Bill Shorten sparked outrage last night among Labor and Green true believers, by not just affirming Labor’s support for the Coalition policy of boat turn-backs, but acknowledging the moral case, indeed the superior moral case of the policy, in that it saves lives.
From the transcript of Shorten’s interview on the ABC’s 7:30 Report last night:
“Labor wants to defeat the people smugglers and we want to prevent drownings at sea. Therefore one of the options which we believe has to be on the table, if we’re given the privilege of forming government, has to be the option to turn back boats. It’s not easy, though, because it involves the admission, I think, that mistakes were made when Labor was last in government,”
These words echo those of Labor’s immigration spokesman Richard Marles, earlier in the week:
“Despite best intentions, a terrible loss of life took place on Labor’s watch. We did not get it right then but we are very clear now about making sure we don’t repeat those mistakes.”
The XYZ would like to make 3 things crystal clear:
1) This is exactly the case the XYZ has been making in its first two months. On June 16, 2015, we wrote:
“When the ALP won power in 2007, the number of refugees held in detention could be counted on one hand, and none of them were children. Under the Howard Government, Australia had had the highest immigration and refugee intake it had ever had.
The measures which were taken to achieve this result were harsh, and caused suffering, but they provided a strong enough deterrent to prevent more suffering from occurring had it not been done. Nothing short of these measures could have achieved this.
The removal of Howard’s Border Protection regime by Labor, strongly supported by the Greens, directly caused the death of over 1000 people who drowned trying to come here in unseaworthy boats.
Australia’s refugee and immigration quotas had to be reduced in order to cope with the 50,000 refugees who arrived here illegally in Labor’s two terms. Now that the Liberal Party has restored order to the immigration program, (again at great cost, sometimes fatal, to the unfortunate refugees involved,) Australia will once again be able to help more people.”
2) Naturally, many on the left refuse to accept this moral case, accusing Shorten of chasing the racist, redneck vote. On June 24 we made the case that progressives simply don’t get that it is possible for strong border protection to a) work, and b) not be motivated by racism:
“When conservatives highlight the need for orderly immigration to maintain broad support for its size and scope, “progressives” seize on this as code for; “We know you are afraid of black and brown people, so we will make sure fewer of them have the chance to come here.” It is as though the broad desire to keep the intake of new people in to this country orderly, could not possibly be a genuine, reasonable view.”
3) It is for this reason Labor cannot be trusted to maintain a strong border policy. Immigration Minister Peter Dutton rightly tweeted that “Labor giving themselves the ‘option’ to turn back boats is what they promise at every election.” And again, the XYZ made the case:
“There is.. an important distinction between when a conservative and a progressive talk tough on these issues. Conservatives strongly believe in the sanctity of national sovereignty, and they understand the dilemmas involved in making tough decisions and imposing unquestionably harsh rules in order to save lives. Progressives, on the other hand, give the impression that they are mouthing things they don’t really believe in, but they know they must say in order to remain viable. This is why they think we are being racist- because deep down, they are cynical toward the idea of strong borders, of the nation itself.”
Left wing Australians went feral last night. They went feral because they don’t understand that strong border protection works, saves lives, and helps more people. But most important of all, they went feral because they cannot handle the acknowledgement that policies which they supported cost the lives of 1,200 people, and that the collective left in this country has blood on its hands.