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THE POINTED VIEW: Tough talk on refugees still a sign of the times
Issue 189 - 29 Oct 2009
ISSUE 189, October 29, 2009: Moral leadership from the Prime Minister on the immigration debate is just too much to ask for, writes PROF LARISSA BEHRENDT*.
One of my friends once said to Phillip Ruddock when he was Minister for Indigenous Affairs, "I know why you don't like these boat people. We let them in in 1788 and look what happened to us."
I am often reminded of her comment when I see the hysteria in the media and general community about asylum seekers who come to Australia by boat.
It is a strange obsession, too, when one looks at the facts.
In 2006, 300,000 refugees arrived in Europe to seek asylum.
In contrast, 4174 reached Australia by boat or plane.
Australia comes in 32nd out of the 71 countries resettling refugees (slightly behind Kazakhstan, Guinea, Djibouti and Syria).
The "resettling" is mostly done by countries like Pakistan and Indonesia who have to deal with millions of refugees.
We are one of only eight countries that set a quota for refugees.
We are one of only five countries that put asylum seekers into detention.
By comparison, Britain places restrictions on asylum seekers but they work and live in the community.
Tanzania hosts one refugee for every 76 Tanzanian people.
Britain hosts one refugee for every 530 British people.
We host one refugee for every 1583 Australian people.
We are not being over-run with refugees. And most of our refugees come by plane, not by boat.
The rhetoric that we are being flooded with boat people simply does not stack up against the facts.
But the public debate on the issue of immigration - especially refugees - is as emotive and devoid of reason and rationality as debates on Indigenous issues in the broader community often are.
And as a few more boatloads of people arrive seeking refuge in Australia, criticism has been levied on the Rudd government that they are not being tough enough on asylum seekers and border protection.
The critics charge is that the Rudd government has gone soft.
The people on these boats are fleeing Sri Lanka, and the political situation they are running away from has more of an influence on their decision to take their family and seek a new, safer life somewhere else, than tinkering with legislation and policy in Australia does.
Most end up proving that they are legitimate refugees and are granted asylum.
A report from the Edmund Rice Centre for Justice and Community showed that genuine refugees from Afghanistan who had been denied asylum, including children, in Australia were killed when they were returned to Afghanistan after being told by the Australian government it was safe for them to return home.
Ninety-seven percent of applicants from Iraq and 93 percent of applicants from Afghanistan seeking asylum in 1999 were recognised as genuine refugees.
About 84 percent of all asylum seekers are found to be legitimate refugees.
You do not hear Rudd and his team using the words "illegal immigrants", which the Coalition would use interchangeably with the words "asylum seekers".
The two are very, very different. But Rudd's stance is one that seeks to show he is tough on border protection but a little softer when it comes to the humanity of refugees.
Rudd has been shown in the media repeatedly spouting his message: "I make absolutely no apology whatsoever for taking a hard-line on illegal immigration to Australia."
Or "this Government makes no apology whatsoever for the fact that we have a tough line on asylum seekers."
Or: "Make no apologies for a tough approach to border protection; make no apologies for the retention of mandatory detention on Christmas Island."
The "tough line" is to tip off Indonesia about the whereabouts of boats spotted by Australia, give the Indonesians some money and have them deal with the asylum seekers.
This has become known as the "Indonesian solution".
The problem with the "Indonesian solution" is that it is, firstly, an abrogation of our responsibility and obligations to take legitimate refugees who seek refuge in Australia.
Secondly, we are turning asylum seekers over to a jurisdiction that has not signed any international instruments committing itself to the humane treatment of refugees.
Refugee advocates have expressed concerns about the welfare of asylum seekers who have been handed over to Indonesia.
There have been some significant developments in the immigration portfolio. Minister Chris Evans was one of the best shadow Ministers of Indigenous Affairs when he had the position.
He saw through the ideological push of the previous government and when he gave speeches about the need to take a "policy-based approach" he seemed to know what it meant.
It is impossible to imagine him hiding behind the rhetoric that Macklin uses ("I just care about women and children") to cover a whole range of policy failures and ideological drivers.
Under Chris Evans' watch, long-term mandatory detention has ended.
We are no longer locking up the children of asylum seekers and Temporary Protection Visas have been abolished.
Evans is measured and humane when speaking of asylum speakers. His language is much more tempered than Rudd's.
Many on the left think that Rudd is playing this badly, that he has misjudged the mood post-Howard and he will be forced to rethink when the opinion polls show that he is being too tough, too inhumane.
I don't agree. I think Rudd has the mood of the electorate pegged. And most Australians are still uncomfortable with the sight of boatloads of brown people floating towards us.
Many believe the fear-mongering of the likes of Wilson Tuckey, who allege that there are terrorists amongst the arrivals.
There is still deep anxiety amongst white Australia about other cultures and their impact on Australian society.
But Rudd has the capacity to make a fundamental shift in the whole immigration debate.
He enjoys enormous political capital. His popularity is in the mid-60s. After the same period in office, Howard's was hovering under 40 percent. He could use this political capital to show leadership and perhaps challenge some of the misunderstandings surrounding immigration.
Of course he will not do this. And it is a reflection of the same mistake that those of us who work on Indigenous affairs made about Rudd.
He's not Howard, but somehow we assumed that this meant that he was going to show the moral leadership that Howard wouldn't and couldn't on human rights related issues.
But that is not the way Rudd operates. He is not Howard but he shares the same motivation to remain in power and the same attention to the mood of the electorate.
He is not a moral visionary. He is a pragmatist. He will no more attempt to change misconceptions about asylum seekers than he will challenge the popular misconceptions about the Northern Territory intervention.
So we just have to accept that, under a Rudd government, the old prejudices and hatreds, the xenophobia and intolerance are going to be cultivated and allowed to simmer.
Culture forgotten in secondary school curriculum
The Rudd government have been adamant about the development of a national curriculum and the Australian Curriculum Framework is in its formative stages.
This work is being driven by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA).
ACARA has said that it will establish an Indigenous reference group and appoint Indigenous people to a number of the subject-specific writing panels. Everyone concedes that this is a good start.
However, the Australian Education Union (AEU) has raised concerns about the recently released framework for the development of Senior Secondary Years Curriculum.
It mentions Indigenous perspectives only twice.
Once in History - Ancient History. The other is mention is in English, in the context of developing a course for students from diverse backgrounds with English as an Additional Language or Dialect (EALD).
The AEU has called on Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard to ensure that:
• Structured opportunities are created for Indigenous educators and community members from all areas of Australia to engage collectively in all levels of the process of the development of the Australian Curriculum;
• Through this engagement, the Australian Curriculum accurately include and reflect perspectives of Indigenous Australia;
• Consideration be given to a stand-alone stream of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander studies in the Australian Curriculum;
• Indigenous people are appointed to all panels established to guide the development of the Australian Curriculum;
• An Indigenous person with appropriate educational qualifications/experience and expertise in curriculum development is appointed to the ACARA board; and
• Indigenous educators are employed by ACARA to drive the above processes.
This agenda would be an even better basis for the work of ACARA. The AEU has invited people to support this request. I will be putting my name to it.
larissa@nit.com.au
* Larissa Behrendt is a Professor of Law at the University of Technology Sydney. She is an award-winning author and a fortnightly columnist with NIT. She is this year's NAIDOC Person of the Year.
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