The Refugee Crisis

We have been told for years by the Liberal Party that we have a refugee crisis.  They blame the Labor Party for "rolling out the welcome mat" and "being a people smugglers best friend".  All of this rhetoric is designed for political purposes only.  To drum up fear of the "invasion" what ever that is.  To tell them to get to the back of the line.  To tell them to go back to places like this -

And these are the nice pictures!

Would you wanna stay here for years?  Surely we can get above the base politics and show a little more compassion.  

According to the Refugee Council of Australia from 1975 to Dec 2012 we have had 48,856 people arrive by boat.  Hardly an invasion.  (0.02 % of our population or 0.0006% of our population per year)

Instead of buying boats we should process asylum applications in Indonesia within short time frames and take genuine refugees.  This would stop the need for perilous boat journeys.  

Although the rhetoric says otherwise the flood gates are not open.  This is the safest and most humane solution.  

The elephant that American's don't want to talk about

Today we saw another mass shooting in an American school. Senseless murder was committed against children in the most depraved and disgraceful manner. It brought tears to my eye watching the news.

This comes only a few months after the batman cinema shooting and only a few years after the murder of many at a political rally where a then-Senator was targeted and nearly killed. I could go on and on and on.

While these acts are horrible in the extreme it is even more disgusting the lack of political will to take on the gun reform battle.  Even when one of their own is the subject of a mass murder plot.  The affinity America has with its guns in the face of these continuous tragedies is truly mindboggling.

Now is the time to say enough is enough. Massive reform is needed now.  I just hope I'm not saying "enough is enough" again in another six months!

Queensland health payroll enquiry: A political witchhunt

Today (13/12/12) the Queensland government announced an enquiry into the Queensland health payroll debacle.  While this is truly a disgraceful series of events and probably led , inter alia, to the downfall of the Bligh government do we really want a $5 million dollar political slogfest.  How many public servants would that money have kept in a job?

This enquiry will only provide the government ample fodder with which to fire at the severely depleted opposition.  This isn't about seeing if they can recover money. The legal advice says as much.

This is politics pure and simple.

You won the election Premier. Move on and govern!

* The title in no way suggests that the Honourable Justice Richard Chesterman will conduct this enquiry in any way other than with propriety.  He is a respected jurist.  The motives are all that I question.

Julian Assange: striving for continued relevance

Julian Assange, founder of the infamous website Wikileaks, has announced plans to run fir the Australian Senate at the next election. 

My feelings on him are somewhat mixed. I think he is a self-aggrandizing megalomaniac interested primarily in self promotion. Although I don't know him so he may have pure intentions.

His website has released some state secrets that show indifference to human rights on the part of some elements of the US military.  Yet most of the controversy surrounds millions of cables that frankly have no need of being in the public domain.  They only seek to embarrass public officials. 

There is also the issue of the sexual assault complaint from Sweden. I have problems with his extradition being sought and approved in circumstances where no changes have been laid and it is for the purpose of questioning him.  Here in Australia there must be an arrest warrant prior to extradition being approved.  We have no arrest warrant for questioning.  If the Swede's wanted to charge him they should say so. If they only wanted to question chin they could have done it in England or via Skype or some other include medium. There is certainly some fears that fear he will be extradicted grin Sweden. How rational that is no one will know until it is too late for Julian Assange.

Overall, I believe that in life you reap what you sow. Assange wanted notoriety.  He certainly got it.

Qld LNP views on women

#auspol

It is disgusting generalisation that women only care about what clothes their female leaders wear.  Does this show the LNP attitude towards women in general?

The Liberal National Party's former state secretary says women need to change their attitudes if they want to be taken seriously in politics.

Michael O'Dwyer made the comments during a Queensland University of Technology seminar about campaign strategies used during the state election campaign, which gave his party a landslide win.

Mr O'Dwyer said the LNP had mainly male candidates because they were chosen on merit rather than a gender quota system.

He said women were often their own worst enemy when it came to politics because they were more concerned about what shoes leaders wore than what their policies and issues were.

"So something, I'm sorry ladies, needs to be done from your perspective to try to build women up to look and sound like leaders and talk about the attributes of a female being a leader rather than talking about their appearance," he told the crowd about 100 people.

Read more: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/women-their-own-worst-enemy-odwyer-20120622-20ryh.html#ixzz1yUCJuDYV

Qld LNP mounting right wing social change after years in the wilderness

#auspol

In 2012 the Liberal National Party took to the Government Benches after a comprehensive election defeat of the longstanding Labor Government. 

So far the major issues being handled by the new Government appear to be driven by an extreme Right Wing agenda.  The issues that seem to be taking up most of the focus are civil unions and surrogacy.

Premier Campbell Newman removed a State Sanctioned ceremony for Civil Unions and after great backlash from the right wing loonies in his party it is now to be called the Relationship Registration Act.  As if it wasn’t degrading enough for same sex couples to have to attend the registry, presumably during business hours, to register their union like they were attending Queensland Transport or registering their dog.  Now the symbolic step towards gay marriage was taken back with a symbolic name change in the Act.

Now the Government has removed the ability of same sex or single persons to access altruistic surrogacy.  Is it to be removed for hetero-sexual couples?  Oh no, just the gays and singles!  Because gay people and singles couldn’t be good parents. 

After years in this wilderness the LNP is clearly spewing out legislation to fix all those social policy changes they didn’t like over their years in opposition.  They now feel the need to instil their right wing religious orthodoxy on Queensland. 

And what of the pressing issues such as cost of living pressures --- ah they’re working on it. Apparently.  Not sure how they have time.

Asylum Seeker Solution?

I was recently put on to a blog by Henk Luf where he poses ways of dealing with asylum seekers that appear on the face viable, humane and sensible.  I don’t agree with all his measures but on the whole could provide better solutions than we currently possess in Australia.  If only the Leaders of all sides would stop using asylum seekers as political footballs and came to a sensible solution.

Here is the first couple of his suggestions:

AUSTRALIA’S ASYLUM SEEKER /REFUGEE PROBLEM EASILY FIXED.

While there is currently a great debate in Australia over how the country should deal with it’s asylum seeker / refugee problem this following the rejection by the High Court of the Labor regime’s ‘Malaysia solution’, the actual solution to the problem is in fact a fairly easy and indeed legal one both in international terms as well as domestically.

The basic outline would be as followed and would include measures to deal with people smugglers as well those illegally entering Australia by air as well as overstayers.

1. Those arriving by boat with their papers would be processed on Christmas Island initially and then complete the refugee process on the mainland. Upon their papers having been found genuine and once they have been found to be refugees they would then be released into the community on ‘temporary protection visas’ their final status to be determined by the UNHCR as to their safety within their home countries. This could mean that they could either be granted ‘permanent refugee status’ or be returned to their home countries should such a return be deemed safe. Only those granted ‘permanent refugee status’ and subsequently permanent residency and /or citizenship would have family reunion rights.

2.Those arriving without their papers would be held in detention on Christmas Island or another secure facility until such time that their identity has been established upon which they can then be transferred to the mainland and issued with ‘temporary protection visas’ should they be found to be genuine refugees. The process would be slower thus providing an incentive to keep hold to their passports or other identity papers.

3.Those found to be ‘economic migrants…

Read more here

(via http://worldevents1.wordpress.com/)

 

My initial thoughts on Henk Luf’s solutions:

1. The sentiment is right.  I think however, the use of the term Temporary Protection Visa may confuse some people and think the Howard TPV system is back.  Minor issue but still one.   I think too the issue of timing is important.  How long will be minimum times for custody etc…
2. Same as 1.
3. I think there always needs to be a chance for review.  Whisking people out of the country may be more expeditious but Immigration Department officials make mistakes and if there is no chance of review in Court then this goes against what our country stands for.  After all avenues for review are up I’m happy for the 48 hour deportation period to commence.  The problem is always going to be when the home country wont accept them back.  But that is another issue I suppose.
4. Automatic jail sentences of 7 years for operators of boats is too harsh a penalty.  They are generally paid very little to make the journey and would know their fate when caught.  This should tell you what state of mind they are in (dire economic).  And while they probably understand the illegality of their actions I think that their actions are not worse than Manslaughter, Grievous Bodily Harm, Unlawful Wounding and Rape offences which quite frequently receive lower than 7 years jail terms.  And these are certainly not mandatory minimums like that suggested.  Sure punishment must occur but it must fit the crime.
5. 15 years might the right penalty so long as is isn't a mandatory minimum.
6. Excellent idea
7. If an overstayer is not claiming asylum I have no problem with their deportation within 48 hours.  But there must be an avenue of appeal.  Time limits should apply to this however.
8. Same as 7.
9. Same as 7
10. Fine idea.
11. Fine idea.
12. Fine idea.  But more work should be done to develop cooperative approaches to catch these boats prior to leaving the point of origin.  Incentives should be given to have those countries prosecute and stop the boats leaving. 

 

 

A novel idea that many will probably hate*

Australia could set up refugee processing centres (living in the community) in places such as Indonesia to stop people getting on boats.  I don’t know the numbers of asylum seekers there but might stop them getting in a boat to come here.   We have to deal with them anyway and we want to “break the people smugglers business model” (*argh I hate that phrase).  This might just do it. 

 

* This is an idea trotted out without much analysis or research.