Kevin Rudd was deposed by his own Labor party last week. It was a huge shock and no one saw it coming. The new Prime Minister Julia Gillard, is basking in the glory of being our first lady Prime Minister. But there are two problems she needs to address if she hopes to be re-elected for another term.
Tony Abbott, Opposition Leader of the Liberal Party had been doing very well in the polls but the outing of Kevin Rudd and the rise of Julia Gillard has set him back a bit. Now that she's done a deal with the mining industry, Tony is stuck with his policy which promised to dump the 40% profit tax and people are thinking .... why should we be championing giant multi national mining companies whose only bottom line is profit? Lets go for it!
The Labor Party was advised by Ken Henry, a man endorsed by John Howard, to hit the big miners hard for a bigger tax on profit. Labor maintained that they were ripping the guts out of the country and the Australian people, who owned the minerals in the ground, were entitled to a bigger return. As of today, Julia announced that a resolution has been reached with the mining industry and now she has her sights set on the other problem - asylum seekers arriving in leaky boats.
Since John Howard and the Liberals lost office, refugees have been arriving by boat in droves. Christmas Island is full to overflowing and they have had to fly people to the mainland and house them at great expense. It will be interesting to see what she comes up with because it's a very touchy subject.
The way I see it, to stop refugees from setting a course directly for Centrelink Australia (where people collect unemployment benefits) we have to go back to John Howard's TPV. It's a harsh step and one that will not sit well with many, but I think it's the only way to stop the boats coming.
A TPV is a Temporary Protection Visa. It was introduced by the Howard Government on 20 October 1999 and issued to people who had been recognised as refugees fleeing persecution. The scheme was controversial with the government claiming it was necessary to stop unauthorised arrivals of refugees. Refugee advocates descibed the TPV's as a cruel way to treat people which left asylum seekers with an uncertain future.
A TPV was issued to persons who applied for refugee status after making an unauthorised arrival in Australia and was issued to refugees when they were released from Australian immigration detention centres. After being granted a TPV, refugees were required to reapply several years later in case conditions changed in their homeland. While on a TPV, refugees were forbidden to travel overseas, they could not access social security benefits and were not allowed to sponsor family members for settlement in Australia.
I believe the Federal Election, scheduled to happen before Christmas this year, will be won or lost on these two issues.
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