A SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS
(This is a slightly modified version of a post from my blog
[theblackflagweb.wordpress.com] It has particular reference to Australia but probably applies to all European countries as well. I understand that the US situation is different.)

The problem of illegal immigrants claiming refugee status in Australia is currently a stick to beat the Liberal Party with, since we have a Liberal Government. A couple of years ago it was a stick to beat the Labor Party with. In fact it is an ideal cause for supporters of whichever party is out of power. They can claim moral superiority without having to actually do anything about the problem. Since I despise all political parties equally I am well placed to come up with a practical solution.

I start by suggesting that any government has a right to decide which people are welcome. Does anybody disagree with that? Does anybody think that every person who turns up has a right to come in? It's a defensible position and might be even more so if we had a different form of government but I haven't heard anyone espouse it.

OK, how should we decide? Well, there is apparently an official way of deciding whether or not to grant a person "refugee status". I don't know anything about it and I'm sure it's as bodgie as most bureaucratic procedures but let's stick with it for now. Let that be the first part of the process. Now it gets interesting.

There are some people who are reluctant to admit Muslims. I can see that there are plenty of  reasons for that. Personally I'd have no problems letting bad Muslims in, but I'm wary of devout ones. Do you believe that homosexuality merits death? Are you in favour of mutilating young girls? Do you think that apostates deserve to be killed? Should it be a crime to burn your fantasy book? Well, you can fuck right off. We have to find some way of separating the sheep from the goats and excluding fanatical lunatics would be a good start. It might also be necessary to make them confirm their opinions publicly in some way. I leave it to you to work out the mechanism.

But is it enough to just exclude devout Muslims? What about other religious dingbats? Most of their beliefs are not very dangerous but they are insane. Let's get rid of them as well. There is no doubt that a country which discriminates in favour of atheists will have a saner, more intelligent population. And there is also no doubt that immigrants are a net gain for the receiving country. So any illegal immigrant who passes our tests (a genuine refugee who is also an atheist) is welcome. Our population will improve both in absolute numbers and in moral fibre (I've waited for years for a chance to recycle that expression!)

So what do we do with all the others who don't qualify? Aha!

The places with the greatest numbers of refugees are those who are next door to the wretched countries from which the refugees emanate. Turkey, for instance or Jordan or Lebanon or Rwanda.  So the Australian government says to the governments of those countries "We will take off your hands three (or four or five) refugees who pass our tests for every one who doesn't pass that you will take from the current population of our detention camps." It's a good deal for both governments (though certainly a better one for Australia). It has another virtue as well: unlike the present "system",  it doesn't give rich illegal immigrants an advantage over poor illegal immigrants.

I make no charge for this modest proposal.