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What does the election result mean for Australia's politics?

By Vienna Ma: 0 Comments Print E-mail Xinhua, August 25, 2010

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Neither Labor Party nor the Coalition has won enough seats to win the Aug. 21 Australian federal election, which means Australia is set for a hung parliament in 70 years.

Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard (L) is going to cast her vote at Melbourne's Seabrook Primary School polling station, Aug. 21, 2010. [Bai Xue/Xinhua]

"The early indications are that Labor lost support with a campaign that was hijacked by former leaders, especially with the focus on former (ousted) Prime Minister Kevin Rudd," Professor Zareh Ghazarian, senior political analyst of Monash University in Australia told Xinhua in an exclusive interview on Tuesday.

At the same time, the election result also indicates voters did not seem to endorse Coalition Leader Tony Abbott as the next prime minister.

Meanwhile, the media lately expected the emerging of a hung parliament marks a likely change in immigration intake and mining resources tax policy in Australia.

In terms of immigration, the Labor Party vowed to form a " sustainable, small" Australia, while Coalition planned to reduce net migration to 170,000 a year, which is a huge decrease from the peak of 300,000 in 2008.

In terms on receiving the numbers of international students to Australia, the major parties have policies that understand the importance of international students coming to Australia.

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