australia accepted 200000 boat people

From Vietnam and we had a Liberal government at the time. Also it was in 1951 we signed up to the UN treaty on refugees which many Liberals are saying should be torn up.
ABC Online...
British Cabinet documents have revealed Margaret Thatcher was so worried about resettling Vietnamese refugees in Britain that she wanted Australia to help buy an island in South-East Asia to house them.

The documents from 1979, released under the 30-year rule, show that Baroness Thatcher, then in her first year as British prime minister, asked Australia to help buy an island in Indonesia or the Philippines.

She warned ministers that there could be a public backlash and riots if 10,000 boat people went to Britain at the UN's request.

But the plan was opposed by Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore, who was concerned the colony could become a ''rival entrepreneurial city''.

The Australian prime minister at the time, Malcolm Fraser, says he cannot recall the request.

"It may not be accurate," he said.

"If it happened it might have been dismissed before it ever got to me. Certainly it wasn't something that was considered seriously by the Government."

Mr Fraser admits the refugee issue was controversial and volatile.

"Australia took up 20,000 [boat people] or more for two or three years in a row," he said.

"We managed to handle that number with compassion, with humanity, and without any particular concern."

Australia eventually received more than 200,000 boat people.

Mr Fraser says the Government policy toward refugees has become "much harsher" in the last 15 years.

"The suggestion that 4,000 or 5,000 boat people a year will change the character of Australia, I think is ludicrous," he said.

Mr Fraser says Opposition leader Tony Abbott's opinion that refugee boats should be turned back, is out of touch.

"I think it's the policy out of the past, appropriate to the 1930s," he said.

"The idea of taking boat people back out to sea is also a total denial of obligations under the refugee convention."

Dave R.