Despite my suggestion that he should go to Sri Lanka to deal with the crisis of refugees and economic migrants, resulting in deaths and the current fiasco on the Oceanic Viking, Mr Rudd instead decides it would be more productive to jet off to India.
Mr Rudd should make the trip across the channel to Sri Lanka. Surely he could organise that, unless he has some philosophical or personal reason for not making that trip. After travelling 10 thousand kilometres to Mumbai wouldn’t you think he could make it a further 15 hundred kilometres to Colombo.
We suggested this to Mr Rudd weeks ago; he’s getting so close. Why don’t you go all the way Mr Rudd and speak with Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapaksa and Prime Minister Ratnasiri Wickramanayake?
Australians are starting to become aware of the current cost of this fiasco. It would be interesting to see how much it has cost to have the Oceanic Viking parked off the coast of Indonesia. I imagine there is not much change out of 30 or 40 thousand dollars a day.
I understand that Home Affairs Minister Brendan O’Conner has urgently requested a breakdown of exactly what it’s costing the Australian taxpayer to keep the Oceanic Viking sitting at anchor off Indonesia and I’m sure all Australians would be interested in the answer.
At an estimated cost of around 35 thousand dollars divided by 78 refugees per day, that’s about $448 a day, per refugee. It would be cheaper to put them up in five star accommodation than to keep them on the Oceanic Viking.
I’m sure there would be a lot of Australians who wouldn’t mind being subsidised nearly $450 a day for their accommodation. This just puts more pressure on Mr Rudd to bring this fiasco to a conclusion.
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