Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection. With two refugees setting themselves on fire after being sent to offshore detention camps, will you finally accept the consequences of putting desperate people in a situation even worse than the trauma that they are fleeing? Minister, aren't you just showing pure cowardice by blaming the advocates helping the vulnerable, instead of accepting responsibility for your actions? Can't we do better than this Labor-Liberal policy of not drowning but burning?

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Finance) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order—I suspect it stands for members opposite as well. The reference at the end of the question is deeply unparliamentary and offensive to all members of the House. I ask that the last part of the question be ruled out of order. It is not the policy held by any of us here.

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I heard enough of it to concur. The minister will disregard the last part of the question. I ask the member for Melbourne to withdraw.

Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw.

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am sure I speak for all honourable members and, in fact, for every Australian when I say that we do not want to see people self-harming. We do not want to see them self-harming in our country; we do not want to see them self-harming on Nauru, Manus or anywhere else. Equally, though, all Australians do not want to see people drowning at sea. The reality is that we need to deal with very tough situations in relation to movements across our borders. We need to make sure, particularly in this day and age, that there is a secure border management system in place and we need to do that because we need to have a safe community.

The United Nations tells us that there are some 58 million people around the world who would seek to come to a country like ours because they want a better life for themselves and for their children. All of us can understand that. The reality is that we are a population of 24 million and we have one of the highest per-capita intakes in the world of refugees. Along with Canada and the United States, we take people in record numbers. Thirteen thousand seven hundred and fifty refugees will come to our country this year and, within two or three years, that number will grow to 18,250. In addition, we are bringing 12,000 Syrians in—we are conducting rigorous security and health checks to make sure that these people will be able to integrate successfully into our community—and we should be very proud of that.

But what the government have been absolutely adamant about is that we are not going to allow people smugglers to dictate the refugees who seek to come to our country. We have said from day one—we were elected, in fact, on this platform at the last election—very clearly and very definitively: the Australian people want secure borders. They want to offer a helping hand to those people who are in a desperate situation, and we do that through the refugee program. We bring refugees to our country by plane, not by boat. We will work with the Nauruan authorities and with the PNG authorities to provide opportunities for people there who have been found to be refugees—in the case of PNG, to integrate into Papua New Guinea society, or, on Nauru, to either stay on Nauru or move to Cambodia. We are working on third-country settlement options, but we need to structure any arrangement in such a way that it will not create a pull factor or an opportunity for people smugglers to get back into business. We have dozens of health workers working on Nauru at the moment, including mental health workers and support people, who are providing support to refugees and to people on Nauru but also delivering a very clear message—and that is that they are not going to settle in our country.

Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Do you still blame the advocates?

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Melbourne will not interject.

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are not going to tolerate a situation which allows people smugglers to get back into business. It does mean that we need to take tough decisions to ensure that we do not see women and children going to the bottom of the ocean, as they did only a few short years ago. We should speak for the 1,200 people who drowned trying to make the journey across to our country, and we should never allow that to happen again.