Numbers Game: Refugees.

We're wasting millions on asylum seekers.

• We could save $80 million dollars a year if we processed our asylum seekers in Australia as opposed to using offshore "solutions". $80 million is also the cost of building a new hospital.

We are being flooded by "boat people".

• "Boat people" (beware of people who use this term without irony) made up 1.5% of Australia's immigration intake since the first arrival of "boat people" from Vietnam in 1976 (Dept. of Immigration).
• The number of applications for asylum last year was 922 500. South Africa received 222 000, the US received 47 900, Ecuador received 35 500 - Australia received 6 206, which is 0.67% of the world's total.

Boat people are "queue jumpers".

• If such a "queue" existed (the UN has confirmed it doesn't), it would take all the refugees in the world 188 years to resettle (UNHCR).

They should stay where they are and fix they're own problems.

• A report in 2009 showed that 1 in 4 of the world's refugees were from Afghanistan. 96% of of these are hosted by Pakistan and Iran - both developing countries.
• The other countries that are the largest sources of refugees are Iraq, Democratic Republic of Congo and Myanmar - all experiencing war, torn apart by violent and corrupt governments (UNHCR).

The "Malaysia solution" will serve as a "big blow" to people smugglers.

• Labor's proposed Malaysia solution would see 800 of Australia's "boat people" traded to Malaysia in exchange for 4000 refugees in Malaysia currently in a state of limbo and living in poverty. Trade? Refugees are people. People should not be traded like commodities. This is not a "solution".

Multicultralism in Australia isn't working.

• My parents and my two sisters moved to Australia in 1981 after walking to a Thai refugee camp from labour camps in Cambodia and living in the camp for ever a year - almost 30 years later, they have 3 university-educated daughters who pay their taxes and are politically aware and involved. To say that refugees contribute nothing is to purposefully ignore the reality of the situation to strengthen your bigotry.

Now that we're done talking numbers, let's start talking about refugees as if they are human beings. We, are the luckiest people in the world by virtue of the fact that we were born in the First World. Refugees aren't so lucky. They are living through our worst nightmares because were unfortunate enough to have taken their first breath in the world's most dangerous places and are feared and loathed in Australia because they dared to hope. Dared to hope. Dared to dream.