L

et me tell you a story about Tony Abbott, the new Australian Prime Minister. In October 2005, Abbott, who was then health minister, and his wife and daughters were holidaying at a modest three star resort in Bali'€™s Legian. The second Bali bombing took place, killing more than two dozen people, among them several Australians.

At first, nobody could get Abbott because his mobile phone didn'€™t have global roaming. When next day he heard of the bombing, he went to the hospital and stayed for 15 hours, helping where he could. Indonesia'€™s President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, visited the hospital. But Abbott had a horror of seeming to use the tragedy for personal grandstanding, so he made himself scarce while the President was there.

After the tragedy, and despite Canberra'€™s official travel warnings, Abbott and his family decided to stay on in Bali for another week. They didn'€™t want to be pushed around by terrorists, they loved Bali, they love Indonesia.

I tell the story only to indicate that Abbott is a much more complex and interesting politician than the media stereotypes, and the attacks of his opponents, suggest.

As a journalist, it is not my job to be an advocate for my government. As it happens, Abbott has been a friend of mine for more nearly 40 years. But I'€™m happy to criticize him over the many things I disagree with him about.

But I can'€™t fault him on his attitude to Indonesia. I have had many long discussions with Abbott about Indonesia. He is passionate about the country, and its importance to Australia.

At the weekend, Abbott remarked that Indonesia was '€œin many respects our most important relationship'€™'€™.

Reflecting on the millions of Australians who have holidayed in Indonesia, he said: '€œThere'€™s no reason why there can'€™t be a much closer personal relationship that those millions of Australians feel for Indonesia and Indonesians.'€™'€™

He tried to put the recent controversies over people smuggling in context: '€œIndonesia is a land of promise for us and we do not want the relationship to be defined by boats.'€™'€™ So, what about boats?

Abbott, like Kevin Rudd before him, wants to stop people arriving illegally by boat. Since Rudd scrapped John Howard'€™s tough policies on this in 2008, well over 50,000 people have come to Australia this way. I have followed this very closely. I first got involved in journalism following the Indochinese boat people in the 1970s. I am convinced that now we are dealing overwhelmingly with determined illegal immigration.

The desperation that sometimes motivates people doesn'€™t prove they are political refugees. If you are fleeing a very poor and unstable country for a rich country with a universal welfare system, that can provide its own desperate determination.

Australia'€™s response should not be seen as a sign of racism or fear of the outsider. Australia is the most heavily immigrant society in the world. A quarter of Australians were born overseas.

As a proportion of our population, we have the biggest immigration program in the world. It is completely non-discriminatory racially, and has been so for more than 40 years. My neighbors on one side are Chinese, the other Malaysian, and opposite are people of Turkish and Pakistani background.

This is a routine Melbourne street. Australia also provides the second largest number of permanent resettlement places for refugees of any country in the world. All this is put at risk, though, by a situation which allowed anyone who arrives illegally by boat to stay.

That'€™s the way it was when the system broke down a few years ago. And 50,000 today will be several hundred thousand in a few years if this route remains viable.

This is not only bad for Australia but also for Indonesia, as a certain number of illegal immigrants are attracted to Indonesia solely to get to Australia.

Indonesians have legitimate complaints against Canberra over the last few years. Suspending the live cattle export trade, with no advance notice to Jakarta, was a ghastly mistake by our previous government.

It threatened Indonesian food security, devastated our reputation as a reliable supplier and damaged the long held Canberra position that the best way to secure necessities is through the operations of open markets. Similarly, when Rudd abolished Howard'€™s border control policies, he started up a new, big trade in people smuggling.

Australia and Indonesia should be partners in stopping people smuggling, which damages both our nations. Abbott'€™s proposal to turn boats back where safe is a policy carried out by numerous other countries, including the US, with illegal  immigrants from the Caribbean; and Sri Lanka, which turns back its own illegal emigrants. It is a tough policy, but not anti-Indonesian.

This trade, which has seen more than 1,200 people drown on the journey to Australia, will never stop unless people believe they have no chance of securing permanent residency in Australia this way.

Some other parts of Abbott'€™s policies were either foolish, or foolish to announce. Paying villagers for information, and even buying boats that might otherwise be used for people smuggling, can only be carried out by Indonesian police in Indonesian territory. They are at most marginal measures that authorized police officers in the field might take.

But perhaps Indonesians can forgive these isolated bits of ill-advised policy. I would ask my Indonesian friends to keep an open mind about our new prime minister.

He didn'€™t get everything right in opposition. But he comes to Indonesia on Monday, his first overseas trip as prime minister, full of goodwill. As someone who loves Indonesia, and cares deeply about our relationship, I think the prospects for a deeper, broader relationship are good. Don'€™t think Abbott doesn'€™t care, and doesn'€™t want to bring this about.