Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

We all love questions from the good old member for Murray because the honourable member asks questions about internal government processes to look at how to deal with the challenges of migration policy across the spectrum and specifically refugee policies, asylum seeker policies and outflows from within the region and beyond the region in particular.

This government has had a range of policy mechanisms within government at work on this since we assumed office nearly two years ago. What has changed in that period of time is that we have had since 2005 a range of new push factors from major source countries like Sri Lanka, Iraq and Afghanistan. As I said to those opposite when I recently ran through these figures, if in the last three years you have seen the numbers of asylum seekers from Iraq, Afghanistan and Sri Lanka go through the roof by between 50, 100, 150 or almost 200 per cent then all countries around the world are going to feel those push factors. We in Australia are no different.

The member for Murray then implies within her question what sorts of responses will be developed by internal mechanisms within the government. One of those mechanisms concerns the proper use of the humanitarian agencies like the UNHCR and the International Organisation for Migration, who are working with our government and the Indonesian government on the ground in Indonesia, as they have done for many years. The UNHCR is the organisation which the good old member for Murray says we should be doing more with as well. In fact, she said this morning, ‘Surely the UNHCR can be engaged directly to work with these people whether they are on board or not.’ This is the same member for Murray who said earlier this month that the UNHCR was ‘corrupt’. She said:

… it in fact costs you more to bribe the UNHCR to look at your case and assess you for your asylum-seeking status than to pay a people-smuggler.

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