Immigration idiocy . . .

The Immigration Department seems to have a set of rules expressed as tick boxes that they adhere to no matter what the facts surrounding an issue may be. This is a clear case where AI could immediately be applied at very little expense. No manager seems to have any discretionary powers except the minister and he does not have to explain himself. The Sroubeck case was, and still is, a shambles. The court cases alone suggest that he is not really the sort of immigrant we are looking for.

The Zongwei Lu case just shows that they do not have enough meetings in the department. We are apparently desperately looking for immigrants that can bolster the tourist industry and yet down the corridor some automaton has noted that this student didn’t spend enough time studying for his qualifications so the ‘‘Deport’’ box got a tick. The fact that he was too conscientious and good at his study went right past them. He is precisely the sort of immigrant we are looking for. You would have expected the hospitality school, that surely deals with a number of overseas students, to raise a red flag. Where is Lees-Galloway when this is happening? No doubt hiding in his office reading and rereading the Sroubeck file looking for some evidence that could possibly be construed as new.

And finally the poor woman that spent $300,000 and two years fighting another set of automatons who seem as much aware of the word compassion and its meaning as young students are of the word trivial. Whoever put the Hague Convention nonsense together needs to go and do a good logic course. Did they not consider that a parent who is prepared to change countries and take their children with them may just have a very good reason for doing so – as in this case? The protection order seemed to have got lost in the legal arguments. The Aussie husband was able to tap into NZ’s legal aid system and get it flipped on its back with relative ease. Geoff Orchard, Ohaupo