FED:Editorials, Tuesday April 26

AAP General News (Australia)
04-26-2011
FED:Editorials, Tuesday April 26

SYDNEY, April 26 AAP - The Gillard government is moving closer to restoring public
confidence with a proposed law which could see asylum seekers deported if convicted of
a crime in detention, the Herald Sun says in its editorial comment.

Asylum seekers convicted over acts of violence and riots at immigration detention centres
would fail the government's character test and face probable deportation under the new
law.

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen will unveil the new law on Tuesday, following recent
riots at Villawood, Christmas Island and Broadmeadows which caused millions of dollars
of damage, the newspaper reports.



Australians have watched with growing alarm as the populations at our asylum seeker
detention centres keep expanding, says The Daily Telegraph. Last week matters reached
a literal flashpoint, with the Villawood centre being set ablaze by detainees.

There is considerable sympathy in Australia for those who genuinely pursue asylum in our country.

The paper says Australians have followed the asylum seeker issue long enough and in
enough detail to understand that not all asylum seekers are genuine. Some are opportunistic.

Some are fleeing not oppression but countries in which they would simply prefer not to
live.

And some don't accept the umpire's decision. Several of those involved in the Villawood
fires were on their way out after their claims for asylum had been repeatedly examined
and finally rejected.

The Federal Labor Government's moves to add greater stress to the character element
of asylum claims are long overdue.

An important aspect of these cases is that the lives of security staff and asylum seekers
who are not involved in any trouble-making are placed in jeopardy.



The Sydney Morning Herald says there's both extraordinary boom and impending gloom
on Australia's economic horizon. How this story plays out will depend on how Australia
manages the second phase of the mining and energy boom.

On the face of it, the issues seem straightforward. Unprecedented commodity and energy
prices are again drawing big money into Australia's mining sector - with an important
knock-on effect. Demand for labour is expanding so rapidly that Australia is facing an
acute skills shortage not only in mining and related energy and construction projects,
but in a very long list of support industries.

The solution?: bring in the skilled workers we need to plug the gaps. If we don't,
local wages will blow out, inflation will gallop off and every Australian will feel the
sting of rising interest rates.

This brings us back to migration. Australia probably has little choice but to open
up jobs to overseas workers through migration or temporary visas. Yet both sides of politics
pulled back sharply from generous migration intakes before the last federal election in
favour of more popular plans for a "sustainable" Australia.

The challenge is to strike a balance between two conflicting realities, that of crowded
and under-serviced Australian cities and towns keen to limit population growth and that
of urgent need for skilled labour to keep economic growth, and future prosperity, on track.



Countries such as Australia are in a delicate situation as an uncertain new world order
takes shape, where the balance of power tips closer to China and further from the US,
The Age says.

This is because Australia is an ally of the US but is economically dependent on China,
the newspaper said in its main editorial.

After the Cold War, the US exercised power in every sphere from culture to global economics
and military strength.

But this power has been damaged by the global financial crisis, which means the US
will not be able to deal as confidently with the new Chinese superpower as it did in the
past against the Soviet Union.

China's enhanced global status is likely to intensify the country's conflicts, the
newspaper said.

"Those who want democracy and open, accountable government will, rightly, insist that
political reforms to complement the economic reforms of the past three decades would be
the best means of easing the wider world's apprehensions about Chinese power," the paper
said.

"The ruling Communist Party's suppression of dissidents in response to the jasmine
revolutions in the Arab world, however, suggests that it is unlikely to heed such arguments
from the country's liberal elites.

"Like the US, Australia will have to hope that China's dissidents eventually prevail."



At least someone benefited from Queensland's summer of natural disasters - the owners,
operators and members of the state's pubs and clubs with poker machines.

Gamblers at hotels and clubs lost almost half a billion dollars in the first three
months of this year - more than $4.9 million a day. One theory is that disaster victims,
forced to rely on pubs and clubs for meals while their own homes were repaired, contributed
to the latest surge in losses.

Pokies have become an essential source of revenue not just for clubs across Queensland
but also the State Government, which this year will collect more than $500 million in
poker machine taxes, which is more than it collects in duties on vehicle registrations.

The problem of course is that all this money comes at a high cost. The Productivity
Commission has estimated the social cost of problem gambling, the majority of it from
pokies, is at least $4.7 billion a year.

Governments and clubs are now so reliant on poker machine gambling they have, by and
large, opposed Federal Government proposals to introduce pre-commitment technology to
control problem gambling. And indeed, the Government is only considering this course of
action because it is part of its deal with independent Tasmanian MP Andrew Wilkie to keep
his support to win government.

The Gillard Government has to be seen to be doing something to help problem gamblers
in order to honour its commitment to Mr Wilkie. A good starting point would be for state
governments, Queensland's included, to start thinking of ways to reduce their own reliance
on this hugely expensive source of money.

AAP msk

KEYWORD: EDITORIALS

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