where ministers and departments should be energetically applying their energies.

A regional arrangement at the time of the Indochina outflow was successful. Only a similar type of arrangement will work in the future. The key will be burden-sharing – burden sharing by countries providing temporary accommodation for asylum seekers such as Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, and burden sharing by resettlement countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the US. Nothing else will work.

This morning Frank Brennan was interviewed by Fran Kelly on ABC Breakfast. See link below to the interview. (John Menadue)

http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/2013/07/bst_20130702_0821.mp3

It is surprising to see that the Foreign Minister Bob Carr suggests that we need to be much tougher in refugee determination as many claimants for refugee status are really economic refugees.

Some claimants will undoubtedly be economic migrants posing as refugees. But the refugee determination process which we and others have developed over decades is designed to sort this out and reject those who claim our protection if they are not genuine refugees.

The figures do not support Bob Carr’s proposition. After a thorough review by the Refugee Determination Tribunal, about 90% of boat arrivals are found to be genuine refugees. This figure of 90% is derived from the most recent DIAC statistics. For air arrivals who seek refugee protection, the ‘success rate’ is less than half the success rate for boat arrivals.

Where is Bob Carr getting his figures from to justify his argument about economic migrants? The figures that I am familiar with just do not support his claim. The ‘problem’ will not go away by half-baked theories that cannot be sustained by the facts.

In our discussion on asylum seekers and refugees, the major emphasis is on our generosity in giving a safe haven to persons who have been persecuted. That is the way it should be, but Australia has been a major beneficiary of refugee flows in the past.

As responsible members of the human family, we have a strong moral case to provide protection for refugees who are the victims of persecution and violence.

There is also a strong case in our own self-interest Refugees are almost by definition risk-takers and entrepreneurial. It can be argued that refugees are amongst the most highly motivated and determined in the Australian community.

In desperate situations, refugees make a decision to flee. They abandon almost everything for the hope of freedom, security and opportunity elsewhere. In a sense they ‘select themselves’ better than a migration officer ever could. It is hard to assess the motivation and risk-taking of a migrant applicant. Refugees show it by doing.

Since WWII, Australia has settled over 750,000 refugees from war-torn countries and societies wracked with violence and persecution. Settlement in Australia has not been trouble-free. It is always work in progress. But it has been a great success story in which Australians can be proud. The loss of constructive bi-partisanship threatens what we have done well in the past.

Some well-known refugees have contributed to this success story – Judy Cassab, Anh Do, Mirka Mora, Wolfgang Sievers, Henry Szeps,  Tuong Quang Luu, Les Murray, Sir Gustav Nossal, Frank Lowy, Harry Seidler, and Bishop Vincent Van Nguyen.

But more important than the well-known names are the hundreds of thousands of refugee families who have quietly gone about building their families, communities, acquiring skills, getting a job and educating their children. Early days are difficult for refugees. They come with little or no financial resources, their skills are probably not recognised and they will usually have language difficulties. These early difficulties are reflected in higher levels of unemployment and concentration in lowly paid jobs.

But their situation steadily and rapidly improves. Professor Graeme Hugo, ARC Australian Professorial Fellow, in his study ‘Economic, Social and Civic Contributions of First and Second Generation Humanitarian Entrants’ of May 2011, describes their contribution.

• Refugees are younger and have higher fertility levels than the Australian population as a whole.
• They are increasingly settling in regional Australia.
• They place a high store on education for their children. 48% of second generation people who are Australian born have post-school qualifications. For the total refugee groups, the percentage is much high at 59%, with some refugee groups showing remarkably high levels of post-school qualifications, e.g. Estonia 65%, Latvia 65%, Slovakia 65%, Sri Lanka 61%.
• Refugees are more likely to demonstrate entrepreneurial and risk-taking attributes. They have a higher incidence of owning their own businesses than other migrant groups.
• The second generation of refugee settlers have a much higher level of labour force engagement than the first generation and in many cases, the level is higher than for second generation Australians.

Their commitment to Australia is also shown in their uptake of citizenship.  A study prepared for OECD by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (October 2010) reveals that the naturalisation rate by birthplace for all foreign-born is 80%. For significant refugee groups it is much higher – Croatia 97%, Poland 96% and Vietnam 97%. For New Zealand it is 45%, for the United Kingdom 71% and the United States 70%.

Not surprisingly, refugees in their early years are ‘takers’ of Australian generosity. But year by year they increasingly become great contributors. They pay back many times the generosity they initially receive. They contribute to Australia out of all proportion to their number. It is a great success story for all Australians.

In spite of Government timidity, coalition opportunism and media failure, we can draw inspiration from the very successful refugee programs of the past. Australian business and society generally have been great beneficiaries. It is in our self-interest, as well as for sound moral reasons that we need to break with the stalemate and toxic debate that surrounds refugees. Doing the right thing really pays off.

John Menadue

This piece was published in Crikey 11 June 2013.

The destructive and divisive debate about various asylum policies is designed to scare us. The most shameful manifestation of this in the past week has been the alleged “terrorist” in community detention.

A person sought asylum in Australia. He was given an adverse security assessment . He was then held in community detention with his family. He was subject to reporting and monitoring. The authorities knew where he was at all times. Given these facts we were probably safer from him (if indeed he was a danger to the security of Australia) than the mindless violence that seems to happen on our streets with depressing regularity. We should not hide behind an ASIO assessment as a way to whip up community fear and insecurity, and in the process destroy a family.

If we take on trust the policies on refugees and asylum seekers that the main parties are taking into the election campaign it makes for disturbing reading.

Setting aside the hubris and posturing what do they really say they are going to do?

The National and the Liberal Party say they will stop the boats. Further the Liberal party would tighten up the process for determining if a person is a refugee.  The Government, saddled by incumbency and actually having to have a policy would also tighten up the refugee determination process, keep mandatory detention, strengthen regional cooperation and try and stop the boats. .

The reality is there are no magic answers to the question of asylum and why people get onto boats.  There is no one action that will make the “problem” go away, despite what Tony Abbott or Julia Gillard  say.

Here is a quick summary of what the two main parties stand for.

Regional cooperation is the hardest and most important area for action if there are to be any lasting solutions. The only way to avoid the tragedy that has played itself out again off Christmas Island is to have a genuine regional protection framework, where peope do not feel that their only way to safety is taking a dangerous journey by sea.  But this takes time. The ALP platform is pretty quiet, on this. The best clues as to their polices are found in the budget papers. In this they have committed additional funding for the Bali Process, for capacity building and enhanced screening and refugee resettlement. It will take time to work and 100 days will not cut it. The Opposition on the other hand have very little to say in their “weighty” policy document ‘Our Plan; Real Solutions for all Australians’. They will “rebuild relationships with our neighbours damaged by Labor’s mismanagement and failed border security policies” and that the first overseas trip that Tony Abbott makes as Prime Minister will be to Indonesia to renew cooperation against people smugglers. That is not a policy, let alone likely to bring any results.

The real damage, fueled by the Greens and the Opposition, in our regional relations is the way we have continued to insult Indonesia and Malaysia and their treatment of asylum seekers while they continue to host much larger numbers of displaced people than Australia and where their policies are no more harsh than what the Australian government has progressively put in place.

On asylum processing the government announced in the budget that it would commission a comprehensive review of Australia’s refugee determination system to “identify changes to improve the efficacy of the system and to ensure that acceptance outcomes for asylum seeker claims are consistent with our international obligations and with final acceptance rates for comparable cohorts in other countries”. There is no detail as to when or how this review will commence. The language used is ominous implying that somehow the system is broken but not much to back this up. Similarly the opposition makes wild assumptions about asylum seekers’ behaviors and a presumption that they do not need protection. This statement flies in the face of not just the Refugee Convention but also years of testing such assumptions in the courts of Australia. Presumably for the Opposition if they get into government it will be easier to blame the courts for a failure to deliver policies than to acknowledge that what they propose may not be possible to enact in law.

Whatever the public debate has been on asylum seekers there was an encouraging all party agreement on the resettlement of refugees from overseas. The increase of the program to 20,000 with 12,000 for offshore resettlement had been a beacon of hope in an otherwise awful debate. It is regrettable the Opposition has now gone back on its promise to maintain that number and in its platform returns the program to the previous 13750, while reserving 11000 places for the offshore program.

Boats and People Smuggling is what this hysteria has been all about.

On paper the parties are all quite muted on boats. The ALP’s platform merely says we need to ensure we meet our safety of life at sea obligations. We all know what Tony Abbott will do …”a new order to the navy to tackle illegal boat arrivals and turn back the boats, when safe to do so”.

The  Houston Expert Panel on Asylum Seekers however noted that these conditions do not currently exist and more appropriately focused on better regional and national codification of Search and Rescue protocols and the development of operational guidelines. If we truly want to prevent tragedies it is these arrangements and protocols that are much more important than the empty and ultimately unachievable rhetoric of “stop the boats.”

In his rhetoric Tony Abbott proposes three things to stop the boats. None of them will work. He said he would reopen Nauru. The government has done this  but the boats have kept coming. He said he would re introduce Temporary Protection Visas but we know that when the Howard Government did this the number of asylum seekers increased and a large numbers of women and children were drowned. He keeps telling us that he would turn back the boats but both the Indonesian Government and our own RAN have cast doubt on the possibility of such an approach.

On people smuggling both the Government and the Opposition are singing from the same songbook both wanting to toughen the penalties for people smuggling.

This brief stroll through the official party polices tells us that there is not much to differentiate the Government and the Opposition and that irrespective of the outcomes of the elections we will have more of the same. The Opposition has the current luxury of very little policy. They are able to get away with the refrain “stop the boats”.  Incumbency is no advantage for the Government. Indeed it appears to be a disadvantage, as it must justify every policy with the dollars spent and the outcomes reached. They are accountable in a way the Opposition is not.

So, in the pursuit of populist policies, the major parties are pursuing approaches that will take us nowhere.

In any event the number of asylum seekers coming to Australia by both air and sea are very small in world terms.  Our “problem” is overwhelmingly a political one. Tony Abbott keeps appealing to our darker angels of fear and Julia Gillard keeps following his agenda.

Where is the voice for decency amongst our political leaders and parties?

John Menadue, former Secretary of Department of Immigration

Arja Keski-Nummi, former senior refugee policy officer in Department of Immigration