Luke Gosling (Solomon, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for International Development and the Pacific. Why is the Pacific engagement visa crucial to repairing the damage done to Australia's relationship with the Pacific? What has been the response to the visa and what are the implications if the visa is not supported?

Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Solomon for his question and his deep interest in these matters. The truth is our national security is founded in part on being the partner of choice for the Pacific, and the truth is also that there's a great strategic competition occurring in the Pacific and our standing in that region has been undermined by the last government's incompetence and attitude. We saw the member for Cook's bad treatment of Pacific leaders at PIF meetings. We saw the new opposition leader joking about Pacific islands being wiped out by climate change. We saw the former deputy prime minister saying Pacific Islander people should be grateful we let them pick our fruit. Then we saw the then foreign minister Payne refusing to visit the Solomon Islands in 2022.

In contrast, the Albanese government has been repairing our relationships and has been repairing our standing. Central to that is the Pacific engagement visa, which builds our people-to-people links with the Pacific, builds diaspora and deepens our engagement and relationship with the Pacific family. It complements our increases to ODA, our expansion of the PALM scheme, our increased security ties and our support for Pacific journalism.

Now, one would think those opposite would have learned their lesson after presiding over the Solomon Islands-China security pact, but no. They're blocking action on climate change, they're undermining confidence in the PALM, and now they're saying no to the Pacific engagement visa. 'No,' they're saying, on the spurious grounds of opposition to the ballot system.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Hume is on a warning!

Pat Conroy (Shortland, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Defence Industry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is in total ignorance that the ballot system has been very successful in the New Zealand scheme and in the US green card lottery. It's in total ignorance of the fact that our extensive consultations in the Pacific have said that the ballot system is critical to avoiding a brain drain. Only by making the visa random, with strict conditions around health, age, character and a job offer, do you guarantee that a high school graduate has as much chance of winning a visa as a cardio surgeon. If you eliminate the ballot, you eliminate that randomness and you actually eliminate any chance of avoiding the brain drain. In fact, you deliver a brain drain and you undermine our standing in the Pacific. That would be a bizarre outcome, but that's what they're advocating for.

Equally bizarre was the media statement they put out yesterday, where they said that they support a permanent visa but then said that they don't want people to come here permanently. They also said that they want to pick the most skilled people, so we can't use a ballot, but that we don't want the Pacific to lose their best people. The truth is that by undermining our position in the Pacific, they're undermining our national security. They're going back to their bad old ways of hurting Australia's national interest and being patsies for the interests of other countries in the region. (Time expired)