With the advent of a new Prime Minister, we have moved from the Pacific Solution to the East Timor Solution on refugees. This new policy sounds little different to that of John Howard's Government, with the exception that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is involved, which is a positive step in itself.
The failure of the Howard Government to formally involve the UNHRC in its asylum-seeker policy solutions reflected suspicion of the UN and its agencies more than anything else.

Labor has no such qualms and it is odd that Rudd did not involve them earlier.
The new policy has a very firm eye on the imminent election. It has the look of a plan put together on the run to neutralise a politically sensitive issue, just as Kevin Rudd announced the end of the much-derided Pacific Solution on the eve of the last election. Three years ago, this was a decisive move which further heightened differences between Labor and the Coalition, in addition to signaling the end of a policy which was widely criticised for the lengthy period of time people often spent in detention. But the Howard Government policy did have the desired effect of slowing boat arrivals.
With Gillard's most recent announcement, even the East Timorese leadership were surprised, and are yet to agree.
Perhaps the Timorese would be more willing to assist if they had received a better deal out of the Australian Government on the royalty split from the gas reserves in the Timor Sea. This is still a very sore point with the leadership of the fledgling nation. The royalties are regulated by the Timor Sea Treaty signed in 2002 and a further agreement signed in 2006, the latter providing for a 50:50 split in royalties and a moratorium on sea boundary claims from both sides until 2055. The Timor Sea Treaty originally provided for a 90:10 split in Timor's favour.
These resources are geographically closer to East Timor than they are to Australia. It was widely believed at the time that considerable pressure was brought to bear by the Howard Government on the East Timorese to accede to this new deal.
It is there is a degree of poetic justice here for the Timorese who are now asked to help bail out the Australian Government's refugee policy with an off-shore processing centre on the eve of an election. Whatever the outcome, justice must prevail: a just and fair outcome for the Timorese and a just outcome for refugees.