From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey. It's Thursday, May THIRTI inflation has jumped for a second time, climbing to two point six percent in April. The unexpected rebound has experts worried about the government's budget spending spree and it means no interest rate cut for a while.
Yet.
A phone has been found in the search for missing Ballarat mum Samantha Murphy. She disappeared after going for a jog and a huge search by Victoria police has turned up a mobile phone in a dam close to where Miss Murphy's phone was last detected. You can read that developing story right now at the Australian dot com. U The government will ditch a policy that was allowing violent criminals to remain in the country even after their visas were canceled. So will the minister responsible be sacked?
Stay with us, booted by Border Force, marched to a plaque.
Thirty Kiwi criminals are today back in New Zealand, deported after their visas were canceled. So there's some certain parts of Australia's law which are ridiculous. This is Australia exporting its garbage to New Zealand.
Nothing enrages New Zealanders like Australia. From this side of the Tasman, we tend to regard New Zealand with benign goodwill. It's so pretty, we love skiing in Queenstown. Everyone's so friendly. I spent five years living in New Zealand and quickly realized that to many Kiwis, that attitude of goodwill comes across as just patronizing, arrogant, self centered, all the qualities
they dislike most about Australia. But Australia's prosperity are golden weather and are higher wages mean we attract New Zealand migrants in their tens of thousands. They don't need to apply for visas, and they don't need citizenship to access Medicare and other entitlements. But former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Adern had a huge gripe with one Australian policy in particular. Look, I've I've been absolutely clear this is
corrosive to our relationship. Starting with the Morrison government, Australia started deporting foreign born criminals if they didn't have Australian citizenship. The idea was if you're not a citizen and you commit a crime, you don't get to stay. But when Australia started sending keiwei criminals home, ar Dern and the New Zealand Labor Party turned the issue into a vote winner. Countless who have no home in New Zealand, they have no nitwork, they have grown up and Australia that is
their home and that is where they should stay. Ardern unsuccessfully lobbied Morrison to change the law.
That's what the Australian policy is, and that policy is framed in Australia's national interest.
But it was Anthony Albanesi's government in twenty twenty three which agreed to change the policy for all foreign citizens, not just New Zealanders. Now the issue has turned into a political nightmare here in Australia.
Was responsible and sixty four child in posing those questions.
It's unparliamentary and it's dog.
Listen because the Australian has revealed that new directive has allowed dozens of violent criminals, including rapists, domestic violence perpetrators and child abusers to stay in Australia.
One woman was bashed so hard there eyelids were cut open and terrible crimes against children.
Dennis Shanahan is The Australian's National editor.
This is the hard, terrible truth and the government has had to face this, and of course once the public became aware of this, it has become a much greater issue and Labor overall over the last few months has suffered a big four in standing in the public eye on its ability to handle crime, law and order and border protection. This has become a real hot button issue for the government.
Here's how it went so wrong. Immigration Minister Andrew Giles, in response to New Zealand's advocacy, issued something called Direction ninety nine, a new guideline for the tribunal that considers VISA situations the Administrative Appeals Tribunal Direction ninety nine. There's the coibunal must consider the depth and duration of the offender's connection to Australia as one of the factors when
making its decision. Giles says he intended this to be balanced with other factors like the seriousness of the offending. Problem is the AAT in some cases has made decisions based mainly on the connection to Australia part and that seen some serious offenders allowed to stay. The Australian's journo Paul Garvey has revealed this week the government released this policy on International Women's Day to show it was taking
violence against women seriously. Because Direction ninety nine also contained a new rule that if an offender had committed family violence, including stalking, coercive control, sexual assaults or financial abuse, that should weigh against their visa application.
It didn't work to protect women, it didn't work to get rid of perpetrators of violence against women, and it actually helped them stay. And what's more, we know from estimates committees that the Department of Immigration warned that this direction would make it easier for people who had committed offenses non citizens to remain in Australia or get renewed visas or not be deported. This has been going on close to eighteen months.
What's your assessment of Andrew Giles, the Minister.
I think he has been inept from the beginning. He has tried to duck and weave. This is evidence of his attempting, or his general reluctance to be hard on people who are asylum seekers or seeking refuge or seeking to stay in Australia. This is part and parcel of his long history as a lawyer. He has set himself in Parliament. Oh, my department didn't tell me about important decisions, and somehow he's not responsible. Oh, it's an independent tribunal,
an independent tribunal acting on the actual directive. He told them you have to do this, And of course in the end it's all Peter Dutton's fault. And this has been the problem for Andrew Giles as Immigration Minister. He will not take responsibility.
Will he have to be sacked?
Well he should be.
On Wednesday, the government crumbled and dumped Direction ninety nine, blaming the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, which was already planning to replace with a different body.
The new directive will ensure that the protection the committee out of ways. Anyhow, there's a sist well cease.
This is what we were told it did all along. So it is a complete concession of failure. It is more evidence, even more evidence that Giles should go. Ultimately, the Prime Minister will have to do something about Giles himself, not just his directive, and by then the damage will be even worse for the Labor government.
So whose fault is this? And now what that's after the break. The Australian subscribers get all our journalism and analysis around the clock for a lot less than a cup of coffee a day. We'd love you to join us by subscribing at the Australian dot com dot We'll be back after this break. Losing a minister is something no prime minister wants to do, especially not when you're heading for an election and you've bragged about not having to lose any ministers.
On the second end of the nursery of his election, he continued to make the point and he put it up as a highlight that he had never had to sack a minister in his first two years. He has sent this benchmark. Now, if he has to sack a minister in two years and a week after, that's going to look pretty thin. He can shift him, but if he shifts him, he's got to have a reshuffle, and
he doesn't particularly want to do that. So Labor is left with the problem of having an inept minister in a position he can't handle, and he will continue to make mistakes.
Giles already had a migration problem on his hands. The scores of stateless detainees released by the High Court which said they couldn't be held in custody indefinitely. Some had been convicted of serious crimes. Since their release, some have allegedly committed more violent offenses. Labor has made serious mistakes over immigration and border policy now over two decades. Dinners, what's going on here?
Well? I think part of it is because of their ideological position, a sympathy with asylum seekers and refugees, which is fair enough, but their position is such that it flavors the decisions that they make. Remember Kevin Rudd was elected in two thousand and seven after giving an interview with me and Paul Kelly in which he said he would turn back boats and he didn't. That was a
big failure. Then they changed temperate protection visas. Then they ended up then with even more people coming, tens of thousands of people, including more than a thousand who drowned at sea. They do not grasp what having a tough border protection actually means, not just to Australians but to the people trying to get here. For some its life
and death. They do not appreciate this Ideologically, they can't accept it, and they try to kid themselves that they can trick people like Kevin Rudd saying oh yes, I'll turn back boats, and then he doesn't like the current government saying oh yes, we'll have these tough directives and so on. And we've also seen, of course, in the last few months, the return of people smugglers landing people
on the North coast of Australia. Now it is as if labor can't help itself, and the polling is showing that not just crime but border protection is coming up as far as a major concern amongst the public. Cost of living still the big game, that'll be the big issue through to the next election. But border protection, crime, detainees, labor still can't do enough quickly enough to deal with it.
Dennis Shanahan is The Australian's National editor. Thanks for joining us on the front and don't forget to check out our newest investigative podcast, Bronwyn, reported by Headley Thomas. Check it out now at bronwynpodcast dot com. That's b r o Nwyn podcast dot com and you can hear episodes one and two for free