The Greens oppose the CPRS not because it is too weak, but because it will point Australia in the wrong direction with little prospect of turning it around in the timeframe within which emissions must peak, says Senator Christine Milne.
Enough of the hysteria … refugees are good for us
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Australia has an open-borders arrangement with New Zealand and, despite what they say, we are just not being over-run by Kiwis. They don’t even share our cultural values — they play rugby union. It is simply ridiculous to imagine that we will be “over-run” by anyone else. It is just not credible to label the current hysteria as being an “immigration debate”. The Rudd government’s Indonesia policy is a total shambles and but for the magnitude of the human tragedy and loss of life the sight of Rudd being hoist on the petard of hypocrisy would be one of the all-time great moments of schadenfreude. Refugee policy stupidity is bipartisan; the only party that has had a consistent and sensible approach to illegal immigrants and refugees has been the Greens. Both the ALP and the Coalition has tried to gain the high moral ground while peddling xenophobia as viable policy. Australia has a deep and ugly xenophobia running through its psyche. This manifests itself in many ways: the Foreign Investment Review Board operates to vet foreign investment, AQIS protects Australia from foreign agriculture and the phobia towards boat arrivals borders on racism. This all fits into the anti-foreign bias that Bryan Caplan talks about in his book The myth of the rational voter: Why democracies choose bad policies. People tend to systematically underestimate the benefits of dealing with foreigners. This phenomenon goes all the way back to the White Australia Policy and should be seen in the same light. There are many more visa over stayers in Australia than there are boat people, yet it is the latter who cause all the kerfuffle. “Illegals” are more likely to have arrived in Australia through Sydney airport from Europe than by boat. There is almost no discussion of those people — after all, they are probably good for tourism and picking fruit. Accepting more refugees and boat people into the country is one of the greatest contributions Australia can make to improving the world around us and enhancing our own living standards. Rather than accepting people because we have an “obligation” under international law, why not accept people because we have an opportunity to improve living standards? Most of our foreign aid dollar is probably wasted. Remittances back home are going to do a lot more for the region (and even beyond) than tax-dollars will ever do. Allowing more people into Australia to work and improve their lives will have massive spillovers on the lives of their families and friends back home. Why let Canberra waste our tax-dollars on foreign aid, when people can and want to help themselves? Perhaps the greatest furphy is the argument about the welfare state. The notion that refugees come here simply because they want to get on to welfare is often heard. Milton Friedman once argued that an open borders policy was inconsistent with a welfare state. Perhaps. But why define ourselves by welfare; what about the rule of law, freedom of contract, freedom from persecution and so on? Our welfare policies have not made us comfortable, rich and prosperous, rather our work-ethic and our “propensity to truck, barter, and exchange one thing for another”. We also hear that terrorists may enter Australia via boat arrivals. To be sure that is true, by definition. Many refugees will have opposed their own government and lost; these people are almost always labelled “terrorist”. Had they won, these “freedom fighters” would then not be refugees. To the extent these people are a menace to Australia that is a matter for the police and criminal justice system. Fundamentally, the acceptance of refugees is good for Australia. How often do we hear “We should only take in people who would benefit Australia?” This simply begs the question, how does accepting people into the country who want to work and make a better life for themselves and their children not benefit Australia? The great Austrian economists Ludwig von Mises described the market economy as cooperation under the division of labour. By having more people in Australia there are more people to cooperate with, more people to trade with and more people to grow the market. As our wealth and economy grows there is more money for the finer things in life. Of course, we might hear that immigration brings unemployment and infrastructure stress. But the unemployment argument rests on the lump of labour fallacy. There isn’t a finite amount of work that needs to be shared out amongst more and more people. The infrastructure argument is just lazy government making excuses for their lack of service provision. They levy the tax every year, they can provide the services. The bottom line is this; rather than trying to keep people out, we should be looking to bring people in. The need for some or other orderly process (we will always have customs) is being hijacked by an anti-migrant and anti-refugee debate. It is also being morphed into an anti-Muslim debate. There needs to be leadership on this issue. All worthwhile reforms are difficult and often require leadership in changing public attitudes. Sinclair Davidson is professor in the School of Economics, Finance and Marketing at RMIT University and senior fellow at the Institute of Public Affairs. |
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9 Comments
For once I agree with Mr Davidson.
This is a major turnaround for this writer. I have never, in the past, thought much of the policies of the IPA.
I find myself in complete agreement with Professor Davidson. I have had some (not very recent) experience in migration law and policy, and I am, like most decent Australians, deeply troubled by the conflicting arguments and considerations. But the simple statements of obvious truth and unarguable principle spelt out by Professor Davidson are a welcome shaft of sunlight on the whole tangled and tragic mess.
I voted and will continue to vote for Kevin Rudd, but my view is that he has badly let down his party, many of his supporters and Australia as a whole by what I regard as a badly shambolic approach to this issue.
This woolly thinking is exactly what one would expect from the armchair academic pandering to the chattering classes. Our open border arrangement New Zealand involves two substantially democratic countries with similar social and economic capacities. Migrating from one to the other does not involve a significant change in lifestyle social or economic parameters.
Of the several billion people living in the Third World, migration to Australia would provide enormous benefits if the influx did not reduce our living standards to Third World status. How many hundreds of millions of migrants you want? Every country in the world controls its borders and it has nothing to do with racism. The racism card is easily played even if it can’t be substantiated. It is fundamental self interest which is the primary basis for most Australian’s concern.
I agree that Rudd’s policy is a shambles but that’s because he lied to the Australian population on the presumption that relaxation of border controls would not result in an influx of queue jumping migrants. Evidence has proved him wrong. The boat people however are the”tip of the iceberg”. The bigger problem is the tens of thousands of visa overstayers and students in shonky training colleges who are migrating illegally and taking places that might otherwise be available to genuine refugees.
If we want to have increased migration, and a quota of refugees, we should have some selection criteria. Social compatibility would be one critical parameter. This has nothing to do with racism.
Followers of Judaism have maintained a separate social existence in our community for generations, a process maintained on the basis of mutual respect and substantially common social values. Our recent experience with Islamic extremists in this country would indicate that it is not racism that is the problem but religious fundamentalism. Islamic fundamentalism denies equality of opportunity for women, education for women, and in some instances the murder of unbelievers. Sharia courts treat women and unbelievers as lesser beings from the perspective of justice. Western civilisation has moved beyond this type of social and gender differentiation, and I have no desire to import any more of this fundamentalist threat into our country. Similarly Tamil Tiger terrorists are another potential threat and should not be included in our country. This is not racism. This is self protection.
Self screening through the agency of people smuggling is not the answer. Queue jumping in any system involving quantitative controls is inequitable. There are hundreds of thousands of refugees in United Nations camps who have no chance of getting to Australia while well resourced queue jumpers buy their way in. Why are Tamil separatists choosing to cross the Indian Ocean rather than the short trip to Tamil Naidu? There is one answer only, derived directly from games theory, that the risk return payoff is significantly better in Australia with our generous social welfare system. True refugees would take a shorter trip and not expose their children to unnecessary risk.
Fundamentally Australians are selfish individuals. They choose to maintain their high standard of living through the maintenance of border controls. They share of this desire with most of the G 20 nations. I do not wish to change with this situation along with the majority of Australians.
The eventual outcome of the proposals postulated by the Prof and his followers would be a significant reduction in our standard of living. Overcrowding, water shortages, reduction in the quantity and quality of food are three examples. I have a better suggestion. To those who want to share their living standard with the Third World, I would suggest that they congregate in small enclaves, reduced the food water and resources consumption, and send the consequential financial surplus to Third World countries where it can do a lot of good. On this basis they would be making a noble sacrifice and not dragging me with them. Is easy to pontificate about principles when you are not making the sacrifice yourselves. Be prepared to put your money where your mouth is.
Congratulations Greg Angelo - you said it all for me!
We already have water shortages with cities stealing water from our food production and high cost of rents and houses are due to supply and demand which is fuelled by the larger intake of migrants lately.
Also immigration added 58p to Britain’s economy per migrant on a recent study by their House of Lords whereas their public had been told like us that migrants added billions to the economy. Maybe we should have a study of this done here but that may not suit the left.
Lastly the fact we could only dredge up $30 a week for an unmarried person over 65 and nothing for a married person on the base pension indicates we are not such a wealthy country as we cannot look after our own well enough and they actually did work and pay their taxes to bring us to this point.
Well knock me down with a feather the IPA does have heart…..Though I can’t help wondering if Sinclair Davidson’s hand wringing over asylum seekers has more to with the fact that action by government is interfering in the business activities of those enterprising people smuggling entrepreneurs…..Yeah lets hear it for the free movement of people and goods in a borderless free market utopia….Well said Greg Angelo, you are not voice in the wilderness, not even at Crikey.
Greg Angelo
In order to publicly express my opinion about refugee influx I did some studies on the subject. I thought that the Australian Immigration Department and UNHCR data would be a good start .
1. In 2008 we were 39th in the world in recognising asylum seekers as refugees.
2. Of 827.000 people who sought asylum globally in 2008 only 4.750 came to Australia
3. Of 185,550 asylum seekers claims lodged in industrialised countries in 2009 just 2504 were lodged in Australia
4. Australia accounted for just over 1% of all people seeking asylum in the industrialised world in the first 6 months of 2009
5. Europe accounted for 75 % of all claims for asylum lodged in the 44 industrialised countries in the first 6 months of 2009
6. of the 44 industrialised countries in the world Australia has the toughest and most inhumane refugee policies.
7. We are the only industrialised country in the world to have offshore detention centres and mandatory detention for undocumented arrivals.
8. Number of people who sought asylum in Australia in 2008 - 4750
% who sought asylum that came by plane 97.3%b n
Number who arrived by boat 171 (2.7%)
9. Number of asylum seekers Australia has per 1000 people who reside here 0.2 per 1000
About 1700 asylum seekers came by boat this year to Australia
Italy had 36 000 arrivals, USA - 49 000 in 2008, Canada 36.900., France 35 000, and Britain 30 500 .
THE REASON for these large increases is not because they got ‘soft’ but because of the violence in the countries like Iraq, Afghanistan Somalia, Sudan and Sri Lanka. An increase in the number and intensity of worldwide ‘push factors’ has forced many from their homes.
10. It is illegal for the Australian Government to deny people seeking asylum to be prevented from doing so
11. Australian government is dumping it’s responsibility on Indonesia, the country that has not even a signatory to the Refugee Convention
I also understand that the blatant statement by some members of the government that there are milions refugees all over the world and in refugee camps is not accurate. People who do remain in refugee camps very often do not seek asylum. They hope to return home some day.
Greg Angelo
Have you never heard about Iraqi (refugees) scientists and doctors working for the Australian government??
And I would rather ignore your comments on religious preferences.
Unfortunately the author demonstrates that it is possible to be correct for entirely the wrong reasons. Just as a fallaciously held truth is more dangerous than a falsehood if acted upon, so he isn’t being decent for decency sake, purely to bash Krudd & Ko.
Also, I assume that they are on some sort of retainer from amerika for the FTA sophistry “AQIS protects Australia from foreign agriculture” - try again, with some facts. We allow much agriculutral product into this country (whether we should, for different reasons, is another discussion) but AQIS is about BIOSECURITY. Quite simple, even for an IPA shill.
Like other posters, I find myself in surprised agreement with most of Sinclair Davidson’s article. But the absurdity of one of his passing observations devalues the rest of his argument ie his suggestion that the operations of AQIS are a manifestation of “a deep and ugly xenophobia”. Is he seriously advocating an open borders policy for pests and diseases?
Rena
Thank you for your thoughtful observations. The issue is not how many so-called refugees we are currently taking, is how many that we will have if we relax border control. The very fact that our border controls are distasteful acts as a deterrent. By all accounts the living standards of people affected by war and famine are abhorrent, but we do not have to become the dumping ground for the world’s problems. It is quite obvious that Australia is a destination of choice, and that people are paying significant sums to get here. Try getting into America on the same basis and see how you get on.
I see that you would rather ignore issues of religious reference. This is a significant issue when fundamentalists of any religious persuasion, including born-again Christians, try to force their fundamentalist views on others. I believe it is beholden on any migrant coming into this country to accept the standards in this country and not try to introduce their own fundamentalist religious preferences. If they don’t want to do that they don’t bother to come. This includes equality of opportunity, regardless of gender or sexual preference. Try exercising the freedoms experience in this country in a repressive Third World fundamentalist environment and see how long you last.
Anybody who forces their way into this country, either as a boat person or overstaying a visa are needs to be treated swiftly. Unfortunately there are so many loop holes in our legal system that can be exploited by diligent opponents of government policy that it is absolutely necessary to deny the illegal migrants access to our legal system. This is a harsh truths and a reflection of manipulation of the legal system by refugee advocates.
Just remember that while you are maintaining your high standard of living, it is only because of the migration barriers that this country maintains. Anybody desirous of the Third World living standards through open borders do not have to drag us down to that level. It would be much easier for these advocates to migrate to a Third World country. You cannot have your cake and eat it too.
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