Asylum bid likely to sink

THREE Indonesian families plucked from a leaking boat west of Darwin would have little chance of securing asylum on the basis of economic hardship under current Australian laws. The three men, their wives and their 10 children are "bajo laut", or sea gypsies, who are used to perilous journeys across treacherous waters. Their decision to seek economic asylum in Australia was probably based on "little knowledge" of immigration law and the simplistic assessment that "if Australian detention centres are good, how much better must the rest of it be?", according to Australian National University anthropologist James Fox.

The 16 were rescued in the Timor Sea by HMAS Ararat on Tuesday after their fishing boat took on water and was accidentally capsized by navy personnel. The three heads of the families involved - Sukardi Liri, Sadar and Sangaji Jawa - had all previously been arrested by Australian maritime border patrols while fishing in the Timor Sea. Australia only recognises asylum-seekers who meet the United Nations definition of a refugee: people who are outside their country of nationality or their usual country of residence and are unable or unwilling to return because of persecution over race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion.

A spokeswoman for Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews said yesterday the Indonesians were "at least a day away" from Christmas Island where they would be held at the island's original detention centre, as the new $356 million complex is not ready to be occupied.

Figures from government agencies reveal Indonesia's fishing fleet has largely retreated from Australian waters, or been reduced in size, as a result of increased enforcement and education. After John Howard ordered an October 2005 review of the threat of illegal fishing, the agencies came up with a new enforcement strategy as an education program was rolled out in eastern Indonesian villages. Although the 2006-07 budget included a $389 million, four-year funding boost to "more than double the number of apprehensions each year", the agencies have been so successful their focus has shifted to deterrence.

As well as surveillance, a cut in Indonesian fuel subsidies two years ago and poor weather helped reduce the number of incursions last year. The number of vessel sightings - some legitimate and some counted more than once - fell from 8619 in 2005-06 to 3609 in 2006-07. In the same time, the number of apprehensions also fell, from 367 to 216, as did the number of forfeitures of boats. Fisheries Minister Eric Abetz said it appeared Indonesian fishermen were getting the message.

Professor Fox described the Roti Island sea gypsies as "the poorest of the poor". He speculated that the voyage was "a desperate misguided flight from poverty to some kind of imagined wealth, if they could find acceptance in Australia". The bajo laut are an ethnic group spread across southeast Asia who make their living from the ocean but often regard themselves as having no long-term fixed address. If their claims for asylum are rejected, they will most likely be returned to Roti, where the boat's owner, Sukardi, will probably undertake extra poaching trips to pay off the debt on the vessel that sank.

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Rudd would turn back boatpeople

It looks like the limpwristed approach to illegals that is common elsewhere will not be coming to Australia

KEVIN Rudd has taken a tough line on border security, warning that a Labor government will turn the boats back and deter asylum-seekers, using the threat of detention and the nation's close ties with Indonesia. In an interview with The Australian, the Opposition Leader advocated a layered approach to border security based on "effective laws, effective detention arrangements, effective deterrent posture vis-a-vis vessels approaching Australian waters".

Mr Rudd also said that a referendum on Aboriginal reconciliation, a separate Aboriginal treaty and a republican referendum would not occur in the first term of a Rudd Labor government, if at all. And he refused to give any commitment to a statutory bill of rights, saying Labor's only promise was to "consult the community" on the issue.

With the campaign closing amid Liberal exploitation of fears about Islam in Sydney's west and the arrival of 16 boatpeople from Indonesia off the West Australian coast, Mr Rudd promised a tough and integrated border-protection policy from Labor. This would mean close co-operation with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and the Indonesian Government. Mr Rudd said Labor would take asylum-seekers who had been rescued from leaky boats to Christmas Island, would turn back seaworthy vessels containing such people on the high seas, and would not lift the current [much reduced] intake of African refugees.

"You'd turn them back," he said of boats approaching Australia, emphasising that Labor believed in an "orderly immigration system" enforced by deterrence. "You cannot have anything that is orderly if you allow people who do not have a lawful visa in this country to roam free," he said. "That's why you need a detention system. I know that's politically contentious, but one follows from the other. "Deterrence is effective through the detention system but also your preparedness to take appropriate action as the vessels approach Australian waters on the high seas."

Mr Rudd heads into the final two days of the campaign with an election-winning lead in the polls, although early figures from Newspoll and the latest Galaxy poll in News Limited newspapers give the Coalition some hope. Newspoll is detecting strong gains for the Coalition in Western Australia and a minor recovery in Queensland and Victoria, with full figures to be available in the final poll of the campaign exclusively in The Weekend Australian tomorrow. The Galaxy poll, which surveyed almost 1200 people on Tuesday and Wednesday, had Labor and the Coalition equal on 42.5 per cent of the primary vote. Taking into account preference flows, this gives Labor a lead of 52per cent to 48 per cent - the Government's best result this year. Such a swing, if uniform across the country, would deliver Labor 15 seats, one short of the 16 it needs to form government. An ACNielsen poll in Fairfax newspapers gives Labor a two-party-preferred lead of 57 per cent to 43 per cent, which would deliver a landslide victory.

John Howard accused Mr Rudd, in an interview with The Australian this week, of forming an alliance with the Greens in the Senate and with all state Labor governments. The Prime Minister warned this would form an unprecedented coalition in the Senate, House of Representatives and all state and territory governments, without checks and balances.

Mr Howard said yesterday he believed Mr Rudd "would change the country" if elected. "When there's been a change of government, there's been a profound change in the direction of the country," he said. "Now if the country were going in the wrong direction, it would be understandable that people would want change, but if it's going in the right direction, why would you change something that's going in the right direction?"

But in his interview with The Australian, Mr Rudd rejected or played down a series of social policies and issues that Labor and the Greens had pursued for years during the Coalition Government. He said a referendum on the republic was not a priority, flatly rejected the prospect of a separate treaty with Aborigines and said he was unlikely to pursue Mr Howard's plan for a reconciliation preamble to the Constitution if he were elected tomorrow. Instead, he will pursue practical outcomes for indigenous communities that "close the gap" between the living standards of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal communities.

Mr Rudd said he understood the proposal for an Aboriginal reconciliation preamble to the Constitution was a big change for Mr Howard, but he did not feel the need to pursue it. "From my point of view, the key thing is closing the gap (between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal living standards) and the key to this also is to introduce policies that give effect to closing the gap," Mr Rudd said. "I am concerned about making advances on the practical front first. Let's take other things subsequent to that."

Mr Rudd also said he was "absolutely" committed to following through on the Coalition's federal intervention in the Northern Territory. "I am steeled and seized by the report, The Little Children Are Sacred," he said. "You can't read that and just pretend it's business as usual in the Northern Territory, so I am prepared to give it a go." Mr Rudd said Labor would review the intervention after 12 months to ensure it was working effectively against a series of benchmarks on infant mortality and education standards. "I am fundamentally committed to making a difference on those areas of disparity between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australia," Mr Rudd said. "If that is done, perhaps we can look at other initiatives." He emphasised there would not be a separate Aboriginal treaty under his government.

Mr Rudd said a referendum on Australia becoming a republic was "not a priority" and he could not see it happening in his first term. "The republic is not a priority," he said. "I doubt therefore we would see any action on a republic during the first term." Mr Rudd said the ALP conference had agreed to look at a bill of rights but he did not put it as a priority. "It's not a priority," he said. "We had this debate, it's a highly contentious area." Mr Rudd said he was aware of the implications for national security legislation if a bill of rights were introduced. "I think it is an area to proceed very cautiously with," he said. "We are committed to consulting the community on the need for one, we are not committed to implementing one."

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House full, overstretched midwives at NSW hospital warn

SENIOR staff at the state's busiest hospital have threatened to close its doors to women in labour because there are not enough midwives or beds to cope with the baby boom and they fear lives are in danger. Angry midwives at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital in Camperdown wrote to the Herald to complain women were left to labour in chairs because the beds were full, and that they were asked daily to work double shifts to cope with demand. They said the maternity unit was down 29 midwives, and some staff were working three shifts in a 34-hour period.

"Our maternity services are stretched beyond a safe working capacity. We are constantly . asked to care for more mothers and babies than is humanly possible," one midwife, who sought to remain anonymous, said. "Patient safety is continually compromised . bed block is occurring every day. Delivery suite is constantly overcrowded with 14 women in an 11-bed unit and unsafe staffing levels." She said staff had requested that the maternity unit be closed to new patients when full or overcrowded to ensure its safe operation, and that women be transferred to other maternity units in the area.

"Our members have told us it is a complete crisis," said Hannah Dahlen, secretary of the NSW Midwives Association. "They have had vacancies they cannot fill, the staff are burning out and going elsewhere - they are getting desperate." While Ms Dahlen said that many other hospitals were in similar dire straits, she said Royal Prince Alfred was experiencing particular pressures because of a local baby boom. More than 5000 babies were delivered at the hospital last year - almost 1000 more than expected. "That is a 25 per cent increase in the birthrate, and there hasn't been a staff increase, in fact staff have been leaving." Add to that a crisis in the midwife workforce, where up to 600 positions are vacant across the state, and there was an increasing likelihood of mistakes and other problems occurring.

"The gold standard is one midwife to one woman, yet what we currently have is three labouring women to one midwife - it isn't the best care and we do know that the risk of adverse events increases when that happens." It was understandable that the midwives had chosen to make their complaints via a series of unsigned letters to the Herald, given all staff were under threat of disciplinary action if they spoke out against the state's area health services, she said.

However the executive director of Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Di Gill, disputed the figures, saying there were only 15 vacancies in the unit. Miss Gill also denied that the delivery room was ever overcrowded and insisted "no woman has ever given birth in a corridor". She scoffed at the idea that nurses or midwives might feel that their jobs were under threat if they spoke out about conditions in the unit. "That is rubbish. I am not in the habit of sacking people and certainly not midwives."

Yet the nurses' union backed the midwives' claims. Its general secretary, Brett Holmes, confirmed to the Herald that less than two months ago, there were 29 vacancies in the unit.

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New Victorian public hospital will have everything

Except enough doctors and nurses and beds. That's too hard. One billion dollars just to provide 46 extra beds? Unbelievable. But I guess that it compares with the $702m for just 27 more beds that the NSW government is spending

THE new $1 billion Royal Children's Hospital will have its own aquarium, Scienceworks, cinema -- even visits from zoo animals -- to help take patients' minds off their illness. Plans for the Royal Park hospital were unveiled yesterday, with work to begin within five weeks and finish by 2011. The new buildings will contain 353 beds -- 46 more than the existing hospital -- capable of treating an extra 35,000 patients a year. The original $850 million price tag has grown to an estimated $1 billion to accommodate a 90-room hotel, gym, two childcare centres and a small supermarket.

Premier John Brumby said the $150 million "add-ons" would be paid for by private investors with no cost to taxpayers, under the public-private partnership with the Children's Health Partnership consortium. "It will make it the most state-of-the-art, environmentally and family-friendly children's hospital, not just in Australia, but anywhere in the world," he said. Patients and families will have more privacy, with 85 per cent single bedrooms complete with bedside entertainment systems and pullout double beds for parents. It will be built in parkland immediately west of the present hospital.

A two-storey coral reef aquarium will dominate the hospital entrance, while Melbourne Zoo will bring animals to the hospital for interactive education programs. A Scienceworks display with 20 hands-on experiences and two large exhibit spaces, and a bean-bag cinema, will also help children relax between treatments. McDonald's has the option of keeping a store at the Royal Children's.

Having spent a combined three years in the hospital fighting cystic fibrosis, Leanna Babet, 15, said the comforting surrounds of the new design would put patients at ease. "It is overwhelming when friends come to visit sometimes because this hospital looks so much like a hospital, and with the new designs it just looks funky and cool," she said.

The Royal Children's will be Australia's first five-star green hospital, with a 45 per cent reduction in greenhouse gases and 20 per cent reduction in water demand [What a hot and smelly place that will make it -- if other "Green" buildings are a guide]. But that has not eased the concerns of Melbourne City Council environment committee chair Fraser Brindley, who said the Government missed the opportunity to increase the size of Royal Park by relocating the hospital to Docklands. The Government has promised to demolish much of the old hospital by 2014. It has also said there will be no net loss of parkland.

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