BY ALISON DELLIT

On August 27, the Bega valley shire unanimously voted to support the work of Rural Australians for Refugees, support in principle an RAR proposal for “Welcome Towns” to host asylum seekers and to encourage the government to reduce the amount of time detainees are held.

According to the August 30 Bega District News, moving the motion, Councillor Keith Hughes said: “Asylum seekers who have suffered at the hands of dictatorial governments or intolerant societies elsewhere in the world have already suffered trauma beyond our fortunate experience. It is to our shame that we compound such suffering with mandatory detention — particularly for women and children.”

Another councillor, Vicki Wooten, pointed out that her family had not been locked up on arrival in Australia. “But that's just what we do today to these people who have fled torture and persecution or just starvation. Many now revel in a convict family heritage where their ancestors stole food to feed their families, and yet for present day people fleeing starvation we keep them in the desert and then charge them for accommodation.”

From Green Left Weekly, September 11, 2002.
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