Pat Conaghan (Cowper, National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Social Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

CONAGHAN () (): My question is to the Prime Minister. Can the Prime Minister confirm the 215 hard-core criminals released into the Australian community are receiving welfare and housing benefits at the expense of the Australian taxpayer?

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

First of all, the greatest expense that any of these individuals have incurred is the cost of their crimes. That's the greatest expense. And those crimes are why their visas were cancelled. That's why our first priority is for them to be out of the country.

If they can't be out of the country, then we wanted them in detention but the High Court has said that's not possible. The High Court has said, for these particular individuals, they have given us a way of being able to use the forms of monitoring we wanted to use but not under the specifics as to what had previously been approved by this parliament, and so that's what we are now having to do. But our first priority is always that we don't want these people in the country in the first place.

The most expensive option is when they're in detention. The next most expensive option is when they're in the community. And the cheapest option is to get them out of the country. The arrangements when they're in the community and the expenses that are involved with that use procedures that were put in place and existed for the entirety of the previous government.