Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the very effective Minister for Immigration and Border Protection.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Wait for it! Will the minister advise the House of the importance of strong and consistent policies on border protection?

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Mitchell will resume his seat. I cannot hear the question from the noise, but the member will desist from adding extraneous information to his question to keep the noise level down.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am very happy to start this question again. Will the minister advise the House of the importance of strong and consistent policies on border protection? What are the consequences of taking alternative approaches on border protection?

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Mitchell for his question. He is a champion of Western Sydney.

When it comes to border protection and doing it properly you need to do three things. The first thing is you need to know what works. The second thing you need to do is have the resolve and strength to stand by what works, particularly in the face of opposition and criticism. And you need to have the competence to implement what works—safely, effectively and sustainably. That is what this government has done on border protection. It has been 92 days since the single, solitary venture that came to our shores earlier this year. The detention centres are closing. The costs are falling to the tune of $2½ billion in the budget because of our success to date. And the children in detention centres are leaving; they are going out. The number of children in detention centres is declining. As the Prime Minister and the foreign minister well know, no longer is it the case, in our regional engagements, that people-smuggling is the elephant in the room as it was under Labor. We got to the point where 4,000 people were turning up each month illegally on boats, as occurred under the member for Watson's watch.

But in contrast to that, we have what was put in place by those opposite when they were in government. It was a cocktail. It was a recipe—the indecision, division and the fundamental weakness meant those opposite were a people smuggler's picnic during the time they were in government.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

There will be silence on my left.

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was a picnic on border protection for the people smugglers. But they have learnt nothing in opposition—absolutely nothing. We heard from the shadow minister yesterday that he has discovered the sunrise and that turn backs actually work. Having worked out that they got it wrong, they still cannot get it right. They cannot bring themselves, as they voted in this House against turn backs just last week, to embrace the policies they now admit work. Today, right across the frontbench and the backbench, the shadow minister for immigration got turned back on turn backs. He was turned back on turn backs because we know those opposite, at the end of the day, do not have the resolve or the ticker to do turn backs, particularly this Leader of the Opposition. We know that if they were ever to occupy these benches again, the people smuggler's picnic would be back because that same indecision, that same division and that same witness would come back.

You can never have any confidence that Labor will do what they say they will do on border protection. The people of Australia know that their hearts are just not in it. If they do not get it by now—that turn backs work and turn backs are essential to stopping the boats—then they never will. We know they never will and the Australian people know they never will.