Asylum In Australia Essay

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Somewhat predictably, a lot of fuss has been made about the increase in asylum applications received by Australia. While numbers of asylum seekers globally have remained steady, Australia has seen a 30 per cent increase. A crude reading of this statistic may seem to support the “pull factor” argument, namely that Australian domestic legislation, not international situations, is to blame for seemingly large increases in the number of asylum applications. But statistics, and percentages in particular, can be misleading. Australia receives so few applications for asylum that a 30 per cent increase means only 1400 additional people sought asylum here last year, as compared to 2008. To put this number into perspective, in 2009 the USA, France…show more content…
For anyone still fixated on percentages, that’s a mere 1.6 per cent. Despite the small numbers of people seeking asylum in Australia, the issue continues to generate heated debate – particularly in this, an election year. Overwhelmingly, the debate focuses on how best to deter persecuted people around the world from seeking protection in Australia. This focus on preventing asylum seekers from coming to Australia ignores a simple reality - as long as there are people facing severe persecution, there will be people who flee to safety; and as long as Australia remains a safe, stable country, and a signatory to the Refugee Convention, some people are going to come here. The reasons people flee their homelands, the “push factors”, have not changed. Instability, conflict, persecution and political oppression remain rife in many countries, including Iraq, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and China. Most asylum seekers coming to Australia are from the Asia Pacific region. Asylum seekers from countries such as Colombia, Mali and Ghana rarely, if ever, attempt to travel to Australia to seek asylum. These countries were among those that generated dramatically less asylum seekers in

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