BEFORE his abrupt political execution, former prime minister Kevin Rudd announced he would not be "lurching to the right" on refugee policy in order to save his leadership.
With Mr Rudd's leadership now a thing of the past it is hardly surprising to see his successor lurching pragmatically with the rightward tide.
It had been obvious for some time that increasing arrivals of boatloads of apparent refugees was unsettling a portion of the Australian electorate.
Tony Abbott's Coalition had seized the issue, running a florid television advertising campaign depicting Australia under siege from potentially dangerous illegal immigrants. That's hardly remarkable.
Few have yet forgotten how Pauline Hanson built a short-lived but influential political career by fanning the flames of racial fear. Nor how John Howard eliminated the threat of Hansonism by absorbing its author's policies, going on to use the issue to telling electoral effect with such milestone events as the Tampa crisis, the "children overboard" drama and the "Pacific solution".
Like the resource tax argument, the refugee issue was a key obstacle the Labor government had to overcome to gain the clear air needed to give itself the viable option of an early federal poll.
New prime minister Julia Gillard has announced a package of measures to deal with boat arrivals that her advisers hope will take the air from Tony Abbott's sails.
The centrepiece is a de facto return to John Howard's Pacific solution of processing applicants for refugee status offshore. Instead of Nauru, this time the proposed processing centre is East Timor.
Ms Gillard has argued that this measure will help destroy the lucrative people-smuggling industry by removing any perceived benefit from its services.
Whether East Timor ultimately agrees to host the proposed centre and whether, if it proceeds, the centre really does kill the people-smuggling industry are issues for the future.
In the meantime, Labor will be polling to assess the impact of the prime minister's speech where it really matters - in marginal Australian electorates.
If the speech is deemed a success, voters may consider an early election more likely.
A wise rate pause
GIVEN growing global economic uncertainty and rising domestic living costs, it would have been surprising if the Reserve Bank had lifted interest rates again.
Yesterday's decision to leave the rate unchanged seems wise in light of continuing bad news in the US economy, fears of a "double-dip" recession in Europe and signs of a slowdown in Chinese exports. If these trends persist in the world's biggest economies, Australia's fiscal settings might soon need a reappraisal, with pressure on interest rates bearing down instead of up.
It makes sense to leave rates unchanged while the impact of July 1 cost of living increases on households are assessed. The present cash rate of 4.5 per cent leaves room to move in either direction in future - a good thing in an uncertain climate.
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