Culture

Bill Shorten Is Getting Slammed After Bragging About Australia’s Shitty Immigration Policies

"We are the home of the fair go for all" (unless you came by boat).

by Tom Clift  29 January 2017

Want more Junkee in your life? Sign up to our newsletter, and follow us on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook so you always know where to find us.

On Friday, President Trump signed an executive order that temporarily prohibits citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States, while also temporarily suspending the country’s refugee program. The backlash that followed was immediate and intense, with protests breaking out at airports across the country, and American lawmakers and civil rights groups condemning Trump’s decision en masse.

The move has also drawn criticism from a number of world leaders. The foreign ministers of France and Germany held a joint news conference to express their concern over the ban, while Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted that “those fleeing persecution, terror & war” would always be welcome in Canada. Trudeau was later retweeted by Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon (because that’s how international diplomacy works now).

Of course, it’s somewhat harder for politicians in Australia to claim the moral high ground given our own appalling treatment of asylum seekers. Sure, we may not openly discriminate based on religion or country of origin, but you’d be hard pressed to argue that offshore detention doesn’t disproportionately affect people from Muslim-majority countries. Not a whole lot of white Christians locked up on Manus Island or Nauru.

Related

Still, if you thought a little thing like repeated condemnations from human rights groups would stop Bill Shorten from throwing shade, you were very much mistaken. As a matter of fact, the Labor leader took to social media this morning to brag about Australia’s “non-discriminatory immigration policy”, tweeting that “we don’t just tolerate diversity, we embrace it.”

At this point, it’s probably worth pointing out that it was Shorten’s party that introduced mandatory detention under Keating, and was also responsible for reopening the Manus and Nauru detention centres under Gillard.

Thankfully, Twitter users were quick to call Shorten on his bullshit.

Gotta love living in the home of the fair go. Unless you came by boat, in which case I guess you can just get stuffed.