NUMBAT
we are making progress.. u were less paranoid this time :)
For the issue at hand, my position in reality, is a bit different from what I've been arguing, but I don't know how practical it would be.
I have written to both Family First and Libs to look at getting community guarantees in the form of forfeitable financial undertakings if assylum seekers 'dissappear' into the cracks of our society. I still feel we need detention centres, but I detest the idea that the government is not running them personally. Its a state responsibility, such things should NEVER be managed where profit is an element. Profit focus by definition means focus on cost cutting, and possible compromise of quality of care.

The other side of this coin, is that allowing people to establish roots in the community when there is a chance they may need to be deported, might in the end be harsher and more troubling than the detention camp approach.

Finally: I would never ever ever EVER accept an open door policy, because I've lived through a real life example of how this will inevitably be used as a political tool.

Numbat.. pls don't emphasise the 'Christian' aspect of the government in order to make the faith look bad. Howard is an Anglican, Costello Baptist, Abbot Catholic, but they still have a responsibility to protect the borders, which is also a Christian thing to do. "He who does not look after his own family first is worse than an unbeliever" (1 Timothy 5:8)
Always remember, we have laws, which have to be respected. Compassion for 'outsiders' is what caused the current problem in Ivory Coast. (please look up the background)

How does this sound ?

Gee fancy that none of you had much a read of the links so that you could have a more inform debate about the issue. I'm shocked :).
BOAZ_David the studies are international and if you waded through them you would find the Aussie data. These are comparative studies so you have to look at everyone’s data. you are quite right when you say TIMSS data is only about maths and science because that is exactly what it was looking at. If you read the brief of the TIMSS testing group you see they make very different claims about what their data can and can’t show then our friend Kev does. This is were the beef that many people working in this field have with Kev. Reading his articles on this subject would led many people to believe that there is data in the TIMSS reports that back up what he is saying. This is clearly not the case as the authors of the both the PISA and TIMSS.
Thankfully the state education boards don’t use chaps like Kev to develop circuli and if you people did a bit more reading and research on the subject you may well come to the same conclusion. Kev wants to make this issue in Australia simular to the current issues in the US and there in lies his real agenda.

So you wonder why I don’t post long post BOAZ_David well because it falls on deaf ears. It seems to me most people on this site don’t want to explore the issues that want to simply tell ever body else what they know (or believe they know). I listen because I find it interesting to try and work out the motives of people.

Kenny..
thanx... the problem with reading through swags of info is time....
Its better for you who have already done it, to just pick out the salient points, and post those, then give us the references which we can read further at our leasure.
If we have to read heaps of papers just to find the 'important bit' its a slog and a grind mate.
I am more concerned in regard to Kevs point about 'how the delivery is to be structured' and the main 'emphases' which are to be promoted.

Just curious about something, may I know your ethnic background ? I'm picking up bits and pieces here and there in your structures which suggest u might even be a Singaporean or malaysian chinese background :) but of course.. I have been wrong at least once or twice in this life time hehe.

Numbat ,you are obiviously a compassionate person of integrety.Politicians of all persuasions make promises they can't keep,or stretch the truth in all directions.I think, on average, John Howard is an honourable man.You cannot judge anyone by a single act of impropriety.We are all fallible and must judge people on the long history of their track record and not on occasional errors of judgement.Those who trumpet the ideals of the high moral ground too often, are often judged too harshly themselves, when their own flaws are laid bare.

We cannot just open our borders and be all things to the world.Open borders will see us just become another "banana republic" in the South Pacific.

arjay..... or... an Ivory Coast.

Howard is on balance an honorable man, but he is also a politician.
Beazly and Rudd seem honorable to me also.

Yes ,a very clever and astute politician who knows about the realities of survival that gives us so much prosperity today.