The myth of the good life for asylum seekers in Australia

One of the most enduring myths in the asylum seeker debate is that once asylum seekers arrive in Australia, they are treated to the good life.  Not a week passes without ASRC receiving an email complaining that asylum seekers are getting 4 times what a pensioner does, and that asylum seekers are flushed with support from the Federal government.

The reality could not be more of a contrast.  Each day at the ASRC, asylum seekers present in extreme levels of destitution with no income, no right to work, no access to health care or no safety net.

The policies of successive governments have created an underclass; a community of people who have fled torture and trauma who are denied some of the most basic human rights from accessing an education to the right to work to the right to health care.

No people seeking asylum have access to a raft of basic entitlements such as no access to Centrelink, public housing, Job Services Australia, settlement, integration and ESL programs.

Asylum seekers are 1200 times more likely to be homeless and 12 times more likely to be unemployed that the average Australian in the experience of the ASRC.  The experiences of poverty, isolation and invisibility have left many asylum seekers feeling demoralized, excluded and living from hand to mouth each day.  This is certainly a long way form the ‘good life’ many people imagine they are living.