The Chaser Report - Stop The Barges | David Hunt

Episode Date: August 10, 2023

Author and historian David Hunt joins Charles Firth to discuss how history always repeats itself, especially when it comes to British policy on refugees. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gatigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to the Chaser Report podcast with Dom and Charles. Now, Dom isn't here today, but instead we have, well, I think a global expert in everything. Oh, well, that's two kinds. David Hunt, author of Gert, Gert, Gert Nation. True Gert. True Gert.

Do you write any books that don't have the word girt in them? I haven't written any successful books without the word girt in them. So I'm pretty much a one-word guy. You wrote a book about nose-picking ones. I did. I did. What was that called? The nose-pixies.

Yeah. I read that to my kids. Yeah. Did they like it? Well, they thought it was a bit sort of low-brow. Yeah, well, you know, I get that a lot. I'm Australia's most low-brow historian. I did a podcast with Dom, so I think it's only appropriate.

that I'm filling in for Dom on his podcast. But you were the sort of interesting fact-laden person who knew what they were talking about. Oh, it was the person who knew she, yeah. Yeah, so there's a bit of a conflict because I'm mad on this podcast. I'm the person who knows stuff. Knows everything. And this is a successful podcast. Well, you're frightening me, Charles.

There's something very wrong because our ratings keep going up. It's sort of an inverse law between knowledge and content and ratings. And you've worked that one out. Good. The mainstream Australia has listened and they've adjudged this as the way to get their information. More after this. Now, Dave, the reason you're on here is because a couple of days ago, we came across this fantastic story in England where they've decided,

And this is true. Like, this is not like, you know, the news from 200 years ago. This is, like, happening in 2020. You realize I am a historian, Charles. I'd do the news from 200 years ago. But England has honestly decided to deal with their, quote-unquote, refugee problem, the fact that they've got some refugees that they need to house, by setting up a barge to put them on in the middle of the water.

The fun ship, I think they call it. Which is exactly what happened. in the lead up to Australia being founded where convicts, well, no, convicts prisoners in the sort of 1770s filled up all the British prisons and instead they put barges on the Thames and filled those up as well. Yeah, look, you've got to give it to the English. You know, they say that history never repeats but in England it always does. And they've decided to recycle an idea from 1775, William Eden, Secretary of State for the Colonies. During the American War of Independence, Britain had been shipping all of its criminals to America for several decades.

And when the Americans said, we want to run our own race, they said to the Brits, we don't want your nasty pickpockets and sheep thieves. You can keep them. Yes. And so Britain, back in the day, prisons were only used to hold people awaiting trial. They didn't have anything for people who'd already been convicted. Oh. So what happened whence you'd been convicted?

Well, you were either shipped to America or you were whipped or hanged or so the idea of imprisonment was not a form of punishment. It didn't occur to them. Hang on, we could just keep them in this hellish prison. Well, it did when the Americans said, we're not taking your prisons anymore. And so the hulks were actually a legal fiction. So people who were sentenced to transportation because the judges kept on sentencing people to be shipped out. Britain had nowhere to ship them to, so they said, well, we can put them on ships. And the ships might leave sometime soon, next Thursday, possibly.

And they had to wait 13 years until near South Wales was set up as a convict colony. And so people were just detained on these floating prison hocks in the river. And they've gone for the same idea now. And when they set up the barges, they didn't actually go, oh, it'll probably be Australia. it. In actual fact, it was a bit of a sales pitch by Sir Joseph Banks to say, hey, you know what we could do? We could send all those criminals across the other side of the world. Three years later in 1778, banks came up with the idea for a common colony at Botany Bay. So the Brits wanted, obviously, to win the American Revolution War of Independence.

In which case, they could have just resumed their... But, yeah, they didn't. And so what was amazing is that the Hawks actually remained in place until the 1840s. Oh, really? Yeah. The idea of punishing people with imprisonment sort of took root at the back end of the 18th century. But they still didn't have enough prisons. And so, hey, we've got a ship that's not really very seaworthy. Yes.

We'll plug the holes in the bottom of the ship with some criminals. Right. And so the barges that they've set up, or the barge that they've set up, to house these refugees. The Bibby Stockholm, I think it's cool, Charles. Right. So unfortunately, it's not in the... It would have been very, you know, like very appropriate had it been in the Thames.

Like, I was sort of planning a trip over to London to just go and see this amazing thing. You could turn it into a tourist attraction. Come and see our imprisoning migrants. Yeah, but please don't take pictures. Who actually have done nothing wrong? Oh, well, no. No. What?

They're migrants. Oh, right. By definition. By fleeing for their lives. Because they're asylum seekers, aren't they? They are. They're people who... And they should be considered lucky that they're not being put in asylums.

That's what they ask for. They're seeking asylums, and we put them in floating accommodation. But this wasn't the first idea. Like, this is sort of also been a bit of a last resort. It's not a resort. No, no. Resort is something like Vanuatu or Fiji. Nauru.

No, that's not a resort. That is the last resort. No, Portsmouth, not Portsmouth in Dorset. No, no, but hang on, but wait a minute. But the barge wasn't the first idea that they had, was it? The first idea was why don't we send all the asylum seekers who have come to England to Kenya? Rwanda. To Rwanda, was it?

Rwanda, yeah. Oh, my God. The place where there was that genocide a few years ago. Well, look, in fairness, Britain insists that it is a safe third. country. It's probably not safe if you're a Tutsi or a Hutu. But look, I mean, in fairness, the Rwandan spent a lot of time killing each other. They probably just don't have the time or energy to kill migrants. But do you think maybe this is the perfect opportunity for them to unite behind a common enemy and kill all the British refugees? Well, look, so Britain has

borrowed from the Australian playbook on asylum. Yes. Yes. On asylum. seekers, and it is actually made it illegal to enter Britain in boats, in small boats in July, sorry, in the middle of the year. Stop the boats? Well, stop, stop. Do we get like a commission or something? They insist that if you come through improper channels, and apparently the English channel is an improper channel.

Well, it's French. If you come through improper channels, those. say, you're never going to settle here and we'll ship you off to Rwanda, where your claim will be processed. But then the whole problem is the court of appeal in England went, nah, you can't do that. That would be horrific. Yeah, the High Court said this, you can do it. The Court of Appeal said two to one, no, you can't.

Because unfortunately, the Brits are parties to the European Convention on Human Rights, Which says... Human rights getting in the way again, of a good idea, of a sensible solution. Well, and Article 3 says you cannot torture people. Ah, come on. Or wishy-washy, or treat them inhumanely. And so the courts have held that Rwanda is not a safe third country.

And that... How racist. That is racist. And that treating, putting, you know, sending these people to Rwanda is inhuman treatment. They haven't yet considered whether putting them on the fun ship is inhumane treatment. But I'm looking forward to that court case. Well, let's have a look at this because, so they've stolen the Stop the Boats idea from us. And now what they're doing is stock the boats.

We're stock the boats. We want to put people on boats. We're going to stop the boats and then also put them on the boats that we presumably. in an improper channel. You are boat people. You should be used to be. You should like boats. Yes, yes.

But all these things, like, just the general vibe of England's politics is just a total copy and paste. Like literally, Lyndon Crosby, I think it is, went over there. He was Libs advisor under Howard. Yeah. And he just...

Crosby texter, pollsters. Yeah. And, yeah. Sure, he's been knighted for his services for being a cop. Yeah. And, well, I think he's been, he's been, he's been knighted for his services to the copy and paste function in Microsoft Word

because what he basically did is he went Control C on Australia's demonisation of refugees for 20 years ago. Control V did a little search function to replace England with Australia or whatever. And then that's been the politics of the Conservative Party for the last 10 years where they've decided, well, we can't actually deliver. They've got the lowest rate of economic growth of any West. country in the world and have done for a decade, their whole economy is falling off a cliff. Brexit's a disaster.

They can't play cricket. They can't play cricket, most importantly. Their fish and chips. They don't put Tartare sauce on their fish and chips. Who are these people? It rains on the outer courts of Wimbledon all the time. I mean, the whole place is a fucking nightmare. It's a joke.

And so, and we were talking about this the other day, which is if your government can't actually, you know, provide for you by, you know, being. good, what you do is you create an external enemy. You do the other, you do the thing that they've done in Singapore so well. Well, they did that first with Europe. Europe was the external enemy. Yes. But we're going to leave.

But then they joined it. Yeah. They left it. So Brexit was sort of like the refugees of a few years ago. Well, that's right. Yeah, we've done Brexit. We need to find a new enemy. Yes.

That might be the people who are fleeing for their lives. A fleeing for their lives who want to come here. And the thing is, because we've got the details on this barge, right? It's going to cost, so how much does one bar, there must be a fairly cheap solution, one barge, an old barge, it's just like a, it's a converted sort of. It's a converted barge. A very expensive, very expensive refurbishment. Yeah.

They're turning 222 single bedrooms into accommodation for 500. Yes. But that's how, foreigners are quite small. But you know how they're doing that? Yeah. Bunk beds. It doesn't strike me as that, like, it's not like to expand the amount of space. Well, I was a killer.

I loved, I loved staying in a bunk bed. I wouldn't like to stay in a bunk bed indefinitely. But it's 1.6 billion pounds is the cost. To keep this barge open for, I think, a year. No, no, not just this barge. They've been given, and what I would say, when you talk about, Oh, well, that's all right. When you talk about.

Two years, it's two years. And there will be other barges, hopefully. This is not a one barge. solution. Yeah? So, I mean, I think the Brits have got the idea of offshore processing in Rwanda, which has fallen on its arse. Yeah.

So now they're going for the policy of just offshore processing, just a few metres offshore. Yes. I see. Where you place people in the nearest body of water. Body of water. Yeah. They become an on-water matter. Yes, of course.

And so you can have that whole, what was it, Scott Morris? The person's trick was, are there are on-water matters of operational security. Oh, therefore we won't comment on it. We're not allowed to comment on stuff in Bobby. We're going to glue all the portholes shut and not give you ventilation lest you throw your children out of the porthole. Yes. Big problem.

Big problem. Yes. So, no, I think they've, and it is an Australian company that is providing. Well, this is the thing. This innovative hospitality solution. So Australia comes up with the solution. We also then turn around and come up with. the product for the solution, which is like $1.6 billion, we're basically, like, is this

going to be a fear-led recovery? Are we going to, like, is Australia going to, you know, we're done with the whole coal exports. It's going to go down the drain. We can export our, treating people like shit. Treating people like shit against, you know, absolutely torturing them and trampling on their human rights as a business model. Now, you realize, that as a former lawyer, I must insist that you avoid those sorts of words like torture and... But you just said that that was the thing that tripped them up in the... Well, it could have been torture or it could have been treating them inhumanely. Ah, so, yeah, accusing people of torture is generally considered a no-no.

Defamatory. Perhaps defamatory. But what I would say is that what are they called? They're called corporate travel management. Yeah, that's the name of the firm. That's the Australian firm. Corporate travel management. But they're not travelling.

Like, these people are, like, by definition, they're not corporate not trouble management. That's right. Corporate stay where you are in definitely management. Who are these people? What have they done before? What's their expertise? Well, the contract with the government,

they have previously housed UK civil servants. And, you know, they don't have very, very demanding travel needs, normally just a little bed and breakfast somewhere, you know, with a small village pub. If you sort of look into the sex scandals, especially amongst sort of Tory civil servants and MPs over the years, they like a bit of tortured. Well, it's normally, I think it's normally an orange in your mouth whilst wearing a pair of ladies stockings and a plastic bag on your head.

Yes, yes. I wonder if corporate travel management actually provides that sort of service. Maybe that's where they've found their edge in the toilet. So the government actually has a pre-existing agreement with corporate travel management for travel and venue solutions, which previously covered official bookings for conferences, flights, train tickets, hotels and vehicle hire. I suppose a barge is a vehicle. Yeah, right, okay.

So they know what they're doing. Well, they do. On its website, corporate travel management describes itself as a global provider of innovative and cost-effective travel solutions. banning corporate, events, leisure, loyalty, and wholesale travel. Well, I suppose their loyalty program is baked in if they've, you know, welded all the windows shut. They offer frequent dire points.

None of the medical advice contained in the Chaser Report should legally be considered medical advice. The Chaser Report. Hang on, and have they done anything in Australia? Oh, very successful. Very successful. quarantine hotels during COVID. Oh, right.

They kept, well. Well, they didn't really keep them out. There was always those people who escaped. And virus. Well, look, nobody's perfect, Charles. I think you're being a harsh task mask. A harsh task master. But look, they are expert at locking people in shitty accommodation.

Yes. With dodgy food services. Yes. Here's a stalled red roll. Yes, that's right. Or, yeah, yeah. That was them. Well, you know, I wouldn't like to say, Charles,

but they did provide some of those hotels. Maybe they were the better ones. Yeah, okay. Maybe. Yeah, likely. Highly likely. So what I want to talk about now is so Australia's got its fingerprints all over these. They do.

You know, they've come up with the whole policy. They've provided the services to get there. And it's costing a fuck ton. Now, this is very similar to what's happening in Australia, which is, you know, we found out the other. day that even though Nauru has zero asylum seekers on it, the government renewed the contract and sent Nauru another $350 million to keep this, you know, essentially a tent city up and running for another year.

Oh, mates rates. Yeah. Which is like almost a million dollars a day to not house anyone in tents, right? You never know when you may need to not house somebody, Charles. Yes. Well, but Christmas Island was kept open for years, provided boutique hotel services to that lovely Trilankan family. Yes.

Very expensive. We, you know, they've got a good deal. But to me, like, it makes me go, maybe, because we look at it and go, what a waste of money, you could sort of solve the housing crisis for actual citizens, you know, with that sort of money, right? But actually, I think when you get corporate travel management to solve the housing crisis, very small rooms with bunk beds that would do the job. When you're making up an enemy that actually is in no way an enemy that you should really fear, right?

Like these people are not, you know, coming here with bombs and guns. They're not like Russia invading Ukraine. Like that's a real enemy, right? who you should actually fear, right? Instead, these are just people who want to have a life, you know, rather than be dead, right? And so the amount of money that you spend on them is actually part of the propaganda. Like, oh my God, you know, these refugees must be a problem.

Because they are costing us. Because they cost us $1.6 billion. So this must be a huge problem. Like, it would not actually, like, if you suddenly went, oh, okay, we'll let them go in the community. It'll only cost a few tens of millions of dollars to sort of... In fairness, the Brits, they have been housing asylum seekers in hotels. Yes, that's right.

And a barge for their just offshore processing is seen as a cheaper solution. I mean, you won't have to provide a chocolate under the pillow every night. You won't have to provide a white terry-towling dressing gown. And people won't be able to steal the soap and conditioner. because they can't get off the boat. But I think also more specifically, like the threat from the local Ibis Hotel and the residents of the local Ibis Hotel

feels a little less fearsome than the threat from all those people on the barge in the ocean. Oh, what are they doing? What are they doing on the barge? It's a more, there's a more theatrical notion to sort of an agglomeration of a whole lot of refugees, just on a boat. On a boat. Refugees on a boat. You know, at any stage, they could, you know.

Get off the boat. Well, they could come here. They could come. Well, actually, yeah. With their foreign arts and crafts. Do you think, so, like, why doesn't Nauru? Because Nauru's going to probably sink anyway due to climate change. And, you know, they've mined all the bird shit off that island.

There's only 10,000 people at, you know, on Nauru. Why don't they just... Put them all on a boat. Well, no, just slice Nauru off from the... Oh, genius. Genius. Flow it.

Throw it. To it up to near England. And provide, you know, barge like island services just off the coast of England. See, I mean, I think there are not enough innovative policy solutions in this area. And I think, Charles, you have perhaps provided an innovative policy solution. Thank you. UK government would probably slip you a cool billion or two if you if they listen to this podcast you might be giving them ideas so Dave you're in the history game you know

how's that going in terms of coin like do you make a billion dollars a year or you know well I I do I make a lot of I make a lot of money from all of the foreigners I've been asked to store in my laundry so is that your side hustle or would you say that's my main business. And the history stuff is just, the writing of the books is to the side hustle. It's a cover, Charles. It's a cover for the other intimate personal services I provide to the Australian government in terms of, yeah, hunt, innovative asylum seeker management solutions. A lot of people have been asking how we keep the Tcha report going. And I think it is our asylum seeker housing solutions that

that's paying the rent. I think I've got, we've got at least 10 of them here in the studio with us. They actually power the electricity for this. I know. The poor kid from Bhutan is peddling that bicycle in the corner. See, would you say that's torture or just inhumane doing that? Oh, it's a fine line, Charles. It's a very fine line.

That's what I said to the judge. Okay. David Hunt. Pleasure as always. Will you come back and explain something else to us? No, no, Charles. No, Charles, I have such a lucrative career in managing people less fortunate than myself. You don't know anything about particle physics, do you?

We need to do an episode on superconductors that are in temperature at some point. No, no. Our gear is from Road. We are part of the Icona class network. Catch you next time.