Howard Government continues to banish asylum seekers to Nauru at great cost to the tax payer

HANDS-OFF APPROACH: A sick Sri Lankan asylum seeker will be sent to Nauru this week after federal Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews refused to intervene.

Media reports "the 31-year-old Tamil was one of 83 Sri Lankan asylum seekers intercepted by Australian authorities earlier this year and taken to Christmas Island.

In February he was assessed as needing medical attention and taken to Perth for treatment. But doctors say he is now fit to travel.

Mr Andrews has refused to intervene on the case so the man will be transported to Nauru.

"As I understand, he applied to be assessed here as opposed to the other members of the group and there was no reason other than he was needing medical attention as to why he wasn't with the group that went to Nauru and now that he's fit to fly he can join his compatriots,'' a spokeswoman for Mr Andrews said today.

It is understood the man has mental health problems and has shrapnel embedded in his brain from a bomb.

But Mr Andrews's spokeswoman said the man was fit to fly.

"As to the nature of what his current condition is, I'm not too sure, but we relied heavily on medical advice in that instance and he's been assessed as medically fit so he'll be transported to Nauru later this week,'' she said."

It has been reported that transferring and detaining the 83 Sri Lankan asylum seekers already on Nauru will cost at least $60 million of taxpayer dollars. Not only is the ongoing Pacific Solution strategy a brutal human rights violation but it is completely unnecessary. The Greens assert:

"Departmental figures show the cost of keeping asylum seekers on Nauru was $30 million per year in 2003-04 when the Nauru camp last had a significant number of detainees. The average length of stay on Nauru has been over two years. If the Sri Lankans are there for two years it will have cost taxpayers at least $60 million.

"It was revealed at that the recent Senate Estimates that the aeroplane used to transfer just eight Burmese asylum seekers from Christmas Island to Nauru cost $225,000.

"It is a long way from Christmas Island to Nauru and 83 people plus new staff and resources will need multiple jet flights. The cost may approach a million dollars.

"Christmas Island detention centre is also irresponsibly expensive at $1830 per detainee per day. That means keeping the Sri Lankans on Christmas Island is costing over $1 million a week.

"It is strange that the government will squander huge sums on the failed Nauru policy when thousands of other asylum seekers are living in the community while their cases are assessed."

Not so strange when you get the point that the punitive approach to asylum seekers pitched by Howard to attract lurking One Nation sentiments in the electorate remains a winning strategy in his mind.

Australia fails in basic human rights obligation

Radio Australia reports "The Australian Council of Social Service has supported a United Nations report which strongly criticises the country's human rights record.

The report, tabled to the Human Rights Council in Geneva, says Australia has failed in its basic human rights obligation to provide adequate housing for all.

Wendy Morton from the Australian Council of Social Service says the problem is that help is only offered by governments when people hit absolute rock bottom.

"That it tends to be people who are most in crisis at the time that are getting access to public housing and a whole range of people, single people with children and families are needing public housing," she said.

"So we need to be looking at ways to address those needs and to be providing different models of housing."

On 11 June the Human Rights Council discussed the reports of the Special Rapporteurs on the right to food, toxic and dangerous products and wastes, adequate housing and human rights and extreme poverty. In the context of Australia's performance they heard:

"A second addendum contains the report of the Special Rapporteur's mission to Australia. While noting some good practices to address some of the problems related to the implementation of the right to adequate housing, the Special Rapporteur has come to believe that there is a serious national housing crisis in Australia, affecting many sections of the population, with a critical and direct impact on the most vulnerable groups. Australia lacks a clear consistent, long-term and holistic housing strategy. The Special Rapporteur concludes that Australia has failed to implement the human right to adequate housing, and encourages the Government to make housing a national priority. Among his recommendations is the need to establish a national housing ministry."

Yet again, the Howard Government has been named in a UN report on human rights failings. The pattern continues....

China condemns Howard & Rudd meeting the Dalai Lama, but condones child labour and other sweat shop practices...

The ABC reports: "Although the Chinese Government is known for frowning upon national leaders who greet the visiting Dalai Lama, it seems a public opinion backlash was the push in the Prime Minister and Kevin Rudd's decisions to meet him."

The usual bullying tactic of the Chinese Government comes in a week that saw media reports that global trade union and labor group investigators found that backpacks, caps and other licensed products for the Beijing games are being made in Chinese factories that employ children as young as 12 and force employees to work long hours for less than minimum wage.

An alliance of global trade unions and labor groups also said they found forced overtime for no pay and hazardous working conditions in four factories in southern China.

It is about time Australian political leaders stopped toadying up to this regime as a benign 'cash cow' and acknowledged that much of the terms of trade advantage China enjoys is a result of child labour, sweat shop exploitation and sundry other human rights violations. This requires a coordinated international response to leave China in no doubt that labour exploitation and economic imperialism is not acceptable.

The Olympics should not have been awarded to China on the grounds of its Tibetan policies alone.

The colonisation and brutalisation of the Tibetan people is a crime against humanity. Countries that persist in persecution and exploitation of minorities (putting aside the question of Tibetan political self-determination) should be condemned. Politicians that duck and weave on Tibet to placate China for trade purposes choose not to face up to their responsibilities to represent their constituents on fundamental human rights issues. It is a sad state of affairs.


The child labour Olympics - something for which the IOC can be truly proud!

Howard on the nose - hold that thought..!

Hugh Mackay, social researcher extraordinaire, is starting to think Howard is on the nose. I can't imagine why, but Hugh thinks:

"Gradually, we got the hang of Howard. The core/non-core promises episode and his hastily revised code of ministerial conduct suggested he was slippery. We saw the poorest and most vulnerable members of the community hit hardest by his two big "reforms" — the never-ever GST and the unfortunately named WorkChoices — and wondered if he cared.

When he declared he could have brought David Hicks home sooner if he had wanted to, we wondered if there was a streak of cruelty in this government — especially when we pondered its treatment of asylum seekers and its extraordinary attempt to chisel poor little East Timor out of its rightful share of royalties from the oilfields in the Timor Sea.

He plunged our defence force into a morally dubious pre-emptive strike and he's sticking by George Bush in the face of incontrovertible evidence that the Iraq invasion was both folly and catastrophe."

This is a cursory overview of Howard's report card but you get the point. I would hold him accountable for turning a blind eye to Indonesia's ongoing rape of West Papua and the AWB kickbacks scandal in Iraq, compliance with rendition and torture of an Australian citizen, using official aid to coerce smaller, poorer countries to do Australia's bidding and much, much more. Roll on election day.

Amnesty's report card on Howard upsets some commentators

I noticed the recent furore in virtual circles and in some media over Amnesty's inclusion of the Howard government in the company of world leaders thriving on fear and division.

The worry was that AI had over egged the cake by lumping Howard in with Mugabe and Omar al-Bashir. Whilst Howard cannot be compared with these leaders in terms of the misery and repression they have wrought in their own countries, it should be remembered that Australia's involvement in the invasion of Iraq has resulted in terrible loss of civilian life and massive upheaval for countless thousands of Iraqi refugees and IDPs. There is a strong legal argument that the Iraq military actions and associated human rights violations will be condemned as war crimes.

The cost of the human tragedy for those impacted directly, the further destabilization of the Middle East and the ongoing threat to world security emanating from the botched occupation puts Howard in the current pantheon of leaders responsible for gross human rights violations. His appalling record on treatment of refugees and indigenous people at home is just part of the picture when it comes to this Prime Minister's human rights record.

Refugee Action Committee Canberra - message to Howard Govt for election year 2007 - Enough is enough!

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

You continue to deny justice to asylum seekers and refugees.
You deny human rights to Australian citizens.

ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

You have taken Australia backwards in the area of human rights.

You create fear, distrust and division.
You speak of Australian values and you lack the core values of respect for the individual, freedom, justice and compassion.

You fail to give moral leadership.

You have robbed thousands of refugee men, women and children of health and happiness and years of their lives.

You have been forced by a few courageous members of your own party to make some concessions but you use your wealth and power to continue to fight any real change.

You leave many once proud Australians with a sense of shame and a grief for where you are leading our nation.

Your leadership is a danger to the future of Australia.

An additional sentiment from yours truly:

Make your vote count for human rights!

Fear & propaganda - Howard's pitch for re-election cranks up

Only those disciplined enough to stay away from television sets are not being bombarded by a Howard government propaganda blitz reminiscent of periods of nationalistic fervour during the last century. Now we are getting the 'terrorism' adds again, just to ensure the right dollop of fear is mixed in with the masala of Howard Government self-promotion.

The Wikipedia has quite a bit to say on propaganda methods. Take this excerpt for instance:

"Propaganda also has much in common with public information campaigns by governments, which are intended to encourage or discourage certain forms of behavior (such as wearing seat belts, not smoking, not littering and so forth). Again, the emphasis is more political in propaganda. Propaganda can take the form of leaflets, posters, TV and radio broadcasts and can also extend to any other medium. In the case of the United States, there is also an important legal (imposed by law) distinction between advertising (a type of overt propaganda) and what the Government Accountability Office (GAO), an arm of the United States Congress, refers to as "covert propaganda."

Journalistic theory generally holds that news items should be objective, giving the reader an accurate background and analysis of the subject at hand. On the other hand, advertisements evolved from the traditional commercial advertisements to include also a new type in the form of paid articles or broadcasts disguised as news. These generally present an issue in a very subjective and often misleading light, primarily meant to persuade rather than inform. Normally they use only subtle propaganda techniques and not the more obvious ones used in traditional commercial advertisements. If the reader believes that a paid advertisement is in fact a news item, the message the advertiser is trying to communicate will be more easily "believed" or "internalized."

Such advertisements are considered obvious examples of "covert" propaganda because they take on the appearance of objective information rather than the appearance of propaganda, which is misleading. Federal law specifically mandates that any advertisement appearing in the format of a news item must state that the item is in fact a paid advertisement...

Propaganda, in a narrower use of the term, connotates deliberately false or misleading information that supports or furthers a political (but not only) cause or the interests of those with power. The propagandist seeks to change the way people understand an issue or situation for the purpose of changing their actions and expectations in ways that are desirable to the interest group. Propaganda, in this sense, serves as a corollary to censorship in which the same purpose is achieved, not by filling people's minds with approved information, but by preventing people from being confronted with opposing points of view. What sets propaganda apart from other forms of advocacy is the willingness of the propagandist to change people's understanding through deception and confusion rather than persuasion and understanding."

Sound familiar? Countless millions of tax payer's dollars are pouring into the coffers of advertising companies selling the Howard government to credulous voters. Just in case you miss one of the ads you can be sure it will be repeated ad nauseum. The question to be asked is why is this bald-faced electoral propaganda being funded from the public purse? How does this stack up in the pantheon of bad governance that has become a hallmark of Howard's government?



'Man of the people' - all trackkied up and ready to lead (up several more dead ends)

Trust me .... would you buy a used government from this man?

Is this smirk OK George...what about the pitch?