Petition on refugees (was Re: luv-talk Digest, Vol 31, Issue 1)
On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 5:31 PM, Russell Coker <russell@coker.com.au> wrote:
Actually many petitions achieve a result.
A petition may well precede a change in policy but this does not show a causal relationship. Politicians take notice of a) Polls b) Focus groups c) People who control large donations (eg trade union heavies in the ALP, large corporates, wealthy individuals). d) People who can stir up trouble and impact voting behaviour (eg the mining tax campaign). e) Cogent demonstrations of better policy options in terms of achieving the politicians' objectives. In my days in politics I heard politicians regularly refer to these but not on a single occasion to petitions. In earlier days petitions were a crude kind of opinion poll but serve little purpose now (but see below). I remember being told by a state secretary of the right faction of the ALP (in those days at least the factions had official office bearers) that a lot of the activities that politicians encourage people to undertake are there specifically to consume time and energy that might otherwise being deployed causing "trouble" and getting in the way of the real decision making process. He had had quite a few beers thus his frankness. He cited party conferences (since they became non-binding), branch meetings, fund raising, and policy assemblies as examples. He did not mention petitions but they would fit.
Alternatively, if you are serious: donate a significant percentage of
your
income to good causes,
If you have as much money as Clive Palmer then you can try to create a personal political party to achieve your goals. If not then your best option is to convince other people.
A person earning a good living such as someone working in IT, like many of the subscribers to luv-talk, could potentially donate $50k/year to a good cause. Charitable donations are tax deductible so this would be pre-tax dollars. This money can go more or less directly to support your cause. Such a sum could make a significant different to a large number of poor people. I suggest that your argument sounds more like a poor rationalization than a good reason. Trying to convince other people just adds your voice to the crowd of people shouting. The chance of making any difference at all is slight.
or do the hard thinking to actually come up with a better immigration policy
We have discussed this with you before. <insults follow>
I have been following this issue around the world for a long time. It is contentious and difficult everywhere. Take as just one example the scandal over the involuntary sterilization of asylum seekers in Israel, and their forced repatriation to Uganda - http://www.vice.com/read/uganda-is-the-first-country-to-swap-african-refugee... . The rise of the far right in Europe is linked to immigration as well as to the poor economy. No-one has responded to my challenge to demonstrate their sincerity and commitment to the cause they are claiming to be so passionate about by a) Demonstrating they are directing substantial amounts of their personal resources to such good causes, and b) Filling in the answers to the policy questions so show they have actually thought through the issues. Several people directed me to the collection of generalities and platitudes which is the Greens web page on immigration. This is not even close to a serious attempt. Given the Greens' poor record of predicting the consequences of refugee policy, an analysis is clearly needed. Eg they contemptuously dismissed suggestions that a softer policy would result in an increase in boat people. They could not have been more wrong. The best effort was Lev's attempt to fill in the blanks in the Greens' document. The problem is that this is neither Lev's policy or the Greens. And there was little or no analysis.
study what's been done before
You will need to be more specific. I have done this as best I can. I don't see any wonderful solutions out there. * Claiming that solutions are out there is not the same as demonstrating this, as we found with the Greens. * Repeatedly claiming that you have provided answers is not the same as actually doing so.
There was nothing below, just text quoted from another message. Did you forget to write something?
The text below was a list of questions that an honest attempt at an alternate policy needs to address. I reinstate it below. In my proposal, posted to this list earlier I suggested a large increase in our refugee intake, combined with a hard line on boat people. Strangely, this was followed by insinuations that I am a racist who wants to keep refugees out of the country! Apparently anyone who disagrees with the Greens' stance on immigration must be a racist. And I have actually studied the issues and articulated a policy. Yet somehow I lack the courage to take on these issues, or something. I would really welcome an honest attempt to grapple with this issues. Questions an honest attempt at a refugee policy should answer ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Policy ******* 1. What measures would you put in place to discourage people arriving by boat or plane, if any? 2. What change would you make to the refugee quota? Would there still be a limit? 3. Would the arrivals get work permits? How would they be supported if they did not get work? 4. To what degree would you vet arrivals to see if a) they are 'genuine' refugees b) They are criminals, terrorists, or fanatics of one sort or another c) They have communicable illnesses? What level of appeals would be possible? Would we pay for legal aid throughout a long-drawn-out legal process? 5. When people arrive would they be detained or monitored? Describe these arrangements. Would this depend on the answers to the previous question? 6. What would you do with people who are not 'genuine' refugees, or who are otherwise undesirable? Would you deport or detain them? 7. What do you do with people whose status is uncertain? People arrive without documentation, they may lie or exaggerate their predicament. You cannot exactly ask, say, the Iranian government "It is true that if this person were returned then you would persecute them?" and expect a useful answer. 8. Would you limit where people could live and what work they could do? How would you enforce this? 9. Would you devote any extra resources to projects such as solving world hunger (as suggested above) as part of the solution? Impact ******** 1. What do you think would be the effect of your policy on the number of unsolicited refugees arriving by aircraft, boat ie refugees arriving without a visa, if any? 2. What do you think the impact of your policy on the total level of immigration to Australia, if any? 3, What would be the effect of your policy on Australia's economy, unemployment levels, wages, crime and welfare dependency, if any. 4. What do you think would be the effect of your policy in any other respect on the people who currently inhabit Australia, if any?
On Mon, 7 Apr 2014 13:40:16 Tim Josling wrote:
On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 5:31 PM, Russell Coker <russell@coker.com.au> wrote:
Actually many petitions achieve a result.
A petition may well precede a change in policy but this does not show a causal relationship.
Often a petition gets a result after other measures have failed.
Politicians take notice of
a) Polls b) Focus groups c) People who control large donations (eg trade union heavies in the ALP, large corporates, wealthy individuals). d) People who can stir up trouble and impact voting behaviour (eg the mining tax campaign).
Petitions meet D and they both indicate and drive factors A and B.
e) Cogent demonstrations of better policy options in terms of achieving the politicians' objectives.
That doesn't seem to be the case. There's no shortage of examples of politicians following bad policy for decades in spite of better options. One of the best examples of this is the "war on drugs".
In my days in politics I heard politicians regularly refer to these but not on a single occasion to petitions. In earlier days petitions were a crude kind of opinion poll but serve little purpose now (but see below).
I remember being told by a state secretary of the right faction of the ALP (in those days at least the factions had official office bearers) that a lot of the activities that politicians encourage people to undertake are there specifically to consume time and energy that might otherwise being deployed causing "trouble" and getting in the way of the real decision making process. He had had quite a few beers thus his frankness. He cited party conferences (since they became non-binding), branch meetings, fund raising, and policy assemblies as examples. He did not mention petitions but they would fit.
The fact that he didn't mention petitions is probably because they work.
Trying to convince other people just adds your voice to the crowd of people shouting. The chance of making any difference at all is slight.
The fact that you are trying to convince me disproves your claim. I almost never argue with people who believe in the power of prayer. Most people who believe that prayer works have political opinions that I disagree with and I'm very happy to have them waste their time praying and then do nothing else.
No-one has responded to my challenge to demonstrate their sincerity and commitment to the cause they are claiming to be so passionate about by a) Demonstrating they are directing substantial amounts of their personal resources to such good causes, and b) Filling in the answers to the policy questions so show they have actually thought through the issues.
There aren't any real policy problems. Take in everyone who arrives, the ones who are determined to be legitimate refugees (the vast majority of people who arrive by boat) are allowed to stay, the rest are returned.
Several people directed me to the collection of generalities and platitudes which is the Greens web page on immigration. This is not even close to a serious attempt. Given the Greens' poor record of predicting the consequences of refugee policy, an analysis is clearly needed. Eg they contemptuously dismissed suggestions that a softer policy would result in an increase in boat people. They could not have been more wrong.
The current Liberal policy of treating people badly enough that risking death is a good alternative is not a viable policy.
* Repeatedly claiming that you have provided answers is not the same as actually doing so.
As long as you ignore the substance of all email sent to you there's not much point in going to the effort of addressing your "questions".
There was nothing below, just text quoted from another message. Did you
forget to write something?
The text below was a list of questions that an honest attempt at an alternate policy needs to address. I reinstate it below.
You need to learn to quote properly.
In my proposal, posted to this list earlier I suggested a large increase in our refugee intake, combined with a hard line on boat people. Strangely, this was followed by insinuations that I am a racist who wants to keep refugees out of the country! Apparently anyone who disagrees with the Greens' stance on immigration must be a racist. And I have actually studied the issues and articulated a policy. Yet somehow I lack the courage to take on these issues, or something.
Everyone should be treated decently, even criminals. When someone thinks that refugees who have not been convicted of any crime (or even accused) should be treated worse than convicted criminals the only plausible explanations are cowardice and racism.
1. What measures would you put in place to discourage people arriving by boat or plane, if any?
For the legitimate refugees nothing other than trying to make things better in other parts of the world. Overall we would have had fewer refugees arriving at Australia if there hadn't been wars in Vietnam or Iraq.
2. What change would you make to the refugee quota? Would there still be a limit?
I believe that the UN agreements that Australia signed don't permit a quota.
3. Would the arrivals get work permits? How would they be supported if they did not get work?
They would get jobs. The number of people immigrating from the EU and the US far exceeds the number of refugees. If it's considered that the overall population increase is too much then we could restrict the number of people allowed to immigrate from other countries.
4. To what degree would you vet arrivals to see if a) they are 'genuine' refugees b) They are criminals, terrorists, or fanatics of one sort or another c) They have communicable illnesses? What level of appeals would be possible? Would we pay for legal aid throughout a long-drawn-out legal process?
I don't think that the situation with communicable illnesses is any worse than for people who arrive by plane. In fact there's a significant advantage in accepting people who arrive from boat in that the probability of someone arriving before they develop symptoms is a lot lower. In terms of terrorists the issue has always been people who have the money to buy a plane ticket. Let's not be afraid of terrorists too.
5. When people arrive would they be detained or monitored? Describe these arrangements. Would this depend on the answers to the previous question?
If they are refugees then they shouldn't be detained.
6. What would you do with people who are not 'genuine' refugees, or who are otherwise undesirable? Would you deport or detain them?
Deport them of course.
7. What do you do with people whose status is uncertain? People arrive without documentation, they may lie or exaggerate their predicament. You cannot exactly ask, say, the Iranian government "It is true that if this person were returned then you would persecute them?" and expect a useful answer.
Give them a decent place to live in the mean time, some place that doesn't make them want to kill themself. Treat them as well as we want Australian citizens to be treated in such situations. -- My Main Blog http://etbe.coker.com.au/ My Documents Blog http://doc.coker.com.au/
Russell Coker wrote:
On Mon, 7 Apr 2014 13:40:16 Tim Josling wrote:
On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 5:31 PM, Russell Coker <russell@coker.com.au> wrote:
Actually many petitions achieve a result.
A petition may well precede a change in policy but this does not show a causal relationship.
Often a petition gets a result after other measures have failed.
Citation needed.
On Mon, April 7, 2014 5:58 pm, Trent W. Buck wrote:
Russell Coker wrote:
Often a petition gets a result after other measures have failed.
Citation needed.
The 2007 UK road pricing and car tracking petition is a good example of success after normal lobbying failed. Perhaps some of Avaaz's successes can be considered as well. -- Lev Lafayette, BA (Hons), GradCertTerAdEd (Murdoch), GradCertPM, MBA (Tech Mngmnt) (Chifley) mobile: 0432 255 208 RFC 1855 Netiquette Guidelines http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc1855.txt
On Mon, Apr 7, 2014 at 4:32 PM, Russell Coker wrote:
On Mon, 7 Apr 2014 13:40:16 Tim Josling wrote:
On Fri, Apr 4, 2014 at 5:31 PM, Russell Coker wrote: Politicians take notice of
a) Polls b) Focus groups c) People who control large donations (eg trade union heavies in the ALP, large corporates, wealthy individuals). d) People who can stir up trouble and impact voting behaviour (eg the mining tax campaign).
Petitions meet D and they both indicate and drive factors A and B....
e) Cogent demonstrations of better policy options in terms of achieving the
politicians' objectives.
That doesn't seem to be the case. There's no shortage of examples of
politicians following bad policy for decades in spite of better options. One of the best examples of this is the "war on drugs".
Perhaps you are confusing your objectives with the politicians' objectives. One (wo)man's bad policy is another (wo)man's win eg any policy that allows the next election to be won, regardless of the long term cost may be seen as a win by a politician focusses on short term results. One example is borrowing money to fund spending programs that are not a solid investment in the future. The war on drugs has been a great success when viewed from a certain perspective eg allowing the growth in police powers, ability to lock up people against whom you can find very little evidence for anything else, also the growth in the prison industry etc.
The fact that he didn't mention petitions is probably because they work.
I think the reason my political acquaintances did not ever mention petitions is more likely that they have a negligible effect. They certainly mentioned polls and focus groups a lot and they were very interested in better ways to achieve their objectives. As you may recall I asked for evidence that the people who have been talking about how immoral our refugee policy is are really serious about the issue. I asked for evidence that a) They devote significant fractions of their personal resources to helping poor people, and b) They have seriously worked through the relevant policy issues. Do date I have - Incomplete top of mind thoughts about policy - Vague claims that people donate (some) money to charities - Claims that people devote (some) time to activism. - Exhortations to sign a petition. Underwhelming. Though your partial answers below are a start.
Trying to convince other people just adds your voice to the crowd of people
shouting. The chance of making any difference at all is slight.
The fact that you are trying to convince me disproves your claim.
I don't think your opinion is that important. I am interested to find out if there are errors or omissions in my own opinions. Also I find the sort of moral posturing and displays of group affiliation that are associated with the refugee issue tedious, so I call them out in the hope that they may diminish.
There aren't any real policy problems. Take in everyone who arrives, the ones who are determined to be legitimate refugees (the vast majority of people who arrive by boat) are allowed to stay, the rest are returned.
If only the ALP realized it was so simple! If they had, they would have realized that they had no need to change their policy when people started drowning in large numbers.
When someone thinks that refugees who have not been convicted of any crime (or even accused) should be treated worse than convicted criminals
...There are a few steps missing in your logic at this point...
the only plausible explanations are cowardice and racism.
1. What measures would you put in place to discourage people arriving by boat or plane, if any?
For the legitimate refugees nothing other than trying to make things better in other parts of the world. Overall we would have had fewer refugees arriving at Australia if there hadn't been wars in Vietnam or Iraq.
To clarify here, you are saying that there would be no measures to hinder people coming to Australia and claiming refugee status, regardless of the method of transport (eg scheduled airline services)? Currently, I believe, airlines are penalized for bringing people without proper visas, for example - you would stop doing this perhaps? So anyone with, or able to borrow, the money for a plane ticket could come here and claim refugee status? Is that correct? You cannot have a policy at the point of arrival that depends on someone being a genuine refugee, or not, because the determination has not yet been made, and can and does take years.
2. What change would you make to the refugee quota? Would there still be a limit?
I believe that the UN agreements that Australia signed don't permit a quota.
I am talking about the overall refugee quota. You seem to be entirely focussed on people who arrive by boat. Apart from these people, there is an intake of people who are accepted as refugees from overseas who we then bring here - there is no UN regulation that prevents us from having limits on this number, and we do have small limits. Previously I proposed a large increase in this number. Please clarify: You have given no indication that there would be an increase in the quota for refugees that we accept directly from overseas - is that correct? I also gather you would have no quota for people who arrive without having been accepted beforehand. If determined to be refugees, they would be then allowed to stay.
3. Would the arrivals get work permits? How would they be supported if they did not get work?
They would get jobs....
OK. So arrivals / applicants would get (temporary) work permits. I assume they would get some form of social security payment if they could not work - correct?
4. To what degree would you vet arrivals to see if a) they are 'genuine' refugees b) They are criminals, terrorists, or fanatics of one sort or another c) They have communicable illnesses? What level of appeals would be possible? Would we pay for legal aid throughout a long-drawn-out legal process?
I don't think that the situation with communicable illnesses is any worse than for people who arrive by plane. In fact there's a significant advantage in accepting people who arrive from boat in that the probability of someone arriving before they develop symptoms is a lot lower.
In terms of terrorists the issue has always been people who have the money to buy a plane ticket. Let's not be afraid of terrorists too.
You did not answer this question. From your answer I get the impression that any such vetting would not occur, but it is only an impression. is this a correct impression? You did not answer the question about legal aid. Below you say that people who are otherwise undesirable would be deported. This suggests that some vetting would take place, in contrast to the impression above. This needs clarification.
5. When people arrive would they be detained or monitored? Describe these arrangements. Would this depend on the answers to the previous question?
If they are refugees then they shouldn't be detained.
You are begging the question. the determination of refugee status can take years. What happens before then?
6. What would you do with people who are not 'genuine' refugees, or who are otherwise undesirable? Would you deport or detain them?
Deport them of course.
OK. See note above about vetting.
7. What do you do with people whose status is uncertain? People arrive without documentation, they may lie or exaggerate their predicament. You cannot exactly ask, say, the Iranian government "It is true that if this person were returned then you would persecute them?" and expect a useful answer.
Give them a decent place to live in the mean time, some place that doesn't make them want to kill themself. Treat them as well as we want Australian citizens to be treated in such situations.
From this I gather you would allow people whose status is uncertain to stay
indefinitely. You did not mention revoking work permits or access to social security in this situation. Overall it looks like you are suggesting they would be treated much the same as people who are positively determined to be refugees. Any differences? You deleted and/or did not answer the following questions:
8, Would you limit where people could live and what work they could do? How would you enforce this?
Seeing you did not mention any limits I am assuming you would not put any limits in place - correct?
9. Would you devote any extra resources to projects such as solving world hunger (as suggested above) as part of the solution?
For this you do say the following:
For the legitimate refugees nothing other than trying to make things better in other parts of the world. Overall we would have had fewer refugees arriving at Australia if there hadn't been wars in Vietnam or Iraq.
From this it is hard to tell what resources including $'s you would be putting into this.
Impact
1. What do you think would be the effect of your policy on the number of unsolicited refugees arriving by aircraft, boat ie refugees arriving without a visa, if any?
2. What do you think the impact of your policy on the total level of immigration to Australia, if any?
3, What would be the effect of your policy on Australia's economy, unemployment levels, wages, crime and welfare dependency, if any.
4. What do you think would be the effect of your policy in any other respect on the people who currently inhabit Australia, if any?
Tim
participants (4)
-
Lev Lafayette -
Russell Coker -
Tim Josling -
Trent W. Buck