People Smugglers still in business

LABOR has declared victory over people-smugglers after the arrival of two lightly-loaded asylum boats in the past 24 hours.

“We have broken the back of the people-smuggling trade,” Immigration Minister Tony Burke said

Wow! Only two lighlty loaded asylum boats in the past 24 hours! Oh well, thats it then – fixed…back broken!

No, hang on, I seem to recall during the six years of the Pacific Solution, just 24 boats arrived carrying 1129 asylum-seekers and that was too many.

Long way to go Burkie but never mind it won’t be your problem next week. You can sit back and watch the problem solved by grown-ups.

Coalition Defence Policy notes

Dan Harrison The Age’s Health and Indigenous Affairs Correspondent says;

The Coalition has backed away from a pledge to spend $1.5 billion on unmanned drone aircraft and has vowed to take advice from the top brass before going ahead with the purchase Joint Strike Fighter aircraft.

No they haven’t! Abbott said they would wait until forming government should they be elected on Saturday and then take Defence advice as to whether the Global Hawke was the best option. He said defence had told them that there may be better options and that it would be ill advised to make very expensive decisions whilst the Coalition were in still opposition.

That’s adult talk Dan and might I suggest you stick to Health and indigenous affairs as you can’t seem to understand plain english or Defence.

I note that Abbott clarified the sitiuation with DFRBF military superannaunts. For years our superannuation has been fixed at just CPI rises which has little bearing on the cost of living and some time ago gave me an increase of $1.12 a fotnight. The Coalition, on the other hand, have undertaken to adjust the pensions of all those ex-servicemen 55 and over to the more generous formulae based around growth in the CPI, Male Total Average Weekly Earnings (MATWE) and the Beneficiary and Pensioner Living Cost Index.

The ALP, on the other hand, has undertaken to do something similar, but only for members over 65 and in doing so Rudd warned Air Vice Marshal Peter Criss; “Don’t bag us. If you do, we’ll pull up the drawbridge and you’ll get nothing.”

Five and a wakey!

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