Illegal immigrants
WHILE it is sad to see an immigrant family sent back to their own country after a seven-year battle to stay, it is also sad for the taxpayers who have paid tens of thousands of dollars supporting them.
They have been given housing, medical treatment and access to our legal system, flights, plus many other benefits that Australians doing it tough must sometimes wait years to access.
It also displaces genuine refugees who have applied through the right channels to come legally to Australia. This couple paid people smugglers to get to Australia even though they knew they were not refugees and not eligible to stay. Instead they went on to have children to make it even more difficult to expel them (knowing full well what soft touches the Aussie legal system is), then used the media to emotionally blackmail the government and public into letting them stay. A precedent that if allowed would open the flood gates once again to all the other illegal immigrants using our legal system against us. What I do not understand is why it took seven years to expel them?
Australians don’t have that privilege so why should illegal immigrants?
Perhaps our politicians should be toughening the laws in regard to who may have free legal representation and put the onus on those that would come here to prove they are genuine refugees rather than Australia having to prove they are not. All those coming by people smugglers should be automatically deemed illegal immigrants and sent back to the port they left from immediately, not years later. The government needs to make this happen instead of pandering to those that would sink this increasingly overburdened ship. Suzy Malkinson, Kewarra Beach 1939: Britain, France, New Zealand and
Australia declare war on Germany. 1945: Singapore is returned to British control after being occupied by the Japanese since 1942. 2000: Russian President Vladimir Putin (above) debuts on the world stage at the UN Millennium Summit in an effort to restore Russia’s clout and develop new partners. 2006: Europe’s first spacecraft to the moon smashes into a volcanic plain as planned, signalling the end of a successful mission to test a new propulsion system and navigation technology for flights to other planets. 2014: Australia bans uranium sales to Russia over Ukraine invasion and opens an embassy in Kiev. 2017: US President Donald Trump warns of a “massive military response” after North Korea conducted its biggest nuclear test to date.