Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Hansard source

Therefore, the new test and the new rules have been in place since this morning. Within 24 hours of the High Court coming down with its decision, the government had taken three actions. The first action that we took was to make sure that we had increased the number of people on Border Force under Operation AEGIS. That has been an increase that we were stepping up in anticipation of the possibility of this decision so that that operation in Border Force now has two-thirds additional people—a 66 per cent increase on the number of people who are there, working on that. Secondly, the regulation was signed off by me. Obviously, we had to check it against the specifics of the majority ruling in the High Court. That was signed off by me last night and put through the executive council this morning, and is now being applied by the department. Thirdly, legislation had to be introduced to the House. The regulation takes immediate effect. Obviously, people then have to be tested against it, but the regulation takes immediate effect.

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