Cory Bernardi (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

As I said, one report had a family of four who were detained on Christmas Island receiving $1,066 per fortnight for food or other expenses. This is more than many Australian resident families would receive from the government when faced with extreme economic hardship. The payment that was made to these illegal arrivals reportedly does not include the accommodation, which is a house or a home in the community. That is right—it is not a jail cell or anything else; it is a home in the community. They are offered internet access and an unrestricted phone card so that they can contact family and friends.

One can only imagine that these people, who have fled impoverished circumstances and who have paid thousands of dollars to people smugglers to enter into this country illegally, must think they have hit the land of milk and honey when they are getting $1,066 to spend at the local shop every fortnight, when they are getting internet access, a phone card and free accommodation and electricity. You tell me that that is a deterrent to people smugglers. You tell me that that is a deterrent to people coming into this country illegally. And this government wants to water down the laws even more and offer them more incentives, whether they are legitimate refugees or they are not. Frankly, I am appalled at this information.

I know that puts me at risk of being called heartless, but these people who may or may not be legitimate refugees have already demonstrated their willingness to break the law to get here. They are prepared to break the law to get into Australian territory. What are they prepared to do when they are here? And yet now, when we find that they are not legitimate refugees, this government in its great wisdom wants to waive any debt that they owe. It wants to waive any disincentive for them to come back a second or a third time, something which we have seen under this government already. People have come back here after being rejected by the previous government.

Of course, there will always be the emotional cries, and I understand there is a great deal of sympathy for those who are trying to jump the legal migration queue and who are so desperate to escape a life-threatening situation that they are forced to take the illegal and risky venture of coming to Australia in a leaky boat. I say that is nonsense. I cannot recall a single instance—and I am happy to have one pointed out to me—where an illegal boatperson entering Australian territory had embarked uninterrupted from their original country of residence. I throw that challenge out there. I am happy to accept it and I am happy to say, ‘Yes, there has been one or two,’ if someone can point it out. The recently reported Afghani or Iranian citizens who have travelled to our country illegally have been through Pakistan or Malaysia or Indonesia before paying a people smuggler tens of thousands of dollars for illegal passage to Australia. It is hardly the conduct of someone fleeing for their life if they are already in a safe country.

Recently I heard of a group of 70 Afghans who were detained in a hotel in Indonesia because they were abandoned by the people smugglers whom they had paid for passage to Australia—abandoned in a hotel. They must have been in fear for their life as they sat around the pool wondering when the boat was going to be leaving for Australia. But of course the Rudd government, as I mentioned before, denies that their policies have encouraged the new wave of illegal arrivals into our territorial waters. I offer that perhaps it is just coincidence. Once again, perhaps it is just a coincidence that since the immigration laws were softened there has been an influx of illegal boats. Some of these voyages have regrettably met with a tragic loss of life and it has reinforced the perception that the Rudd government is not being straight with the Australian people. I say enough is enough.

It is time for a reality check. We have more boats filled with illegal immigrants coming every week. Alarmingly, as I have said, there are reports that when they arrive here the passengers are offered greater financial support than some Australian citizens, and still the government is in denial. But as my colleague, Senator Fierravanti-Wells, mentioned before, a great many of the people that will be affected by this bill are not those that are coming here in leaky boats. They are the illegal overstayers: the 48,000 or so people that have overstayed their visa and come to this country legitimately. Not those who are fleeing for their lives, as Senator Bilyk said; not those who are impoverished—these are people that have flown out here and decided that they like Australia and are just going to stay on for a while. And, when they are incarcerated because they are illegally in our country, this government wants to waive their debts. This government wants to say: ‘That’s okay, mate. We understand. We can accept that. You can break our laws whenever you like. Just go home and you can come back and you owe us nothing.’

Enough is enough. It is time for this government to wake up and recognise the fact that what they are doing is encouraging illegal behaviour in this country. It is encouraging people who are prepared to break the law to break the law. It is encouraging those who want to come to this country in an illegal manner to do so, and all the time it is discouraging those who are prepared to go through fair, reasonable, open and accessible channels—the channels that have served this country so well. This is a policy that is flawed. It is a policy driven around some weird left-wing ideology that simply does not stack up and pass the commonsense test. This is a bill that needs to be rejected, and the coalition will stand firm and reject this bill.