Julia Gillard (Lalor, Australian Labor Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

I am asked about the Malaysia agreement and I am talking about factors relating to it and operationalising it. I am reminding the member for Macquarie that, if she has not read and absorbed the Solicitor-General's advice, that is something she may choose to do. She may have already done so, but if she does absorb that advice she will see that his view, as Solicitor-General, the highest legal adviser the government has, is that processing on Nauru is subject to legal risk without amending the legislation and certainly unaccompanied minors could not be transferred. In those circumstances, even if you ran the legal risk in relation to transferring adults, you would obviously be in the position where you would be at some risk that people smugglers would start choosing to fill boats with children. No-one wants to run those risks.

That means we need to amend the legislation and the question that will be before the parliament once the legislation is introduced is whether the opposition will vote for that and put executive government in the position that the Howard government was and that this government believed itself to be before the High Court case. I have been advised that the Leader of the Opposition has accepted the offer for a briefing at five o'clock on Friday afternoon in Melbourne. I am very pleased to see that.

Opposition members interjecting—

See this speech in context