POSTED: 20 OCTOBER 2010

Really interesting to see that 552 people who came to Australia in 2007 for World Youth Day overstayed their visas — and that 231 of them are still illegally in the country.

The ABC reports Andrew Metcalfe, Secretary of the Immigration Department, as saying this is a comparitively low number.

"We had around 100,000 pilgrims come here for World Youth Day," he said. "That 552 represents about 0.55 per cent of the 100,000, which I note is lower than our general non-return rate."

Meanwhile, Tourism Australia reports that there were 3.7 million visitor arrivals to Australia in the eight months to August 2010.

Round that out to 5,550,000 visitors per year and look at what 231 illegal entrants per 100,000 means — yes, that's right, something approaching 13,000 "air people" per annum. Well over twice the 5609 boat arrivals into northern Australia in 2009-10. And that's based on what Metcalfe describes as "a comparatively low number".

I can only imagine the outcry if these 231 "illegals" had been Muslims.

Generally speaking, our politicians and media totally overstate and sensationalise the relative importance of the number of asylum seekers risking their very lives to be smuggled on to our shores by boat.

The only politicians seriously considering these sorts of figures at the moment are the Greens. Isn't it time that Labor and Liberal did as well?