Bruce Baird (Cook, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Dennis Richardson, now our ambassador to the US. Graham Richardson would be somebody else to ask. We asked him how many problems, in terms of security for Australia, were presented by the 3,000 people who came by boat into this country during this period. The answer was zero. The reality is that people who present as terrorists are not going to find their way on a leaky boat and be processed for several years in a detention centre. With the support they would have from wealthy terrorist organisations, they are more likely to come in a private jet, with fake passports or whatever.

It is the vulnerable and the dispossessed we should be looking after. Instead we want to excise the country. We want them out of sight.

What are we proposing in this legislation? What are the problems? There is no doubt that the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs has attempted to address some of our concerns about the children and families in detention—having a separate centre but still in the general area of the detention centre. Time limits will be provided; the minister has given a commitment to that. The Ombudsman will have an oversight, but the situation is not clear because the people will be in Nauru and not under Australian law. I am not quite sure how the Ombudsman is going to supervise this arrangement.

What about all the people to provide legal and medical advice, the people from the churches and the people from the various social and charitable organisations? How are they going to get there? The other day a group went up to Nauru trying to get in. They did not have visas, so back they came. They went up and back twice to just get in. What does that mean to the people who are going to support the people there?

Finally, the worst feature of the legislation is the last part. What happens to people who are found to be genuine refugees? The answer is: we do not know what is going to happen to them. They could be sent to New Zealand. But there is a problem there. I was with a delegation over in New Zealand just two weeks ago. The minister there said, ‘I have a message to give to Canberra: if you continue to excise the whole of Australia, we will not take any of the people you process.’ I am not sure of the number of people who were taken by New Zealand before; I have been given one figure of 35 and another of 128 out of the 1,500 people who were on Nauru. I think New Zealand is basically the only country that took other people. New Zealand is saying, ‘Sorry, we are not going to take them.’ Is Europe going to take them, with all the hordes of people knocking on their door? The answer is no.

There are no time limits, so my concern is that we are going to have a repeat—that people are going to be there for an endless period of time. I think the total circumference of the island is about 32 kilometres. People can walk freely around Nauru, we are told. That sounds like a very big deal to me. But where does this whole process go? We had a system that people generally agreed was an appropriate one. A large number of people are saying to us, ‘This is not the appropriate way to go.’ The Catholic bishops said that they opposed it. They said:

We believe that all asylum seekers are entitled to protection under the 1951 convention relating to the status of refugees, to equal access to Australian legal processes and to humane treatment while their claims are being assessed. We also believe that Australia should take the lead in observing international humanitarian law and protecting all people, especially children and families.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Baptist Union of Victoria—normally a conservative organisation—said:

Our primary concerns are as follows. The action is inconsistent with the compassionate decision you made last year about the removal of children from detention which received popular support from the Australian people. We would urge a return to a more compassionate stance.

Bishop Joseph Grech, of the Australian Catholic Bishops and Chairman of the Bishops Committee for Migrants and Refugees, said that Australians would be shocked and disappointed if the government’s new policy saw children especially being sent to detention centres again. The National Council of Churches in Australia wrote:

Dear Prime Minister,

We write with deep concern to express our opposition to the proposed legislation which would see all asylum seekers who arrive in Australia by boat being processed offshore. You would be aware of the longstanding concern of many Australian churches to the so-called Pacific solution.

The Uniting Church said that ‘moral courage was absent in the decision’. In terms of churches, it is normally known as being at the more trendy end of the spectrum, but it still represents the whole spectrum of people who are part of it. Amnesty International said:

Australia would be in breach of its international legal obligations. Genuine asylum seekers, including children, face a lifetime of detention depending on the settlement arrangements made.

A Just Australia published an open letter to the Prime Minister from prominent Australians and community leaders. It stated:

We the undersigned are alarmed at the prospect of asylum seekers being removed from Australia, sent to offshore centres and being held there until third countries provide refuge.

The Refugee Council of Australia expressed concerns that the ‘current review will result in breaches of article 33 of the Geneva Convention’. Conference leaders of religious institutes in New South Wales wrote:

I ask that the Australian government abandon the Pacific solution and the use of Christmas Island. All asylum seekers should be housed in the mainland with access to appropriate medical, legal and other support.

We were told at first that it was not about problems with Indonesia. But, as time went by, it became more apparent that that was on the agenda. Let us look at some of the editorials in the Sydney Morning Herald and the Weekend Australian when the legislation was announced. In the Weekend Australian of 15 April, the editorial stated:

Just as Indonesians rightfully asked Australians to respect their law with regard to the Schapelle Corby verdict, Indonesians must understand that Australia has its own laws as well, and those laws may well see Papuans granted asylum. The sooner Jakarta understands that it cannot drive policy in Canberra, the sooner the two nations can get relations back on the right track.

In the Sydney Morning Herald, under the heading ‘The export of refugees: time to drop a bad idea’, the editorial stated:

However, in its concern for the sensitivities of Indonesia, the Australian Government has been too ready to disregard the rights of asylum seekers.

These editorials highlight the fact that we have, across the spectrum, individuals who are telling us that this is not appropriate behaviour. This is not the way we should be treating the weakest and most vulnerable in our community. This is not the Australia that we know and respect. Australia is a generous nation. It is one that has shown enormous compassion to people in need on an ongoing basis. If we look at the aid given by Australians, its generosity has been outstanding. The level of assistance and aid that has been given by this nation has been quite incredible.

We have to address the issue of the bill before us. For most of us, it is a challenging situation. This is government legislation, and people who sit on this side of the House are challenged by it. I have been in public life for some 19 years. I have never crossed the floor during that time. I have never abstained from a vote. But I have trouble in supporting this legislation for the reasons I have outlined. Antonio Guterres, UN High Commissioner for Refugees in 2005, said:

While every refugee’s story is different and their anguish personal, they all share a common thread of uncommon courage—the courage not only to survive, but to persevere and rebuild their shattered lives.

Our responsibility is about enabling those people who have been dispossessed, who have had their lives shattered, who, in some cases, have been tortured and who are fleeing from the situation in their country of origin to start again. Our responsibility as a country is not to say to these people: ‘We don’t want to know you. We want you to go up to another island, which is not part of Australia, because we don’t want you being touched by Australian law.’ There is no doubt that there is a real problem with people who are serial appealers on every case, who do not deserve to be recognised and who should be expedited out the door. There is no doubt about that.

I think, on the whole, our migration people do a pretty good job. But this legislation is about changing the situation, taking away our responsibility and putting it on another country. I do not believe that we can support this bill. It is very disappointing after the changes we achieved to the migration law.

It is up to all Australians who believe in compassion, who believe in fairness, who believe in equity and who believe in looking after the vulnerable to decide that we cannot go ahead and simply ignore their claims and say it is for somebody else to look after them. The people in this House, in the year 2006, have this moral responsibility. We have had conscience votes on RU486 and other things. This is a conscience vote. I am not in a position to support this bill.

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