Open Borders

[Dennis N O'Brien]

Open Borders

Roll on up I’ll take your orders,
Come and sail through open borders.
Here’s your ticket, where’s your cash?
Thanks I’ll add that to my stash.
No! no! you don’t need to be
A bona fide refugee,
Just tear up and trash your papers,
It’s the daddy of all capers.
So what, if some think it's cheating,
That's just the deserving bleating;
Money talks, not hopeless pleas,
We don't take poor refugees.
In our leaky fishing boats,
Anything that kind of floats,
We’ll be heading off to Aussie,
Don’t forget your swimming cossie.
No sweat if our vessels sink
And we end up in the drink,
Though the seas are rough and wavy,
We’ll be picked up by their Navy.
Yes, that’s what their Navy’s for,
They’re doormen at the open door.
Come on, you don’t need persuasion
Come and join the great invasion.

© Dennis N. O'Brien, 2012

[manfredvijars]

As an ex 'Reffo' myself, this subject is a bit close to me ...

There seems to be a stack of misinformation on the 'issue' of "boat people" .
It's NOT illegal to seek asylum and it's NOT illegal to be a refugee ...


Here's Malcolm Fraser's spin ....

Australia has a robust and effective legal system to assess whether or not someone is a refugee. Declaring that a tougher and more rigorous process is required ignores the fact that we do not have an asylum seeker problem and we have not lost control of our borders.

In 2010-11, 4730 asylum seekers arrived by boat. During the same period, more than 13 million people crossed our borders and arrived in Australia; 4730 out of 13.9 million is not a ''system vulnerable to abuse''. Instead of restoring ''integrity and public confidence'', the Coalition's policy is detrimental to people seeking asylum, breaches our obligations under the Refugee Convention and appears to work from the position of the assumption of guilt.
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The most effective way to restore integrity and public confidence in asylum seeker policy is through strong leadership, myth busting and accurate information. Not to present a policy that is the closest thing to evil you can get. A policy that is full of misinformation.

To begin, Abbott referred to ''illegal boat arrivals'' - yet we have been reminded numerous times that it is not illegal to seek asylum, regardless of mode of arrival. How can we expect the public to know facts such as this when a possible future prime minister of Australia doesn't?

One of the main points of the Coalition policy is to introduce an independent Integrity Commissioner for Refugee Status Assessment. Yet the current administrative arrangements in the Department of Immigration and Citizenship already include rigorous assessment of applications, plus summaries of trends and totals. The Coalition's proposed six-monthly audits would add little that is new and would undermine an existing, robust government department.

Another major part of the policy is to draw an unfavourable inference about an applicant's identity if they arrive without documents. The reference to ''90 per cent of arrivals having no documents whatsoever'' is a blatant attempt to mislead the public. A footnote refers to a budget estimates hearing relating to asylum seekers arriving without a passport. But arriving without a passport is not the same as arriving with no documents ''whatsoever''. While people may arrive without a passport, it does not mean they do not have other identity documents.

There are numerous reasons people arrive without a passport: they may not have one, they have had to hand it over to people smugglers, or they have panicked and destroyed it because it is their identity that has caused persecution, torture and imprisonment in the past. Further to this, to prove an asylum seeker is a refugee, identity documents must be provided - therefore there is no way to be found to be a refugee without any documents. This is not indicative of a system ''wide open to abuse'' or one in which assessors are forced to make a ''best guess''.

The reason nine out of 10 people who arrive by boat receive visas is that they have proved they are refugees. They have provided identifying documents and have proved that owing to a ''well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion'' they are unable to return to their home country. Fear that has forced them to flee and seek protection in Australia. Protection that, as signatories to the Refugee Convention, we are obliged to offer and should be proud to offer.

Asylum seekers are not granted refugee status because they do not have documents or are cheating a vulnerable system. The presumption that people who arrive in Australia seeking our protection are trying to cheat our system is offensive.

As a final indication of the value of this policy, it refers to section 49A of the Migration Act. There is no section 49A.

This policy lacks substance and needs to be seen for what it is - opportunistic and based on misinformation. It fuels an unfounded fear and ignores what asylum seeker policy should be based on - humanity.

One thing Abbott is right about is that integrity needs to be restored - but not with the system, as he asserts. What is missing is integrity in the presentation of information and integrity in our politicians and their policies.

The race to the bottom of the barrel in the asylum seeker debate continues and, with this policy, Tony Abbott is winning.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/ ... z20Np5QPdX

[Maureen K Clifford]

I don't think the amount of money they may or may not have comes into it. If you are fearful for your life and the lives of your family, wouldn't you try to escape the best way you could - I am bloody sure I would and if I had to sell everything I owned and take a chance on a leaky boat on the chance of a better life in a far off country as opposed to certain death or imprisonment and possible torture under a harsh regime - well it's a chance I would take, and IMO that is exactly what these people are doing.

The money side of things doesn't come into it. Some probably could afford $$$ wise to apply in the legal manner and wait their turn but perhaps they don't have the luxury of time on their side, just as Jews trying to escape the holocaust ran out of time.

Whilst I fully understand the angst this situation causes and the supposed unfairness that we perceive in offering these people so much when they reach our shores are we really prepared to stand by and see people killed for the want of a bit of Aussie generosity and mateship???? I do hope not. Our hearts and our country are bigger and better than that - we are after all - all citizens of the world.

Cheers

Maureen

[Dennis N O'Brien]

Ummmm.... interesting, 2 to nil so far in favour of the boat people.

Thanks for the comments Manfred and Maureen.

[r.magnay]

...not me Dennis!...refugees, yes, illegal immigrants NO! a genuine refugee would surely be happy to stop at the first place they get to rather than risk life and limb to get to a place further on, and when they get to whatever place they can, surely they would be much happier in a detention centre with all the trappings of a better than average motel rather than the so called persecution they are running from. Not only that, but I doubt a genuine refugee would burn the very refuge they have been provided simply because it is not to their liking! Refugee my bum! too many of them are obviuosly illegal immigants and need to be treated accordingly! If you can afford to pay a people smuggler to put you on an unsafe boat and risk your life crossing the ocean, surely you could buy a plane ticket and take your chance at the airport, after all, if you are a genuine refugee you will be allowed in anyway!

[Hully]

With all due respect - better make it 3 -1 (or 3 - 2 if you count the original post)

h

[Dennis N O'Brien]

Okay.....so that's Manfred, Maureen, Hully and Marty for the Illegal immigrants?/Refugees?/Boat people

And Ross against and although I don't normally post comments about my verse I'll have to generally speaking

side with Ross (otherwise we're getting too far behind )

So that's 4 - 2 to the above mentioned travellers. Ooops... forgot Malcolm

Make that 5 - 2 at this stage.

[David Campbell]

Make that 6-2. The people who come by boat do so because they can't get near a plane in the first place. Even if they can afford a ticket, they don't have the documentation, especially a passport. As it is, the number of people who manage to get appropriate documentation and come by plane seeking asylum is far greater than those who arrive by boat. It's reported that about 95 per cent of asylum seekers arrive by plane. About 50,000 of the 'plane people' overstay their visas each year, but that doesn't make the news because the boat arrivals are far more dramatic and exploitable for political purposes. And, as Manfred points out, there's no such thing as "illegals". Anyone arriving in Australia, no matter how they get here, has a right to seek asylum.

I agree with Maureen. If we were invaded, thrown out of our homes, hounded into the wilderness and constantly threatened with death under a harsh regime, I reckon quite a few of us would be piling into boats and heading off somewhere that looked better. And if, when we got there, that government tried to turn us round and tow us back to Australia we'd think pretty damn hard about sinking the boat in order to be picked up.

David

[Rimeriter]

"G'day" Dennis.
As an older Aussie, 1933 vintage, having sprung from the loins of Pommy parents in the depression years,
learned at the school of hard knocks, travelled a hard road and taken on some bumps and bruises,
I have great difficulty reconciling the easy way we make available.

Come if they must, but use the mainstream method or better still, remain in your mother country and fight for better conditions as our earlier settlers did.

"Kind regards" to all.
Jim.

[william williams]

I was reprimanded for posting poetry that was not R R M and as such. But has this forum now become a political style forum. You have your beliefs and I have mine so let us forget that and try and concentrate on poetry and yarn spinning maybe audio but it is more or less defunct


BILL WILLIAMS