EURI:-KA SYDNEY

COMMENT:2MORAG FRASERAngling in the new centuryT,PaulDurcan, opens the New Yearfor us with the refrain '0tomorrow let's be Warm/Who today are Cool.'You might add a nod toirony when reading whatDurcan-or any poet-writes.But irony's not a bad cautionat the start of a new venturean acknowledgement thatcomplexity goes ann-in-arm with hope.We begin the year 2000, Eureka Street's tenth yearof publication, by taking a fresh look at the necessarybaggage we carry with us as we move into newterritory, new time. This month-and indeed throughout 2000-it will be Australian institutions thatoccupy us. Pity about the Latinate lumpiness of theword 'institution' . It is such a dry term for thecommon law, or for any part of the body politic, orfor the passions and structures that bind us togetheras a people or a family or a state or a religion. We willblow the dust off the term this year as we peer insidethe engines of our social and political lives.If you look at this month's cover, with its greatpale coil of public staircase leading directly from thesunlit people's entrance to the number one court inthe new Commonwealth Law complex in Melbourne,you get some sense of the way in which traditionscan be turned around to fit a shift in historical moodand professional conception. The law moves slowly,but when it does move, its gait is fascinating. Andsurprising-a bit like a tortoise heading, with somegrace, for refreshing waters.The photographic essay on page 26-a day insideand outside of one representative set of Australiancourts-was prompted by a hint from lawyer andmedia commentator, Paul Chadwick, whosejournalist's eye was struck one day by an unusualvista: for a brief period in Melbourne you are able tosee all of the law courts laid out before your eyes.The view will close up once the new Children's andCounty Courts rise to fill the space that was onceoccupied by the old rabbit-warren ABC building. Butfor the moment the law is on full display. It was notan opportunity to be missed.On another institutional front, Brian Howe andAnthony O'Donnell take the spanners to the rustyword 'welfare', in 'All work and no play?' (page 22).We have lost the meaning of the term, they argue. Ina country that once pieced together the Harvester!ROSHPOET,,: Judgment, we have forgottenwhat makes for a healthysociety, and the questionsbeing posed by governmentare the wrong ones.Because it is summer andbecause summer allows acorner of leisure, there ispoetry to read-in unusualquantity. Poetry doesn't bowlow before institutions, but itdoes pay them the courtesy of scrutiny. The essayand books in our summer reading sections arevariously diverting (on food and climbing trees),informative (on Catholic education) and provocative(on prime ministers). And when you have finishedwith them you can retreat into the riddling maze ofthe Y2K quiz, and learn patience when you can't cribthe answers from the internet because the wholesystem has gone down. We also have the first of ournew columnists for 2000, Denis Minns, writing fromBlackfriars in Oxford with a pen sharpenough to puncture blimps.SOME OF THE SHAPE of Eure] a Street's publishing for2000 was conceived as I wandered, bemused andgratified, through the newly hung Australian andinternational sections of the National Gallery ofAustralia in Canberra. It is impossible to maintain astatic, or calcified sense of this place we live in whenyou see how it has been represented in art over manycenturies, by settler and by Aboriginal Australians.Or by artists who have visited and been marked bythe place.We no longer curate in impermeable categories.In one room a work by Rover Thomas, a Kukatja/Wangkajunga man, hangs beside a work by theAmerican Mark Rothko. The language of art isexploratory and connective. Apparently when Thomasfirst saw Rothko's paintings he wanted to know whowas 'this bugger' who had ideas so very much like hisown. The rigidities of our political institutions, ourinadequate generosity and our pinched attempts atreconciliation fall away in the face of such knowledge,such links.Rover Thomas' intuition of connection is a morepositive portent for 2000 than the Seattle demonstrations against the World Trade Organisation. But bothsuggest that we need new ways to carry us through tothe anniversary of Federation and beyond. -Morag FraserVOLUME10NUMBER1 EUREKA STREETPainting above:'A New South W alesnative Stri cki ng fi shwhil e hi s wife isemployed fishing withhooks & lines in herCano e 1788, by ePort jackson Painter.W atercolour. From th eWatling Coll ec tion ,Natural HistoryMuseum, London ,and used to effect inTim Flannery ' sTh e Birth of Sydney,Tex t Publishin g, 1999.5

COMMENT:3ANDREW H AM ILTONINHaven havocN onMe", p, di' o ent P""d icg "latwn 'ffcctmg "Y!urnseekers . During the debate in the House of Representatives,notes passed across the benches recording the progress in a testmatch; finally, the Prime Minister announced that Australiahad defeated Pakistan.The same clay, I was talking with two asylum seekers whowere related to one another. They seemed uninterested in thecricket. One had been granted protection, and hoped soon to bereunited with his wife and family. The other had arrived a fewclays later; the dateline of the legislation meant that even if shewon asylum, she would not see her husband and children for atleast five years. She feared for th eir safety and the effects oflong separation.The Minister for Immigration had secured bipartisansupport for the legislation by an energetic campaign in whichh e spoke constantly of th e boatloads of asylum seekers whohad arrived recently, and warned of a flood of people waiting toembark. The m edia picked up the images they were fed: imagesof the invasion of Australian shores, of criminality, ofwealthy Indonesian middlemen operating with impunity andof an alien horde, variously described as Iraqi, Afghan andMiddle Eastern, plotting brazenly to break our laws and jumpour queues.The media also carried reflectiv e articles refuting thiss im pl is tic rhetoric, pointing out that Australia receivedcomparatively few asylum seekers by world standards, thatpeople came to Austra lia as a last resort after being forced outof other countries, that most Afghan and Iraqi asylum seekerswere granted asylum beca use of the fearful persecution whichthey had encountered in th eir own countries, and that themajority of thos e living and working unlawfully in Australiawere British or American visitors who had stayed beyond theexpiration of their visas. This message, however, was not heard.It was the Governmen t that was heard, and its receptionexpressed itself in xenophobia. On talkback radio, callers werealarmed at the risk of contamination, and suggested that boatsbe sunk while still at sea.In such a climate it is not surprising that brutal legislationshould be summarily passed with the agreement of both majorparties. Its most publicised provision was to restrict asylumseekers to temporary residence for three years, after which theywould have to apply for protection again. They would not beable to bring out spouses or children for a t least five years.The Border Protection Legislation Amendment Bill h adother dramatic features: notably the licence to board boats andarrest aeroplanes. But the technical changes which restrict thecategories of people who can claim asylum are of much grea terconcern. The Bill excludes people who could have tried to enterano ther country which may have offered them protection. Italso excludes those who have spent more than seven days in acountry that cou ld offer them protection, and those who h avenationality in a country other than that from which they h ave6EUREKA STREET JANUARY-F EBRUARY2000fled. These people are excluded from applying for asylum, andare to be deported as soon as practicable.The Bill justifies these changes on the grounds that theywill prevent forum shopping-the attempt to choose the countryin which to apply for asylum. Why it sh ould be illegitimate toattempt to choose is not explained. Its practical effect may beto allow immigration officers to make their own judgmentsabout whether people can find protection elsewhere, and toremove them without any possibility of appeal. The provisionsof the Bill form a seedbed for administrative severity.Meanwhile, in the harsh climate for refugees, the Ministerfor Immigration did not apologise for the new detention centreat Woomera. He proclaimed that it was not a holiday camp,that it would not hav e ai r conditioning. Its isolation wouldprevent escape, and potential escapees were warned that theymight die in the desert. Any pretence that detention of asylumseekers is anything other than punitive incarceration hasnow been dropped. Australia has resurrected an old practicethe transportation of undesirables. This new regime of transportation, however, is different: it is internal, and transportationis not preceded by a trial to establish that only the guilty arepunished. In November, too, the refugees who had been receivedfrom East Timor were put under pressure to return to East Timorin time for the monsoon season. They were to be given rice andblue plastic to prepare them for their return. Many werehesitant, for the NGOs had yet to provide shelter fromthe monsoon rains. Blue plastic offers little protection.WAT TO MAKE OF ALL THIS? If you feel a little ashamed, you'rein good international company. For what is being done inAustralia echoes the harsher attitudes to refugees prevailing inother developed countries. There are no grounds for believingthat compassion will return soon to refugee policy. But in thelonger term this shameful treatment of refugees points to acontradiction that will need one day to be resolved. On the on ehand, the governments of Australia and Europe endorse populistpolicies that exclude the entry of aliens. On th e oth er hand,demographers and business leaders recognise that immigrantsare needed to sustain an ageing and infertile population. Finally,self-interest will dictate a more intelligent policy. Whenhumane sense returns to the politics of immigration, it maywell recognise that refugees are the most resilient andresourceful of immigrants.But if that offers hope, it is a hope for the future. In themeantime, asylum seekers in Australia are matched in testsagainst an opponent who changes the laws to ensure that foreignbowlers will be called for chucking, and that foreign batsmenwill be forced to play tippety run. Once we might have saidthat this was not cricket. Andrew Hamilton SJ teach es at the United Faculty of Theology,Melbourne.

Jack w ·aterfordYuOn a smoothwiclzetCAN nu when govemment,particularly one which started withreformist zeal, is settled in power. It's when it seems relaxed andcomfortable with the institutions it is dealing with and themachinery it is using. When it regards the levers as its own, andfeels that generally it can manage merely by pulling them ratherthan by remaking the engine. And when it feels that it is setting theagenda and that the others are responding to it.The Howard Government is now at the point where it can beexpected to operate in office much as Menzies or Fraser did (or evenBob Hawk e)-presiding over affairs, influencing them with a nudgethere or a pull there, no longer acting with any real sense of urgencyor belief that the system needs fundamental change. This shift alsomeans that the Government is spending again, and treating theassets of government as a re-election fund.This does not mean that John Howard has achieved all of hisobjectives, or that he has abandoned those objectives-completeindustrial relations reform, for example-that he has been unableto achieve. Howard has enormous flexibility about how he getsto the finish line, but hardly ever changes destinations. Rather,he seems to see it now more as a stately progress than as abumping grind against all odds . And getting there now involvesmuch more compromise, and a sharp political eye for whatkeeps the others offside.ITIS HARD TO DENY that Howard had a blinder of a year in 1999. Hehung on to his ministers-even clear liabilities like John Mooreand muddled past the point where their poor performances werecausing him damage. He got his Goods and

EURI:-KA srm:-er TEXT PUBLISHING SYDNEY THE BIRTH O F TIM !:DITtO FLANNERY AHD INT RODUCED BY Special Book Offer THE BIRTH OF SYDNEY Edited and introduced by Tim Flannery This is a book to treasure even if you come from Adelaide or Perth.