Host Selwyn Muru continues discussion around the issue of Polynesian migrations, visa overstayers and the dawn raids against them which have upset the Pacific community.
Dialogue between the Minister of Immigration Frank Gill and Polynesian leaders over the issues surrounding overstayers has reached a stalemate.
Kaikōrero: Frank Gill talks about Polynesian overstayers and the
differences between overstayers in New Zealand and Australia. He explains the current amnesty which has called for overstayers to come forward and go home without being prosecuted. He says dawn raids have not been applied to European overstayers, because they tend to come forward to authorities. He denies his figure of 10-12,000 Polynesian overstayers is over-inflated, although he says he cannot substantiate it..
He refuses to answer points made in the previous week's programme by Tongan lawyer Clive Edwards.
Selwyn Muru asks him why so many legal Polynesian migrants are also being interrogated by police, which he denies.
In Australia, illegal overstayers have been offered a permanent amnesty by the Australian Minister of Immigration Mr McKellar. Mr Gill says this was not a move which he thinks was correct, but the situation in Australia is different to New Zealand.
Selwyn Muru asks him about the ethics of having police hounding people at all hours of the night, and his reference to Rhodesian migrants as 'our kith and kin" i.e. that they are given privileged treatment because they are white.
Kaikōrero: Lawyer Clive Edwards responds to some of the opinions stated by Minister
Frank Gill.
Kaikōrero: excerpt from Prime Minister Mr. Rob Muldoon at the 1976
Waitangi Celebration. He expresses his thoughts on multiculturalism.