274 Rudd Gov't suspends Asylum-seeker claims; Teachers boycott School Performance Tests

Rudd Gov't suspends Asylum-seeker claims; Teachers boycott School Performance Tests

(1) Rudd Gov't suspends processing of Asylum-seeker claims
(2) An election-year fix: easy to implement, easy to discard
(3) Australian Greens calls for increased intake of asylum seekers
(4) Refugee lobby threatens to take Gov't to court over Asylum seeker freeze
(5) Open the Borders - (Trotskyist) John Passant
(6) 5000 asylum seekers predicted this year
(7) Australian Education Union likely to ban School Performance Tests
(8) A test the teachers must pass
(9) Teachers may lose the war

(1) Rudd Gov't suspends processing of Asylum-seeker claims

http://www.radioaustralianews.net.au/stories/201004/2869316.htm?desktop

Australia deploys police back up after refugee policy change

Last Updated: Sat, 10 Apr 2010 18:37:00 +1000

Australia has sent extra Federal Police to Christmas Island - where there's a detention centre for asylum seekers - to deal with any fallout from the government's decision to stop processing certain refugee claims.

The government has suspended refugee processing for Sri Lankan and Afghan asylum seekers because it says the conditions in those countries have improved.

The main opposition party's justice and customs spokesperson, Michael Keenan, says the move could cause tension between asylum seekers.

'We're very concerned about the conditions on Christmas Island,' says Mr Keenan.

Refugee advocates have also criticised the amended immigration policy.

A lawyer, David Manne, says it could lead to a violation of asylum seekers' human rights.

And the Australian Greens Party has described the policy as 'red-neck'.

Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young says the policy contravenes the Racial Discrimination Act and that it is a 'a quick fix' ahead of this year's election.

(2) An election-year fix: easy to implement, easy to discard

PHILLIP COOREY

April 10, 2010

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/an-electionyear-fix-easy-to-implement-easy-to-discard-20100409-ryoc.html

AFTER months of steadfast refusal to submit to pressure over asylum seekers and do something draconian, the Rudd Government has caved in.

What happened yesterday was not rocket science. With an election due within months, there was no sign the steady influx of boats carrying Sri Lankans and Afghans was going to let up.

Kevin Rudd needed a quick fix that could be applied immediately but undone when the conditions suited - like as soon as after the election.

It was designed to avoid kowtowing to the opposition and meeting its demands to reintroduce temporary protection visas and other Howard government measures.

However, it has outraged human rights and refugee groups and made the left of the party jittery.

It was audacious to claim things were looking up in Afghanistan and Sri Lanka and the processing of all future arrivals would be suspended until the situations were reviewed.

Rudd is not concerned about the left-leaning demographic, just the potent swing voters the opposition is targeting. Last week Tony Abbott made nice noises about Rudd's health plan. Knowing he could not beat Rudd on health, the idea was to wave it through and remove it as an issue of conflict. This would allow the opposition to go after insulation and asylum seekers.

Politically, Rudd tried to neutralise the latter yesterday.

Abbott called it an election-year fix that did not go far enough.

The Government does not expect the boats to stop immediately but will hope they have slowed significantly by the time the election is called.

Any reduction will be hailed a victory, and coming off such a high base that is possible.

The policy backdown breaks an election promise to eventually process 90 per cent of arrivals within 90 days. It also casts doubt on government claims that the push factors were the primary cause of the surge in asylum-seeker arrivals.

The announcement yesterday was all about sending a message that the shutters had gone up and that there was no need applying until sometime later this year, if at all.

(3) Australian Greens calls for increased intake of asylum seekers

http://greens.org.au/node/5852

Time To Increase Humanitarian Intake, Not Cut It Back

06/04/2010 - 09:23

The Australian Greens have called on the Federal Government to commit to an increase of Australia's humanitarian intake in immigration in the face of the Opposition's anti-asylum-seeker rhetoric, according to Green Senator Sarah Hanson-Young.

Senator Hanson-Young, Greens spokesperson on Immigration and Human Rights, said it was clear that the Opposition either was being ignorant or wilfully misleading about the motivations of asylum-seekers in Australia.

"The Opposition's talk about focusing immigration policy on skills and productivity is a polite way of saying that it wants Australia to ignore vulnerable asylum-seekers," Senator Hanson-Young said.

"This backward-looking view is reinforced by Tony Abbott's line that people seeking asylum here are really only motivated by envy for the Australian lifestyle.

"Mr Abbott must either be very misinformed to make such generalisations, or else he is deliberately trivialising the trauma suffered by families who risk everything in the hope of a new life.

"It's time for our leaders to be straight with the Australian public and tell them there is nothing to fear from and nothing to hate about people fleeing oppression."

The Greens support an increase to Australia's humanitarian intake along with increased efforts to fulfil our obligations as a signatory to the UN Refugee Convention. The Greens have also called for a national inquiry into Australia's population.

The Greens believe there is room to reduce the overall migration intake through cuts to skilled and business migration.

"We welcome the major parties' interest in a discussion on population, but blaming refugees for perceived population problems is disingenuous and does no one any good," Senator Hanson-Young said.

"The question for the Prime Minister is does he let the Opposition's dog-whistle politics on asylum-seekers go unchallenged, or does he show some leadership and re-commit Australia to increasing its efforts to deal fairly and humanely with the ongoing problem of people movement?

"For the sake of a reasonable discussion on immigration, for the sake of Australia's reputation internationally, but most of all for the sake of vulnerable asylum-seekers, we hope Mr Rudd does the right thing and gives the public a rare dose of reality on this issue."

(4) Refugee lobby threatens to take Gov't to court over Asylum seeker freeze

Government could face court on asylum seeker freeze

By Samantha Hawley

Updated April 10, 2010 20:01:00

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/04/10/2869294.htm

The Federal Government could face legal action over what has been described as a "redneck" policy on asylum seekers.

The Government says conditions in Sri Lanka and Afghanistan are improving and applications from asylum seekers from those countries will not be processed for up to six-months.

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young says the Federal Government's decision to freeze certain asylum seeker applications is a redneck policy.

Senator Hanson-Young says it is a clear breach of the Racial Discrimination Act and she is concerned it will lead to children being held in detention.

She says Prime Minister Kevin Rudd simply cannot be trusted to handle the asylum seeker issue.

"This is a red-neck solution from Prime Minister Rudd, it is a quick fix, in time for election time and it proves that Prime Minister Rudd is irresponsibly dangerous when it comes to managing the issues, concerns and needs of the world's most vulnerable people who arrive on Australia's doorstep," she said.

"Kevin Rudd's announcement yesterday has proven that he is a coward when it comes to standing up for what is right.

"He's simply bowing to the pressure of Tony Abbott and the Opposition and following them down the low road of electoral politics that was so well laid out by John Howard."

Australia's Afghan community says the Federal Government's decision to freeze the processing of new asylum-seeker claims from some countries, is unfair.

The Hazara Australian Community Association met with immigration officials in Melbourne today to discuss their concerns.

The Association's Naeem Yari says the situation in Afghanistan has not changed.

"This is a political decision and not for the interests of those people who are being tortured and persecuted in Afghanistan," he said.

"It has lots of impacts on those who want to flee Afghanistan and those already on the way to Australia."

Refugee lawyers are considering taking the Commonwealth to court, arguing it has breached administrative law by discriminating against a race of people.

Policy unlawful

The Human Rights Commission has condemned the move as a breach of Australia's international obligations.

Greg Barnes, from the Australian Lawyers Alliance, argues the Government's freeze on processing asylum claims could be unlawful.

"I think that a number of lawyers would want to look very carefully at this," he said.

"On this basis that one of the key principles of administrative law and in other words, the law which applies to decisions which are taken by governments against individuals is that they shall be done on the basis of being free from any discrimination based on race, and alternatively that people have procedural fairness," he said.

"The second point to make is that the law in Australia and the rule of law is such that laws have to be applied equally irrespective of where a person comes from or their race."

Mr Barnes says there is a possibility that the courts could reject the Federal Government move.

"The courts have been prepared to strike down government policies and government decisions where they say the legal advice on which the government was acting was flawed," he said.

ABC Radio's AM has also spoken to another refugee lawyer who says a legal challenge under administrative law is being considered.

Julian Burnside QC says there may be legal avenues that could be pursued, but he is not as confident.

"The Government it seems will now say 'okay, people who arrive here by boat seeking asylum will not be sent back; will not be processed. Their application for protection won't be processed; we won't determine whether they're refugees or not; we'll just leave them to rot'," he said.

"It's a sort of new version of the Pacific Solution. These things aren't too difficult to authorise by statute, but of course, the human rights implications of them are terrible."

Human Rights Commissioner Cathy Branson says there is a risk the Government is discriminating on people based on race.

"Well, the Australian Human Rights Commission is fearful that it will lead to breaches of Australia's international human rights obligations," she said.

"In particular our obligation under the Refugees Convention not to treat groups of people differently based on their country of origin; our general obligation not to discriminate."

The Commissioner says she is also concerned about conditions on Christmas Island where the detention facility is at capacity.

"We already had under consideration when we should return to Christmas Island and this will add impetus to our consideration of that question," she said.

Extra Australian Federal Police officers arrived on the island last night.

(5) Open the Borders - (Trotskyist) John Passant

http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/the-hypocrisy-of-the-greens-20100406-rp2s.html
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/politics/the-hypocrisy-of-the-greens-20100406-rp2s.html

The hypocrisy of the Greens

JOHN PASSANT

April 6, 2010

The Greens and leader Bob Brown are no different to any other political party when it comes to ignoring the plight of working class. Photo: Peter Braig

There is a contradiction at the heart of the Greens in Australia. They want change, often progressive social change, but they want it in the context of an ageing and putrefying profit system whose capacity to pay for reform is becoming less and less.

For example the Greens have suggested an interim measure — increasing the price of carbon by $20 a ton — to overcome the present stalling of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme in the Senate. Unlike the Rudd Government's CPRS, the Greens' proposal might actually reduce greenhouse gas emissions a little. And it doesn't compensate the polluters.

It relies on price signals to lower consumer demand for coal-fired energy and encourage green alternatives. In other words it is consumers — overwhelmingly working class people — who will bear the burden of this $20 carbon tax, not the polluters who will continue to profit under the Greens' proposals.

This "change from within the system" approach explains why the Greens are such committed supporters of war criminal US President Barack Obama even though he has approved more drone killings in one year than George Bush did in eight years. Like Obama the Greens give the impression of change but in Australia have not yet had to deliver in Government on it.

The spectre, however, of the German Greens in power — where they capitulated on almost every one of their principles — must haunt the more intelligent Greens' members and supporters or at least give them cause for concern.

This is not peculiar to the Greens. It is the result of the reformist project, of working within the system and playing the parliamentary game.

For example, in Germany right now the Die Linke — the Left Party — is split over these very issues of power versus principle.

And the history of the Labor Party in Australia has been nothing other than ruling for capital at the expense of labour.

It seems to be the fate of reformist parties that they compromise away their principles. Certainly the Greens in Australia have become more conservative as they have become more popular.

Indeed, in Canberra, the local Greens support an ACT minority Labor Government, which is hellbent on attacking its workforce with wage and job cuts. Even the same-sex civil union compromise these Canberra Greens passed is a rotten sop to the reactionaries in Federal Labor who would have overruled real equal marriage.

Now the Greens have sided with the reactionaries on population growth. According to Greens leader Bob Brown "Australia cannot support a population of 35 million by 2050 as discussed by both the Prime Minister and the Opposition".

Brown goes on to say that "the major parties population growth plan is outstripping Australia's infrastructure and environmental capacity and affecting quality of life".

Brown offers no evidence to support any of these assertions.

I would suggest that the infrastructure problems have more to do with Government inaction, inadequate taxation of companies and business inability or unwillingness to invest than any population issue per se. What links these matters is the primacy of profit as the policy and investment motivator, the very profit system the Greens want to use to create a better world.

The idea that population is the problem is not new. Perhaps the most well known proponent is the reactionary Malthus whose work created an economics of austerity and scarcity and who promoted inequity to serve the interest of the aristocracy.

Today the neo-Malthusians hide their essentially reactionary doctrines in glib comments about concern for living standards but the intent is the same — the defence of the ruling elite and their exploitative system.

They parrot seeming truisms about finite resources but fail to understand the problems of capitalism are not shortages but over-production. There is for example more than enough food produced to feed everyone adequately.

Finite resources are a social construct.

Malthusian reaction finds current expression in the Greens' claim that Australia cannot support a population of 35 million and their targeting of immigration as the cause of the problem.

According to Bob Brown the solution is simple. Reduce skilled migration. In the eyes of the Greens the problem is people, not the profit system.

Brown counterbalances this with a call to increase humanitarian immigration (a good move), but in the context of his statement that we cannot support a population of 35 million must mean a cut in overall immigration. This will impact most heavily on non-white immigrants.

If only there were less people, the world would be better is their mantra. This anti-human approach is the cornerstone of reaction, and the bedrock of the Greens.

But there is a problem here even for the Greens. In the 2009-10 year skilled migration is set at 108,100. By my estimates it is likely about 85,000 will come from Asia, Africa, Oceania, the Middle East or South America. They will be the first targeted in any reduction in skilled migration.

And what about education? There were about 460,000 foreign students living in Australia in 2008 at all levels of education. On the logic the Greens use shouldn't that number too be reduced? All of course to save the environment.

That will really help developing countries, the students and cash-strapped universities.

If skilled migration were to be reduced it would have implications for the development of Australian society. Take for example the Greens' proposal for green jobs. According to Greens' Senator Christine Milne: "How exciting would it be to present a plan to rebuild Australia's energy infrastructure for zero emissions as fast as possible, creating tens of thousands of jobs, driving investment in Australia's regions, cleaning our air and water and tackling the climate crisis?"

Won't we require skilled labour to do this? Or are the Greens planning to build some sort of left nationalist autarkic nirvana?

Actually Milne's suggestion of a plan is not a bad idea, but under capitalism planning is undemocratic and anti-human — done by the minority for profit, not to satisfy human need.

Labor's reformism had some connection to the working class, especially when that class took action to improve wages and conditions and defend jobs. The Greens' reformism has no class base.

For example the Greens in Tasmania have not ruled out some sort of working arrangement (including ministries) with the Liberals. Bob Brown wants a coalition of all three parties — i.e. to join the two conservative parties in an unholy alliance of ruling for business.

It is not only the idea that immigrants are a problem that lends itself to racism; the Greens proposal to spend more on Australia's overseas aid budget to go to literacy and reproductive health is clearly aimed at keeping immigrants from poorer countries (i.e. those who are not white) out of Australia. So a good idea on the surface has a hidden message that undermines its worth.

Spend more to keep them out is the Greens' message.

I have an alternative proposal. Open the borders. Let labour flow freely around the world as capital does. Unfortunately the Greens want controlled labour but free capital.

When you play in the sandpit of reaction you can end up with a racist rash all over your party.

There is a heavy responsibility on Greens' members to overturn Bob Brown's call to cut skilled immigration to save the environment.

This article first appeared in En Passant with John Passant.

(6) 5000 asylum seekers predicted this year

Simon Kearney   Sunday Herald Sun   April 11, 2010 12:00AM  

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/asylum-seekers-predicted-this-year/story-e6frf7l6-1225852249865

SAILING season for asylum seekers has begun amid a prediction that more than 5000 will make the journey to Australia this year and as many as 20,000 are in the people-smuggling pipeline.

The prediction came as the first boatload of asylum seekers to be subject to the Rudd Government's new processing suspension for Afghans and Sri Lankans arrived yesterday at Christmas Island.

Home Affairs Minister Brendan O'Connor announced the latest arrival of eight passengers and two crew yesterday morning. ...

Under the move announced on Friday, processing of claims for refugee protection from people from Sri Lanka will be suspended for three months and for six months for people from Afghanistan. They comprise about 80 per cent of all recent boat people arrivals.

Mr O'Connor said the suspension was introduced because of the evolving circumstances in the two countries.

(7) Australian Education Union likely to ban School Performance Tests

Crunch time for teachers' test ban

Sid Maher and Justine Ferrari    The Australian    April 12, 2010  12:00AM   

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/crunch-time-for-teachers-test-ban/story-e6frgczf-1225852474977

THE Australian Education Union is today expected to formally ban teachers from conducting tests that will be used for the My School website, buoyed by an opinion poll showing a small majority of parents believe the action would be justified.

However, Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard, claiming the support of "mums and dads" for the tests, called on the union to drop its plans and reiterated her threat to use parents to usurp the ban and act as supervisors for next month's National Assessment Program Literacy and Numeracy tests.

"Banning the tests would be bad for students, bad for the kids, bad for parents and bad for transparency," Ms Gillard said.

"The nation should know what is happening in our schools."

Tony Abbott seized on the deepening dispute, saying the Education Minister had "completely lost control of her portfolio if she's talking about tests not be administered by professional people".

The AEU yesterday released the results of a national poll that found 54 per cent of public school parents believed the ban would be justified, with 46 per cent opposed.

But the general public was evenly split.

The online poll of 1000 people nationwide, by research company Interconsult, found 51 per cent of all people believed the ban would be justified, compared with 49 per cent against.

The AEU's federal executive will today vote on whether to implement a professional ban on the national NAPLAN tests, which provide crucial data for the My School website.

AEU president Angelo Gavrielatos attacked Ms Gillard for failing to meet the union on the issue, saying the poll found 85 per cent of people believed she should meet the union.

The union has demanded changes to the website, arguing it allows the compilation of league tables ranking schools.

But Ms Gillard told the ABC's Insiders program the union was asking her to "gut My School and I just won't do it".

"My School is all about putting more power into the hands of parents than they've ever had before by giving them more information about their child's school than they ever had before," she said.

Ms Gillard said the option of asking parents to assist with supervising the tests, under instruction from qualified supervisors, remained on the table. She said she knew parents wanted the My School site, which had received about 2.7 million visits.

"Parents have literally voted with their fingertips in extraordinary numbers because they want this information," she said.

Mr Gavrielatos described Ms Gillard's threat to use parents as test supervisors as "regrettable".

He said Ms Gillard had refused to meet the union to discuss its proposal to "improve" the My School website and "protect students and schools from the damage of league tables and improper ranking of schools".

The Federation of Parents and Citizens Associations of NSW yesterday expressed outrage at Ms Gillard's suggestion to use parents as supervisors in the tests scheduled from May 11-13 and called on her to meet the union.

(8) A test the teachers must pass

The Australian    April 12, 2010  12:00AM   

National literacy and numeracy assessments must go ahead

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/a-test-the-teachers-must-pass/story-e6frg71x-1225852483216

WILL the leaders of the Australian Education Union ever understand they have no right to impose their political opinions on families who use the public school system? We will learn this today when they decide whether to order members not to administer literacy and numeracy tests next month. Union officials are threatening the ban because they oppose the test results being published on Education Minister Julia Gillard's My School website. The threat is part of the union's ongoing campaign against the site, which provides parents with all sorts of information on how their children's class compares on national literacy and numeracy measures. It also allows parents to track the school's performance year on year. The biggest benefit is it enables parents to look up other schools -- an enormous advantage for everybody wondering how their children's teachers rate.

And it drives AEU officials nuts. Some of their criticisms are understandable, especially the argument that the statistical formula used to create peer groups of schools on My School generates some odd matches. But their overall objections are ideological. They argue overall scores take no account of the difficulties schools in underprivileged areas endure. They claim it is unkind to publicise the results of poorly performing schools. And they absolutely loathe the idea of anybody using the data to create league tables ranking schools across cities or states. That denying parents comparative information means there is no way to hold poorly performing AEU members to account is, naturally, never mentioned by the union.

But whatever the AEU argues is irrelevant: Ms Gillard rightly says My School meets a community need, pointing to the 2.7 million visits to the site since it launched in January. And as the information it provides expands over the years, this number will increase exponentially. Good. By ensuring everybody is aware of what schools are doing well and which ones need help, the site will be an invaluable diagnostic tool. It will honour the vast majority of classroom teachers who try to improve their performance each year. And it will empower parents to demand improvements. That the AEU is even considering banning tests demonstrates a commitment to engineered uniformity that puts the interests of union officials above the rights of Australian students.

(9) Teachers may lose the war

by Dennis Atkins   The Courier-Mail   April 11, 2010 8:00PM  

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/teachers-may-lose-the-war-dennis-atkins/story-e6frerff-1225852453052

TAKING Mum or Dad to school might be most kids' worst nightmare but Julia Gillard is considering it as her union fight reaches a flash point.

The Australian Education Union is considering whether to press ahead with its plan to refuse to take part in the next round of the national literacy and numeracy tests next month.

The teachers have polling which shows parents split down the middle on whether to back any boycott – a result which suggests their industrial action will go ahead.

Gillard's plan B is to rally her own parents' army to help out with the tests. "I'm asking parents if we need them to consider working with us to make sure that the tests continue to run out this year," the Deputy Prime Minister said yesterday.

She even joked that having parents in the rooms where the students were being tested might actually improve the results.

While the teachers have significant support among parents, there's opposition to the boycott.

Gillard believes she has won the broader battle – pointing to the fact there have been 2.7 million unique visits to her My School website since January.

She knows if she can hold a successful series of tests without the participation of teachers she will have not just won the battle but, most probably, the war.

Government sources say if parents were asked if they supported action which would shut down the My School website, the results would be very different.