Kevin Rudd is a hobby horse rider.
I cannot imagine that the trade union branch of the Labour Party will
allow such a policy to be put in place.

It is so obviously a nonsense that I cannot believe that he was so
stupid to put it up to see who would salute it. But he did !

We would see immigration of hundreds of millions at the least.
There is just not the water to do it.
All people currently in Australia would be unemployed and the
economy would become a mixture of the Indian & Chinese economies.

Arrrrggghhhh, is this the standard we can expect !

”Insane” seems to be the correct word to describe Kevin Rudd’s ‘Asian EU’; but then, it seems that Mr. Rudd has more than a touch of insanity. He is shaping up to be a megalomaniac, determined to strut the world stage with his trips overseas, most recently declaring that he wanted to kick off a new movement against nuclear proliferation after his first visit to Hiroshima.

The Australia/Asia union would be another one to add to his personal CV.

Like many leaders post-globalisation, our Kevin seems keen to concentrate on working for his own aggrandisement world-wide, playing the ‘workaholic’ PM, but working for himself. Like the Labor Premier of SA, Mike Rann, to be seen and heard only when there is good news.

Back to the dangerous idea of an Australia/Asia union. We certainly do not want free movement of people, which would see our already over-populated country flooded by people adding nothing, but taking everything they could get their hands on.

The Labor Party, like the Coalition, is a big-immigration party as it is. Just imagine the effect on wages and living standards of Australian workers if this free-movement happened. They are doing their best already to reduce wages and conditions with high immigration.

Mr. Rudd is shaping up to be a very dangerous man.

China has managed its face to the World and entry into herself, centrally. The cities and entrepots are set-apart from the other regions.

Free movement from China would not be free, methinks. The Communist Party and Chinese Oliarchs would control who left China's shores. I guess China's main purpose today would be to acquire[buy into] Western technologies and to ensure the enrichment of her elite.

China would not be willing to accept a level playing field with regards to rules of corporate governance or working conditions.

China would not want an EU situation. She would prefer to stand-apart and to be deferred to by smaller aggregate economies, whilst using trade surpluses to buy into other countries, especially in the area of supply. Her mission would be to subvert our free economic practices against us, to her advantage.

The Chinese oligarchs being puppet masters with stings leading to The West and her own interior.

One of the critical reasons I migrated from UK was because I disagree with the nature of EU. Western Europe was dominated by two economic blocks, the EEC and EFTA.

The UK and Scandinavian countries belonging to EFTA (European Free Trade Association).

The differences between EFTA and EEC are significant.

To join EEC UK had to withdraw from EFTA.

My preference would have been for EEC to have joined EFTA, which would have saved billions of dollars in EU bureaucracy and the shot-gun marriage of British economic interests with the conflicting interests of Germany and France.

I see no merit to duplicate the failings of Europe onto Australia.

I further concur with the views of the author, which show the dangers of mass migration across borders especially when domestic economic conditions are so diverse (ie Average Income).

All that would happen is Australia’s living standards would be reduced to those of a third world economy. Maybe bringing to life the Keating threat of a Banana republic, lets face it, Krudd, through the incompetence of socialism, is about to bring us another “Recession we have to have”.

Don’t blame me, I did not vote for them.

“Kevin Rudd is a hobby horse rider.”

He is better on the toy than the real thing, trouble is his other toy is the national economy and he does not have the where-with-all to play properly with either, in both cases being likely to get bucked (and other words which rhyme with “bucked”).

But as a diversion it displays Krudds "Neroic" ability to play the fiddle, whilst the economy burns.

Too stupid to contemplate, but nothing surprizes me about politicians these days,

I believe it was the threat of massive influx of Asians to Aus that brought about the so called 'White Australia Policy' years ago. I may be wrong but was it not Labor that implemented that policy. to protect our working conditions. Later it was wrongly conscrewed as 'racist' by social ideoligists.

If the unions thought that the previous IR policy was bad, wait until they absorb this notion.

We need to reduce our present immigration rate and be far more selective so those that come will integrate into our society.

Look and learn from Europe and England.

Further to my comment on China: I have worked not only in China, but also Hong Kong and Singapore [bases], and, Indonesia and Malaysia [visits]. The business communities would not want to play according to Western rules regarding corporate governance and IR policies.

As a rule of thumb, regarding the Chinese Diaspora, the Chinese business interests end-up owning 70% of economic activity. Basically, that is why Malaya, became Malaysia and Singapore. That doesn't happen in The West, because our penchant towards innovativeness, a wide educated middleclass and rules of corporate engagement. If memory services, it was Germany, followed by the US, whom moved the corporate sphere from familial based, familial controlled product focused organisations, to become the market based public companies, which succeed today.

Alteratively, should Australiatilt towards Asian business practices, then, we would be moving towards state capitalism and cronism on scale far beyond that which are now accustomed. Such a turn, could prove profitable in the short-term for oliarchs, but, in the longer term would collapse the breadth of the "consuming" Western [read Australian] middle class. It is not the path to follow. Instead, a market-based economy needs to be maintained. Melding into Asia is not for us. That said, we can trade with Asia, while maintaining control over our advantages.