"The key thing is to get them out of immigration", Australian Colonel Hotman tells the Indonesian smugglers, who are trying to get a shipment of refugees to Australia. He leans back, thinks for a moment and then inclines forward filling up the screen of the hidden camera, "he's a marine but he's got bad morals", he says of the officer who will let the ship pass, and throws down his pack of cigarettes, point made.

It's a confronting picture for the Australian government. But one they wouldn't have seen without the determination of asylum seeker, Hussain Nasir, who was resolute in his goal of exposing the people smugglers who use refugees as commodities. In a series of hidden camera stings, he catches smugglers and their accomplices talking about bribes and border security. At every point the smugglers seem to see their clients only as numbers, because for each person its the same price, "It's seven thousand per person", and the aim is to fill the boats.

Yet Through Nasir's mission to expose the smugglers we also see all of the contradictions and injustices of immigration. Nasir himself was denied entry to Australia for three years while he watched others reach Australia through smuggling. This for a man who carried a letter from the US Military saying, "his contribution to making Iraq a safe and secure country for Iraq's people is invaluable".

At the root of this malfunctioning system is the breakdown between Australia and Indonesia. At each step in Nasir's journey through the underground the smugglers display connections with high-ranking officials and a canny know how when it comes to working the system. Australia's determination to create a firm border is being undermined by this corruption and so, while those who use criminal methods to get in may stay, those who legally try enter may never reach their destination. "I am worried about all of the bad people who are getting into Australia, it's not right", Nasir says of the deep injustice being wrought.

Nasir's efforts demonstrate how easy it is for corruption to subvert the efforts of the Australian government against the smugglers. As the influx of asylum seekers swells, Australia will not succeed in slowing it, unless Indonesia's endemic corruption is addressed.