Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is for the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship and I remind the minister of the government's decision to remove families from the Manus Island processing centre. Given that there will now be no offshore processing facilities for children and families until later this year on Nauru, why has the government created an incentive for people smugglers to put more children on boats?

Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It would be a lot easier if the honourable members asked me these questions and did not embarrass themselves in the House as this honourable member has done. There is no change to the policy in relation to regional processing centres. There are children and in fact all demographics on regional processing centres including Manus. There are men, women and children on the regional processing centre on Manus right now as we speak, so the premise of the question is fundamentally wrong. But again I am not surprised by an opposition that does not care about the facts and only wants to insinuate all sorts of things and sloganeer. We have an opposition leader who really does not want to fix this problem. He says yes to a country that says no, Indonesia, and no to a country that says yes, Malaysia, when it comes to returning people safely to a transit country. That is because fundamentally this man is not a leader. He does not care about people dying at sea, he does not care about what is happening to people—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Ms Anna Burke (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I apologise, I actually did not hear what the minister said. I was engaged in something else. The minister will resume his seat. The member for Cowper on a point of order.

Luke Hartsuyker (Cowper, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That was an outrageous statement, Speaker, and you should ask the minister to withdraw.

Ms Anna Burke (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The minister will withdraw.

Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I do withdraw. I say to the member for Bonner that if the member for Cook wrote that question he should go and complain to him, because the premise of the question is wrong. Children and other family members are indeed in the regional processing centre. The question is wrong and the premise is wrong. What I think is most important is that the opposition consider for the first time genuinely listening to the experts and the recommendations of the Houston panel's report and helping the government with this very significant challenge. That includes the Malaysian arrangement, because that is something that is absolutely critical to see a reduction and ultimately a cessation of vessels coming in this manner.