Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Hansard source

This is a government that is in panic, and it is in panic because of its own failed policies.

Labor want to turn this into a race debate. We just saw that then from the member for Hindmarsh, turning this into a debate about immigration when this debate today is about an arrogant government flailing from their own policy failures and forcing a decision on a local community. I welcome those in the gallery today from the community of Woodside who out of their own pockets have come to get what they could not get in Woodside—meetings with the government and particularly a meeting with the Prime Minister. I note today that the Prime Minister has scurried away, despite the fact that she has been in Adelaide on numerous occasions and could have met with the good people of Woodside but has refused to.

This government needs to face up to its own failures. The people of Woodside are not only standing up for their community but I believe they are standing up for people around the country, because this will not be the last set of beds opened by this government in the detention network. There have been some 1,800 to 1,900 people who have arrived illegally by boat since the election. The government have announced around 3,000 new beds and they will be exhausted in very short order. So the processes established by which this government arrogantly and in a panic imposes these matters on people in our community is a matter that is worthy of debate.

Where the government has failed to consult, the parliament should act. That is what this motion is about. The parliament should act. The parliament should call on the minister to come into the House of Representatives this week and give a statement on the broader failures of this government that have led to this situation occurring in the first place. But the government should also agree to the motion put forward by the member for Mayo that the Joint Standing Committee on Migration, which is a bipartisan committee representing members from all over this parliament, including formerly the member for Melbourne Ports, who is sitting opposite here today and who did work on that committee. It is chaired by a government member and includes members from the Greens, the Labor Party and the Liberal Party and the Senate and the House. This is a committee that can go and do what the government failed to do, and that is to talk to the people of Woodside—to go and hear what their concerns are.

When I was in Woodside recently—and those in the government did their usual thing of trying to accuse the coalition of being racists, basically, in considering the legitimate concerns of people in the community—these were some of the concerns put to me: they were concerned about the future of the Inverbrackie base and want an answer to that; they were concerned about the location of demountables on the school playground as a result of having to cater for additional students at the school, which will take away the play area for their children; they were concerned about whether there would be counsellors placed in the schools who would be able to address the concerns of parents and their children and who would deal with the inevitable situations that would arise from these matters; and they were concerned about bushfire risk and the lack of a plan—and I understand there is still the lack of a plan to deal with a catastrophic bushfire event—where you have 400 people in a centre in a very hazardous zone, none of whom can respond directly to any English directions. That is a concern that this government should be concerned about.

They were concerned that the alternative uses of this facility for supported accommodation for people with disabilities had not been assessed or considered. The need for social housing in this community—and there are quite a number of people in the Adelaide Hills in need of this, I am told—was also ignored. The potential for this facility to be used as a women’s refuge for women who are fleeing domestic violence was also discounted. There were concerns that the $10 million that is going to be spent on this facility could be better spent on the Mount Barker hospital. People were concerned that the site was chosen without any discussion about what the alternative sites were other than in this facility, and that remains the issue. We do not know what the alternatives were; the government will not release the list of alternatives. They are not prepared to stump up and explain their decisions to this community.

This community was also concerned about access to health services and whether there would be a two-tiered health service in Inverbrackie and Woodside: a substandard service for those who live in Woodside and the Adelaide Hills and another standard for those who will be detained as part of the Inverbrackie detention centre. These are very legitimate and reasonable concerns. This motion put forward by the member for Mayo, who I commend for his advocacy in this parliament on behalf his community, is simply designed to give people a say and to force this government not simply and arrogantly to impose decisions on a community. It is because of their failures, and let us not forget that they are their failures that have created the need for this facility. More beds and a never-never solution in East Timor are no solution. What this government needs is to put a real solution on the table for their border protection failures. The minister should come into the House this week before the parliament rises and stump up with his plan. I am ready to put mine forward and the people of Australia can decide. (Time expired)

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