Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Hansard source

I've seen levels of incompetence in my nearly 14 years in this place when it comes to immigration, especially in my first term. The incompetence was beyond belief. But I've got to say that the incompetence we've seen over the last week in the handling of this issue is absolutely extraordinary.

On Monday I asked the Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs a very simple question. It went along these lines:

My question is to the Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs. Under the Albanese Labor government, the decision to release 80 hardcore criminals will result in more violent crimes against Australians. Why hasn't this government drafted any legislation to keep Australians safe from these criminals?

It was a fairly simple question. Now, I won't go through the minister's answer, but, needless to say, it was: 'Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.' Then, after an interjection on relevance, he said this:

We moved quickly to ensure that we issued visas to impacted individuals with appropriate conditions to ensure that community safety can be upheld …

There are two points that need to be made about the complete incompetence of this government in dealing with this issue. Let's not forget that this issue is about the government's first priority—keeping Australians safe. The No. 1 priority of any government is keeping Australians safe. Now, let's go to the point about legislation. We have heard excuse upon excuse upon excuse from this government as to why they cannot legislate. Yet, today, we find out, because we've heard it in the Senate—not even here—that the government is going to legislate. Rather than having done their day job and being able to present to the parliament on Monday that legislative fix, they've made every excuse in the world as to why they couldn't—until today, when they have been shamed, absolutely shamed, into having a legislative fix, which we still haven't seen. I say it again: this parliament should not leave here this week—none of us should leave here this week—until that legislative fix is in place.

The second gross incompetence that we've seen is this claim that visas will be issued with appropriate conditions to ensure that communities are safe. It is complete and utter nonsense. Three times we asked the minister today about the visa conditions and whether it was true that these hardened criminals, or some of them, had been released without visa conditions. He would not answer the question. Three times we put it to him in three different ways, and he would not answer the question. What we found out was through, I think, outstanding journalism from the West Australian. A journalist actually went and stayed overnight in the motel with the detainees. What the detainees were doing under these so-called conditions of the visa, it seems, is boasting about how good it is to be smoking marijuana, how good it is to be drinking and how they were having a lot of fun heading into Perth at 2 am in the morning. There were young kids on their bikes driving into the motel and waving to the detainees, who were then abusing the young kids on the bikes. This is the level of protection the Australian community was being provided by this government. It is shameful. It is shameful, and we have to remember what crimes these hardened criminals have committed—child sex offenders; rapists; murderers. Those are the crimes that have been committed by these hardened criminals. This government has failed to keep the community safe from these hardened criminals.

The No. 1 priority of any government is to keep the community safe, and you have abysmally failed in doing that, for two reasons: (a) there is still not a legislative fix, and (b) your visa conditions were a joke.

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