Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Prime Minister. Former Prime Minister Mr Rudd stated in 2007 that the government needs to be willing to turn back boats on the high seas if it is to discourage people smugglers. Does the Prime Minister agree with this statement of the member for Griffith?

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

Of course, what we want to achieve is effective turnarounds. What the Deputy Leader of the Opposition must know is that the people smugglers' business model has changed. They do not sit in the boats now enabling our Navy and patrol boat personnel to turn the boats around. There is not a way of going out to sea and turning the boats around and taking them to Indonesia, for two reasons. Reason No. 1: the transnational crime of people smuggling, like other transnational crimes, mutates in the way that it goes about its business, depending on enforcement techniques. Knowing that boats are at risk of being turned around, what happens now is that people disable boats. So you are left with a stark choice: do you leave people to drown at sea or do you go and pick them up? Well, we are Australian. We go and pick them up—of course we do. Then, of course, the attitude of Indonesia has changed. Indonesia does not take boat returns.

The Deputy Leader of the Opposition claims some expertise in foreign affairs. I know the Leader of the Opposition doubts it and he is looking to the member for Kooyong to take her job, but she must know that Indonesia does not take boat returns any longer and she must understand the hypocrisy of the Leader of the Opposition pretending that Indonesia will take boat returns, pretending that boats can be turned around and taken to a non refugee signatory country, with no protections negotiated. And then they come in here and bleat—

Ms Julie Bishop (Curtin, Liberal Party, Deputy Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It was a simple question. I asked if she agreed with the statement of the member for Griffith. Does she agree with his statement?

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As in the past, there is no way that the chair can dictate the way in which the response is made, whether it is made by one word or by many, but the main thing is that the answer must be directly relevant. The Prime Minister is responding directly to the question.

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

I was asked about the statement of the Minister for Foreign Affairs about turning boats around and I am explaining the factual circumstances. I know the opposition does not like facts, but facts are important. We have heard bleating today about human rights issues—bleat, bleat, bleat from the opposition—when the policy that they went to the last election with was that the Leader of the Opposition would direct patrol boat commanders to take boats to Indonesia, not refugee signatories, and he would not have cared less what happened to them afterwards—men, women and children. To pretend that he did is absurd nonsense. The hypocrisy of this is truly remarkable. The shadow minister for immigration is on the record saying he does not care less about refugee signatory countries.

So the answer to the deputy leader's question is this: I so much agree with the statement of the Minister for Foreign Affairs that turning boats around is effective deterrence that I have worked with the minister for immigration in the modern circumstances where the crime of people smuggling has changed and where the attitude of Indonesia is different—I have worked with the minister for immigration to create a circumstance where, in effect, we are turning boats around—that is, people come here and they end up on a plane. It is the same process. They believe they are coming to Australia but they end up somewhere else. It is a virtual turnaround of boats. If the opposition had listened to the facts—

Mr Tony Smith interjecting—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Casey is warned!

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

And screaming abuse does not make the facts any different. I do not know when the opposition will ever learn that screaming abuse does not change the facts.

Mr Tony Smith interjecting—

Harry Jenkins (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Casey will leave the chamber under 94(a) for one hour, having been warned.

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

The opposition was advised that turning the boats around in the past, when it was possible, did work as a deterrent. They were advised that in the modern age Malaysia is the best deterrent. Why do they come into this place and play cheap politics with national interest questions? That is what the Australian people are entitled an answer to. What a ridiculous— (Time expired)