politicalowl

On  AM   this morning: CHRIS UHLMANN: Why have you broken your policy for off-shore processing and decided to sent them to Curtin? SCOTT MORRISON: We haven’t broken our promises for off-shore processing. Off-shore processing is the backstop measure. Where we can get people sent back to the country from which they’ve come from, then that’s exactly what we’ll do and that’s the step we’re now engaged in.  It’s not the policy of this Government to send out the water taxi the second the whistle goes up, as was the practise of the previous government, that’s not what we do. We seek to frustrate every aspect of this venture, and that includes having people sent back where we can do that. And now you’ll know that he mainland of Australia is an excised off-shore place for the purposes of the migration act. CHRIS UHLMANN: That’s true, Australia is no longer part of Australia for the purposes of the Migration Act. SCOTT MORRISON: And that was the legislation brought in by t...

Monday, 20th June, 2005    - Richard Farmer   The best way to blunt the impact of a critical report is to make changes before the report becomes public. No one knows that better than Prime Minister John Howard. So we have had some concessions on the way illegal immigrants are treated in detention camps. Stand by for the report into the system which resulted in an Australian resident being held in detention. The PM might not have had the report of former Federal Police Commissioner Mick Palmer in his hand when he reached agreement with the backbench critics of the detention policy, but he would surely have known the broad thrust of Mr Palmer's findings. The Immigration Department is sure to get a caning and Mr Howard will continue trying to get the public service to carry the can for the detention abuses. As the impact of the report is played out over coming weeks we should note it down as the formal end of the Westminster principle of ministerial re...