Australian coalition suffers defeat as lower house clears asylum bill
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Australia鈥檚 government suffered an embarrassing defeat in parliament yesterday as the lower house voted to allow asylum seekers held offshore to receive medical care in Australia, the first such loss for a government in 78 years.
Independent lawmakers and the opposition Labor Party voted together to pass the bill by 75 votes to 74, dealing a blow to the ruling conservative coalition, which is trailing heavily in polls ahead of an election due in May.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who had firmly opposed the bill, responded by saying the measure could undermine national security, offering a preview of what is likely to be his campaign pitch, and the election鈥檚 central issue.
鈥淰otes will come and they will go, they do not trouble me,鈥 he told a news conference in the capital, Canberra.
鈥淲here we will always stand, and the Australian people can always trust us to do, is to have the mettle to ensure the integrity of our border protection framework ... The Labor Party demonstrated tonight they have no such mettle.鈥
Morrison鈥檚 government lost its lower-house majority at a by-election in October. His Liberal-National coalition鈥檚 six years in power has been marked by instability, with two prime ministers toppled by internal insurrections.
Its defeat, the first such loss of a lower house vote on a bill since 1941, comes as the government has struggled for months to close a six-point gap in Australia鈥檚 most widely watched opinion poll.
鈥淚t鈥檚 humiliating for the government,鈥 said Rod Tiffen, a political analyst at the University of Sydney.
鈥淚鈥檓 not sure if it鈥檚 going to have any great effect (on votes) but I do think it鈥檚 a precursor to what the government鈥檚 going to try and do in the election campaign.鈥
The bill must be approved by the upper house to become law, but is likely to pass, as the Senate supported an earlier version last year.
Labor representatives said it was about 鈥渄oing the right thing,鈥 and the vote provoked cheers from asylum-seeker activists in parliament鈥檚 public gallery.
鈥淕reat to see the Australian parliament finally vote for humanity,鈥 Behrouz Boochani, an Iranian held in an Australian-run camp in Papua New Guinea, wrote on Twitter.
鈥淢any people are happy now because they will finally receive medical treatment.鈥
Immigration policy requires asylum seekers intercepted at sea to be sent to camps in PNG and its northern island of Nauru, and they cannot set foot in Australia, even if they are found to be refugees.
Opponents of the policy introduced the measure to amend the Migration Act to allow the temporary transfer of 鈥渢ransitory persons鈥 from PNG or Nauru to Australia for medical assessment, a move backed by doctors.
The United Nations has repeatedly criticized Australia over conditions in the camps.
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