Criminalising smuggling does not prevent the free movement of people

RISE is highly critical of ABC?s Four Corners report on people smuggling which aired on Monday 4 June, 2012 in its failure to address the most pressing aspects of the issue of refugees and asylum seekers. We condemn ABC?s obvious descent into the fear-mongering and dog-whistling around this issue that has been indicative of Australian politics since mandatory detention was instated as official policy, and perhaps well before that when White Australia was the state?s prerogative.

Criminalising smuggling, which is the narrative this report chooses to contribute to, cannot and does not prevent the free movement of people, particularly in the current climate of global financial instability, food scarcity and war. Millions of people are forcibly displaced from their homes due to factors such as persecution, war, state terror and natural disasters. In the search for a safe life for themselves and their loved ones, people will move to escape these circumstances. Opposing ?smuggling? – a means through which people travel to ensure their safety and well-being – is to take a position against refugees and asylum seekers.

Rather than focusing on this non-issue, ABC could have taken a more productive and critical look at why people are fleeing their circumstances in the first place. The Four Corners report could have looked into political and economic arrangements between Australia and some of the countries from which people have been forced to leave – Australia?s complicity in atrocities in Afghanistan and Sri Lanka has been documented. In short, it could have taken a more journalistically honest and thorough look at the environment that allows an industry like smuggling to work.