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Barry Soper: Aussie PM touches down in Auckland

Author
Barry Soper,
Publish Date
Fri, 22 Feb 2019, 6:13AM
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the ASEAN summit in Singapore. Photo / Supplied
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the ASEAN summit in Singapore. Photo / Supplied

Barry Soper: Aussie PM touches down in Auckland

Author
Barry Soper,
Publish Date
Fri, 22 Feb 2019, 6:13AM

COMMENT:

It was obvious John Key's buddy Malcolm Turnbull didn't like Jacinda Ardern.

His privileged uneasiness was a pleasure to watch as the irksome Ardern raised an issue that should make the Aussies feel uneasy, the refugees on Manus Island and Nauru.

Long deprived children on Manus have now been evacuated, mainly to the United States.

Still there are just on a thousand refugees in both detention camps but offering to take any of them, as Ardern did like a cracked record to Turnbull, is a pointless exercise.

The Aussies have insisted on us stopping them by law, if they came here, from using this country as a back door to Australia.

Given their treatment by that country, why would they ever want to go there?

So today the new Aussie Prime Minister touches down in Auckland for an afternoon of talks before heading back home to fight an election.

The issue that still grates and the one which will be raised with Scott Morrison is the deportation of so called Kiwi crims from Australia if they're done a year or more in the slammer.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the ASEAN summit in Singapore. Photo / Supplied
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the ASEAN summit in Singapore. Photo / Supplied

We all now know the familiar story, many of the 1600 who've been sent packing from Aussie to New Zealand have little association with this country.

When I put it to Malcolm Turnbull that they have about as much association with this country as his former deputy Barnaby Joyce had he wasn't impressed.

But Aussie Prime Ministers have been deaf to our entirely legitimate protests.

The crims have learnt all of their bad habits in Australia, so why should we be held responsible for their behaviour?

It's called taking responsibility.

Perhaps Morrison, or Scomo as he's known, should more than the others who've occupied that job in recent years have a good understanding of the issue from this country's perspective.

He was appointed by National's Dark Prince Murray McCully twenty years ago as the first director of the Tourism and Sport office, spending a couple of years in the capital and was involved in the campaign 100% Pure New Zealand.

Presiding over the return of crims, he's now got the opportunity of ensuring he's as good as his slogan.

Although these days he probably adheres to the campaign he was also involved in on his return to Australia "So where the bloody hell are you?"

Ardern can give him the answer to that one today when she raises the issue of the criminal deportees.

The answer will no doubt be, they're where he wants them to be.

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