The fact that a Suspected Illegal Entry Vessel ( SIEV) capsized and drowned nearly a hundred asylum seekers is making ordinary Australians both ashamed and angry. Border protection has become a political football and both sides of politics seems more interested in point scoring and denigrating remedial plans than actually stopping the boats.
Achieving consensus is impossible without a working compromise being reached between the Labor government and the opposition Coalition. Any solution will be blocked by the Greens unless the two main parties deliver the numbers, and the Greens are totally opposed to any solution that involves asylum seekers being assessed in a third country.
The main stumbling block seems to be an agreeable destination. Labor is adamant that it wants the boat people sent to Malaysia. The Coalition is equally firm that they be sent to Nauru. The only thing the two sides seem to actually agree on is that moving asylum seekers offshore will destroy the people smuggler's myth that once asylum seekers reach Australian soil they will be allowed to stay. There will be no incentive to risk their lives on a leaky, overcrowded little boat if they will immediately be deported away from that treasured Australian landfall.
It is not hard to see why a workable plan remains out of reach. This is the classical political clash of ego's.
When Kevin Rudd won office he inherited a working solution devised by John Howard that had virtually stopped the boats. This plan offended Labor principles and so it was scrapped and replaced. The replacement has clearly failed, but to change course would involve Labor admitting it made a mistake - and in politics that is unthinkable !
No solution has been reached because a decision that favours either Malaysia or Nauru delivers a win for one leader and a loss for the other, and human life runs a long way second to the ego's of our political leaders. They would prefer to see people drown at sea than suffer the humiliation of being the one who is seen to back down.
Perhaps the only way out of this mess is to invoke the Australian national character. We are a people known for our love of sport - and our affinity to wager on events. If both sides agree to let fate decide the destination of the asylum seekers, that decision can be made on the flip of a coin. Heads - they go to Malaysia. Tails - they go to Nauru.
At least it removes politics from the decision !
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