Kevin McCracken: Boat people surge has Rudd Government in deep waters

Australians will almost certainly go to a federal election this year to cast judgment on the first-term Kevin Rudd-led Labor Government.

What a few months ago looked a re-election certainty is now considerably less so.

A series of botched programmes, policy backflips and broken promises has resulted in public support for the Government dropping quite spectacularly.

Shaping up as one of the hottest election issues is the resurgent flow of "unauthorised" boat-arrival asylum-seekers from Asia.

After several years of a trickle of such arrivals, numbers have risen sharply - 59 boats and 2750 people last year and already more than that this year.

This surge, although paltry by British, American and European levels, is electoral dynamite. It is an axiom of Australian politics that no government can be seen to have lost control of the borders, which is what the federal opposition now loudly proclaims.

The rise can be traced back to the 2007 election campaign. Before that boat arrivals were minimal, reflecting the conservative Howard Government's hard-line approach to discourage people from trying to gain refugee status in that manner.

In the campaign Labor played a dual boat-people card to the electorate, promising to deliver firm control of the country's borders, but in a more humanitarian way.

Elected to office, the Rudd Government quickly set about softening its predecessor's regulatory system, ending offshore asylum-seeker processing arrangements with Nauru and Papua New Guinea (the so-called 'Pacific Solution'), abolishing the contentious temporary visa protection scheme and overhauling the policy of mandatory detention.

Not surprisingly, Prime Minister Rudd has been reluctant to admit anything his Government has done has led to the resurgent flotilla. The official Labor line is that "push" factors are to blame.

But Government realists have reluctantly accepted that the 2008 softening of asylum-seeker policies clearly sent a signal to people smugglers and would be asylum-seekers that getting into Australia is now easier.

Turning around that perception in Asia and stemming the tide of boat arrivals is essential for the Government's election hopes.

But it will be difficult. In an April Newspoll survey, 44 per cent said the Liberal-National Coalition would best handle the asylum-seeker issue. Only 26 per cent nominated Labor.

In recent weeks both political factions have tried to convince voters of their credentials and deter people smugglers and intending asylum-seekers.

With regular reports of new vessels being intercepted, the Indian Ocean Christmas Island asylum-seeker processing centre bursting at the seams and growing voter unease, the Government clearly felt obliged to be seen to do something firm quickly.

It ruled suddenly on April 9 that all new applications for asylum from nationals of Sri Lanka and Afghanistan, the bulk of arrivals in the recent surge, would be frozen: Sri Lankans for three months, Afghans for six months.

Its justification was that improved security conditions in the two countries meant fewer of their citizens would rate as genuine refugees. It also claimed

The irony of claiming security had improved as its Smartraveller website was warning Australians of the danger of travelling to the two countries seemed to escape the Government. Similarly, it was unable to cite cases to support its claim other countries had frozen Sri Lankan applications.

The Government has been accused of breaching international law through the freeze, by discriminating against people on the basis of their country of origin. It's no surprise the Immigration Minister rejects this view, saying the Refugee Convention allows temporary freezes of this nature.

Whether a definite legal violation or not, the suspension is a backflip on the Government's "immigration detention values" that say "detention that is indefinite or otherwise arbitrary is not acceptable". And "detention in immigration detention centres is only to be used as a last resort and for the shortest practicable time".

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is doing everything he can to stir up the issue, seeing it as a vote winner for the Coalition. Unabashed fear-mongering is getting a good workout.

In a May 4 "headland speech" for instance, he warned of millions perhaps being tempted to try the boat trip to Australia if global conditions worsened.

A Liberal television ad shows a map with dramatic red arrows portraying movement of people from Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and Indonesia to Australia and a call by Abbott for "real action" to stop boat arrivals.

The intended "real action" was spelled out in a May 27 policy directions statement ("Restoring Sovereignty and Control to our Borders") by Abbott.

This in essence foreshadowed a move back to the John Howard era - turn back the boats whenever possible, process all unauthorised arrivals seeking asylum offshore and negotiations to take place on establishing a third-country processing location, re-introduction of temporary protection visas and requiring temporary protection visa holders to work for access to benefits.

How these policies would work in practice remains to be seen.

But the benefit of opposition is that it's the Government's measures that are put to the acid test.

The Rudd Government can only hope its new measures work and are accepted by sufficient voters.

Tony Abbott meanwhile probably wouldn't mind seeing the flotilla of unauthorised boat arrivals continue through to election day.

* Kevin McCracken is an Australian population specialist. He is a former Dean of Environmental and Life Sciences and now an honorary senior research fellow at Macquarie University, Sydney.