Categories: australia, charity-social-welfare
Date: 10 August 2006 06:30:46
Very much in the news of late: and a bill to extend offshore processing of asylum seekers has just passed the Lower House.
I'll make no secret of the fact I'm probably way of left in politics. And in terms of Australia's current refugee policy, I am rather ashamed and embarrassed to call myself Australian. We lock up asylum seekers who don't have the correct documentation, for years, seven years in the case of one fellow a few years' back, and some we even intercept and send to remote islands that have been removed from Australia's migration zone so we can't say they have landed in Australia. And now we are extending the 'off-shore' processing of asylum seekers. While I'm upset about this extension, I am far more ashamed at the locking-up for periods far in excess of what is surely necessary, and what is surely loving. I admit I may not be informed in matters such as processing of asylum seekers or illegal immigrants, but surely, surely, they can be processed in months, not years. And it should not take four years or more. No doubt some time is needed to asses claims, and check for various things such as disease, but I can't imagine that this can take years.
One of the things I love about this country is its multiculturalism. Apart from the six months I've just spent down south, which was still a fairly 'white' area, I have always been surrounded by those of every nation, tribe and culture: many of my friends were refugees or children of refugees; I've had very few Anglo friends, and still have a smaller number than those from Asia or the Middle East. And I love it: how can I not? it is all I have known. I love the fact we can all live together, and I love the many things these new Australians bring: food is one big thing, but there is so much more: their rich culture, their values, their beliefs...to me it is a wonderful thing. Being friends with people outside your culture opens your horizons greatly and helps you realise that, in many things, your way is not the only way. And yet while this can, and does, happen: we lock up and treat so terribly many of those who are coming here to escape war or persecution: who simply want the life we so often take for granted.
Lord, have mercy.