Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

I second the motion. Another day, another boat, another policy failure. The Labor government’s border protection policy is in tatters. Since Labor changed its border protection system in August 2008, 43 boats—or is it 44 boats, Prime Minister; what is it today: 42, 43, 44 boats?—have been intercepted or arrived on our shores, intercepted by our Australian Navy personnel. Over 2,000 people have now arrived in this way, and the Prime Minister has refused to take any responsibility for the change in the border protection policies which have led to this outcome. The Prime Minister would have Australians believe that it is just an unhappy coincidence and that when he changed the law, when he provided the people smugglers with marketing tools to lure people to Australia, when he changed the laws to play into the hands of the people smugglers, it had no impact—that the surge in boat arrivals in the 14 months since he changed that law was just a coincidence. Well, Prime Minister, it is no coincidence; it is the major cause of the surge in boat arrivals in this country since August 2008.

The Australian Federal Police know it is no coincidence. The Australian Federal Police completed a report in March this year called Strategic Intelligence Forecast—Transnational criminal trends and threats to Australia. That report contains an indication that the government’s changes to border protection policies are going to be marketed by people smugglers to potential asylum seekers. That was a warning from the Australian Federal Police. Yet, unbelievably, the minister will try and tell this House, tell the Australian people, that he does not know anything about the contents of that report. It was a warning to the government that the changes in policies were being used as a marketing tool by people smugglers. Prime Minister, your minister has not even bothered to read that report, yet we hear that the report has been disseminated around the world—to agencies in Australia, the United Kingdom and Canada. A Canadian Mounty can read this report, but not the minister! I find that an outrageous state of affairs and a very disgraceful reflection on this government.

The Prime Minister has not directed that this report should be considered by the ministers who are responsible for the border protection policies. Isn’t it a matter of concern that the Australian Federal Police have warned this government that its changes in policies are being used as marketing tools by people smugglers, by the people-smuggling trade that the Prime Minister feigns such outrage about? He calls them ‘vile, outrageous people’, yet his own minister has not even read an Australian Federal Police report that warned the government about the dangers of changing the border protection policies. It is no coincidence, according to the Indonesian Ambassador to Australia, who said that people smugglers were using the weakening of the laws as a marketing tool. It is no coincidence, according to the International Organisation for Migration’s chief-of-mission in Indonesia, who said that the people smugglers were ‘testing the envelope’ because of the changes in the border protection laws. The numbers speak for themselves. It is no coincidence, and the government knows it. Yet the Prime Minister thinks that by putting his head in the sand this will all go away, that it will just be a nasty nightmare. It will not go away, Prime Minister—another day, another boat arrival, another policy failure.

The government has also lost control over the immigration detention facilities. Remember when the members opposite called Christmas Island a ‘white elephant’ and said ‘It’ll never be used; it’ll never be needed’? Christmas Island is at breaking point. It is not a question of ‘if’ the government will be bringing asylum seekers onto mainland Australia; it is a question of ‘when’. Christmas Island is having to put up with makeshift accommodation that has been pressed into service. Contractors, staff and supplies are being flown in to deal with the thousands of people who are arriving and being intercepted by Australian authorities. And none of this has been budgeted for, because the Labor government took the border protection policies of the Howard government for granted. They inherited a border protection system which kept our borders safe, which reduced the number of boat arrivals to an average of three per year. In some years there were no boat arrivals. In the 14 months since this government changed the laws, there have been 43 or 44 boat arrivals carrying 2,000 people. Prime Minister, this is an abject policy failure. The Prime Minister must take responsibility for his failure to keep our borders safe. (Time expired)

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