15 myths and facts about refugees

The facilities resemble medium security prisons. Length of imprisonment varies from person to person. Over half are detained for longer than three months, while some remain in detention for as long as six years. It is not unusual for people to be detained for longer than a year.

Refugees often exhibit chronic and acute health problems, originating in experiences of torture and trauma, or years in refugee camps. Emerging medical evidence shows that the experience of being in an Australian detention centre often exacerbates such problems.

Denial of English language tuition and employment assistance are major barriers to TPV entrants’ participation in society.

". . . I prefer to go back and be killed. … You die and suffer for one day and it’s all over. Every single day here I feel I am dying gradually."

Asylum seeker, who remains in detention after two years.

14. Refugees cost too much

Mandatory detention is the most expensive way of dealing with asylum seekers. The high security and remote locations of the centres adds considerably to the cost.

There is potential for large savings if asylum seekers were allowed to live in the community while awaiting their hearing.

At $104.00 a day per head, detention is very expensive. Community-based alternatives to mandatory detention can be found internationally and within the current Australian parole system.

A select committee of the NSW Parliament has costed alternatives to incarceration including home detention and transitional housing. The average cost of community-based programs are (per person, per day): Parole: $5.39. Probation: $3.94. Home Detention: $58.83. These options are clearly more economically efficient, and much more humane.

"With regard to the desire of people from the poorer nations breaking the ‘rules’ in coming to Australia, why not change the rules to our medium-term advantage? Wouldn’t it be a positive and sustainable use of our immigration and security resources to facilitate a greater number of arrivals, and use the millions of dollars currently being spent delaying or resisting their arrival by assisting their eventual contribution to our country?

Mark Kelly, Margot Kingston’s Webdiary SMH 10/09/2001

15. Australia has to get tough with people smugglers

The people smugglers are not listening. They have been paid, and the fate of those on the boats is of no interest to them as long as they can fill the next boat. The smugglers will not be discouraged by measures that make life even more difficult for their victims.

Prohibition failed to stop people drinking alcohol, it is failing in the "drug war" (as many former proponents now admit). Why should it succeed with people smuggling as long as conditions persist that produce refugees? Improving those conditions is a massive worldwide problem. Australia will not contribute to any solution by becoming isolationist and throwing up (mainly for show) barriers.