It seems John Key is alone in his preference to not offer refuge to any more than the quota of 750 asylum seekers annually.

That’s certainly the way it appears anyway because everyone else, every other member of the Opposition at least, is claiming that if they had their way, oh yes, you’d better believe they’d open New Zealand’s gateway and allow stricken refugees to just flood in…

Curious that those maintaining these sentiments of nobility, are the same ones whose opinions ultimately mean nothing.

…Prime Minister John Key has undoubtedly done the math on the situation; given New Zealand’s meagre population he has seemingly decided that we are simply not fit to take any more than the original 750 quota – which per capita, is in fact a respectable number.

According to a recent News broadcast though, we should be doing more: apparently many of New Zealand’s public would happily take into their homes a few Syrian refugees; moreover they expect that we as a nation ought to be following this example.

In fairness to our great leader, while the Opposition is naturally objectionable and many of the public are venting their displeasure also – upholding the idealistic, fairy-tale belief that their nation’s goodwill will cost them nothing, through it all Mr Key must maintain his grip on realism.

The reality is that these asylum seekers would provide no immediate benefit to New Zealand’s economy. Realistically they would each require sizable financial handouts just to re-establish themselves and even then there is no guarantee that their skills – if any – would be transferable to our way of life – realistically.

That must be the main problem with running a country: all of your citizens constantly demand lower taxation then fall into uproar when unexpected phenomena result in tax rises, yet when it comes to providing aid to those less well off those very people seem to expect the country has an infinite source of funding.

The question therefore begs: do these people even know where the Government gets its money?

Article by Tim Walker

Edited by A Psalm

Photography by C Kerr