Ian Macdonald (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

I also wish to speak on the motion to take note of the very embarrassed answer of Senator Sherry, the Assistant Treasurer, to an excellent question from Senator Colbeck relating to the Oceanic Viking and the patagonian toothfish stocks it is supposed to be protecting. Back in 1997, a unique alliance was formed between sensible, practical conservation groups, the very professional fishing industry that fishes the Southern Ocean and the Australian government. We were all concerned that the stocks of the patagonian toothfish, a very rare and very valuable fish, were being plundered by pirates. From that moment, we as a government took a great deal of action to protect those fish stocks for the Australian fishing industry in a very controlled way and to ensure the continuation of this species of fish.

The Howard government was very strong on border protection and protecting its fish stocks, as it protected its borders against illegal immigrants. As a result of that, and a lot of work by the Howard government, in August 2003 an Australian patrol vessel, the Southern Supporter, followed the Viarsa 1, a patagonian toothfish pirate vessel caught fishing illegally in Australian waters, for some 21 days across the Southern Ocean and the southern Atlantic Ocean: some 3,900 nautical miles and the longest chase in Australia’s maritime history. I do not think I am giving away any secrets now, some seven or eight years after that, to disclose that on the Southern Supporter there was not even so much as a cap pistol—no armaments at all. But it followed this vessel and, with the help of the British and South African authorities, that vessel was arrested and brought back to Australia.

As a result of that, the Australian government then decided to get a vessel that could actually go down into the Southern Ocean and protect our fish stocks; an armed vessel that would really make the pirates sit up and take notice. As a consequence, the Oceanic Viking was acquired. It is an ice-strengthened vessel and it has two 50-calibre machine guns on it. It was there to protect the fish stocks in the Southern Ocean. Since it was acquired by the Howard government it has served its purpose: because the pirates knew we were serious and because we had a strong policy, patagonian fish pirating actually ceased. It is one of the great credits to the Howard government that they got rid of that pirate trade in the very valuable patagonian toothfish stock.

Fast forward to the Rudd government, with its well-known soft approach on border protection—everywhere you look the Rudd government has no interest in strong border protection for Australia. Have a look at the illegal immigration issue: the Rudd government laid out the welcome mat to illegal immigrants into Australia. In so doing, they have ensured that the vessel that was specifically acquired for the ice flows in the Southern Ocean is now holed up off Indonesia in tropical waters, doing something necessary because of the failure of the Rudd government’s border protection policy.

I can assure you that the patagonian toothfish pirates are a well-organised, very well-intelligenced group. I can almost bet you that they are now heading back to the Southern Ocean, because this fish stock is a very valuable fish. There is a lot of money to be made, and their intelligence sources will tell them that this boat—the scourge of their lives—is holed up in some tropical port off Indonesia. So the patagonian toothfish pirates will be down there, raping the Australian fish stock, and the Rudd government has no answer for that. It is the failure of the Rudd government’s border protection policies in all of its forms that causes us to stress as a nation and to be laughed at by those who would breach our borders.

Question agreed to.