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November 28, 2023
Any real prospect of Anthony Albanese and the Labor government using question time in the dying days of the 2023 Parliamentary sittings for an agenda reset has been killed off by the High Court’s determinations on the immigration detention of convicted criminals.
The release of more than 100 stateless people from immigration detention who have been convicted of crimes ranging from rape to murder and the Ministers’ lack of preparation of precautionary legislation has gripped the public.
The news that one of the convicted criminals is now “missing” despite assurances of strict controls and ankle bracelets has made it worse for the government day by day as more are released.
But, the sudden decision of the High Court to bring forward the release of its reasons for the order to release up to 341 people in immigration detention has ensured the Parliament and politics of the week will be dominated by Labor on the back foot trying to defend previous failures rather than forging future solutions.
Now and again Parliamentary question time is captive to the Reserve Bank’s monthly decision on interest rates but this week the High Court has hijacked the agenda and put the Prime Minister and Immigration and Home Affairs’ Ministers, Andrew Giles and Clare O’Neil in a white hot focus of political attention.
As Opposition Home Affairs spokesman James Paterson said on Tuesday: “If the Parliament rises before Christmas without having dealt with this issue, we run the very real risk that one of these very serious offenders re-offends against the Australian community over summer and that would be totally unacceptable. There can be no more excuses.”
The Ministers have been caught in downright evasion and deliberate vagueness for the last two weeks and will be left with no way to dodge and weave any longer. There is now no one to blame but themselves.
Albanese, suffering real setbacks in policy, ministerial failures and from his own hubris, was looking to use the final Labor MPs’ meetings of the year to instil some hope and spirit going into 2024 but the immigration issue, including the first successful landing of a people smugglers’ boat on the Australian mainland since the election, has severely damaged those hopes.
Forlornly, in a friendly interview with John Laws celebrating 70 years in radio, Albanese pointed to the “fun fact” that at the next election he would be “seeking” to be the first prime minister since John Howard in 2004 - 20 years ago - to be re-elected.
Albanese reeled off all the intervening PMs who were either removed by their colleagues - including Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard in which he played a part - or lost the election.
He was right to express fun fact in terms of seeking and hoping.
