At a time when climate change poses the greatest threat to our world as we know it, it is the politics of immigration – specifically refugee resettlement – that is rocking democracies around the globe.
Donald Trump has had illegal immigration front and centre of both his presidential campaigns.
Quoting US Homeland and Border Protection statistics, the Republicans claim that in 2023 the agency had 3.2 million encounters with illegal immigrants including 2.4 million at the southwest border (often South Americans crossing the depleted Rio Grande from Mexico into the US) – a 40 per cent increase on 2021.
The ‘Brexit’ referendum
In the UK many describe the ‘Brexit’ referendum result as being focused on stopping the seemingly unrestricted passage of immigrants and refugees from Africa via Europe. Nigel Farage, is an icon of far-right politics.
His claims that the suspect in the three murders and ten attempted murders of young girls in the UK, Axel Rudakubana, is an undocumented Muslim refugee are wrong. Rudakubana was born in Cardiff and the family are committed Christians.
In France Marine Le Pen has been running for President as a National Front (called ‘National Rally’) candidate since 2012 and has risen significantly in popularity focusing on the party’s anti-immigration policies. In Germany the ‘Alternative for Germany’ (AfP) has transformed from a small far- right group the second-most-popular in the polls ahead of their 2025 elections.
The ‘Victory Party’ in Turkey was founded to fight against citizenship rights for the three million Syrian refugees – the claim is that a massive Sunni Muslim population is being introduced to destabilise Turkish national identity.
Nationalism on the rise worldwide
Nationalism is on the ascendency around the world as war and famine cause significant population shifts. These movements are pulling conservative mainstream political parties including the UK Tories, the US Republicans and the Australian Liberals to the right.
It is happening across all cultures. Late last year Pakistan’s government expelled 540,000 undocumented Afghan refugees and is in the process of removing another 800,000.
Malcolm Turnbull has previously told me of his concern that if border security issues continue to go unaddressed there is a real risk of a resurgence of fascism.
Why do extremists hold such sway on these issues? It is obvious to me that our highly-charged political climate precludes any sort of sensible debate. Our brutal social media and super-sensitive media mean all potential contributors run the risk of being denounced as a racist or a supporter of terrorism.
Jordan
In 2016 I represented the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians (I was a member of the international executive that represents all Commonwealth parliaments) at the World Women’s Conference in Jordan. The war was still raging in Syria.
I signed up for a tour to a refugee camp on the Jordan – Syria border. When it was hinted that the visit was cancelled, I pressed ahead anyway, and thanks to the persistence of my driver and the hospitality of the Jordanians I was able to get in, meet the camp police commander and undertook a driving tour.
The camp commander explained Jordan has no borders stopping refugees and its population of around 11 million now includes three million Palestinians and over one million Syrian refugees.
Just think about that – Jordan has no oil and no welfare resources for such an intake. Their schools are all open to refugee children and all can work for a living. Those Syrians who could not support themselves because they are sick, disabled or traumatised were left in these UN refugee camps.
I said to the police commander that Australia had announced it was taking refugees from the camp. He wanted to know how we were selecting the intake. I replied proudly ‘the policy is compassionate taking the most disadvantaged women and children who have been prioritised by the UN’.
‘The UN are idiots’
He told me bluntly this policy helped nobody. ‘The UN are idiots. Australia should take the Syrians you need – those who can work and be a success.’
‘One day this war in Syria will end and Syria needs to be rebuilt. Jordan cannot pay for that, Syrians need to rebuild their own country. If Australia takes able-bodied refugees they will work hard, send money home, their children will be educated and this diaspora will be the ones to rebuild Syria. This is how you help Syria and how you help Jordan.’
It was a jaw-dropping insight – not from a committee or a government but just one man on the frontline protecting tens of thousands of war refugees. A thought worth considering.
The absence of rational conversation about war and refugees plays into the hands of the far right.
It is so fraught most of us prefer to avoid it altogether – the irony is, if we don’t speak up now for commonsense and moderation there is a risk the opportunity for thoughtful approaches will be lost. Vacating the debate to activists is never a good idea. We need to have the courage to try for balance and improvement, while we still can.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
