Trish Crossin (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Senator McGauran—and I will take that interjection. The Australian people are getting tired of the low road that your party continually wants to take when it comes to asylum seekers, the low road in terms of trying to somehow demonise these people, suggesting that in some way they have no right and no entitlement to claim asylum and refugee status. You think that out there in the electorate this will get some political traction as you create division and racism in the community by trying to alienate people when in fact this country proudly accepts refugees under the international conventions that we have signed.

For some reason you want the public to believe that our policies are responsible for the number of people that are now coming here, without looking at all at the trends that are happening in countries overseas, the movement of refugees internationally and the part that Australia plays in this when we ought to in fact play a more significant role in this. This is of course on the back of celebrating International World Refugee Day over the weekend. I went to the Jingili Water Gardens in Darwin and I want to commend the multicultural council and in particular the Melaleuca Refugee Centre for the wonderful celebration of refugees in our Darwin community where people from mainly African nations and Burma were there with all of the community—probably a couple of hundred people there—endorsing and supporting these people who have made the journey to this country and have successfully claimed refugee status.

This opposition would have you believe that in fact we have abandoned policies that they put in place when they were elected. Apart from abolishing temporary protection visas, which I will go to in a minute, we have made some changes that treat asylum seekers and refugees in this country more humanely than this opposition ever did. It is with some audacity that we get question after question in this place, particularly about children in detention and the way in which refugees are treated under this government, after the way in which refugees were treated so inhumanely for 10 long years under the policies of the people opposite.

Since we have come to office we have dismantled the failed Pacific solution—and I notice the people opposite have resurrected the Pacific solution. I noticed that during estimates they launched their policy: nothing has changed in the policy except the date at the top; there is no substantial change to the way in which the opposition would treat international refugees seeking asylum in this country. Nothing has changed at all; it is a return to the past. They have simply changed the date at the top and want to rehash that as their policy as they go into an election. They want to dump asylum seekers onto some island in the Pacific or Indian oceans once they try and get assessment here.

They are going to resurrect the Pacific solution; we have dismantled it. We have abolished the temporary protection visa regime. We have introduced fairer work rights arrangements for asylum seekers in the community. We have twice increased the size of Australia’s humanitarian program. We have introduced fairer arrangements for asylum seekers on Christmas Island, including an independent review of decisions, access to migration advice and oversight by the Immigration Ombudsman. None of that was done under the coalition. People seeking asylum were treated appallingly by the people opposite. We have abolished the ineffective system of charges for immigration detainees and we have adopted a new values based approach to immigration detention.

Let me go to that approach for a minute. On coming to government we initiated immigration detention values. We set a high watermark for the way in which we believe people who are seeking asylum in this country ought to be treated. Seven key values were established to guide future policy and practice in immigration detention. Among other things, these values are about the length and conditions of detention, so we will not hold people in detention languishing for years and years at a time waiting to know the outcome of their application. We hold people in detention to look at their papers to assess security and health risks but we have values on that. Immigration staff are now guided by these values. We also look at the appropriateness of the accommodation and the services provided, and they are subject to regular review. People in detention will be treated fairly and reasonably within the law, and the conditions of detention will ensure the inherent dignity of the human being—something that of course was totally lost and forgotten under the policies of the people who sit opposite me.

Our view is very simple. We have signed international conventions. We have said that if people want to seek asylum in this country they have the right to do that. We have said that if someone’s claim for asylum is not legitimate then they will be sent home, and they are being sent home and we will continue to do that. We have a strong and fair, not unfair, policy on border protection and we believe it is the right policy for now and the right policy for the future.

The opposition believe that it is time for a fear campaign, which is being mounted almost daily by the people opposite me. It is mostly based on a series of untruths. The whole picture is never told. The facts are never revealed. They want to fabricate stories in the community that somehow our border protection policy has been weakened—it has not—and that we are somehow responsible for people who are trying to seek asylum in this country. They do not look at what is happening with international movements and trends, and the situations in the countries from which these people are actually fleeing.

Those opposite would purport that the figures suggest that we have had an increase in the number of people arriving by boat. We have not. The Howard government still holds the record for the highest number of boats and arrivals. The largest number of asylum seekers for three years over the last 15 years were in 1999, 2000 and 2001—under the Howard government. The highest number of boats arriving in Australia in any one year was in 1999—under the previous government—when 3,721 asylum seekers arrived in 86 boats. Under the Rudd government, to this point the highest number of boats to have arrived is this year, which now numbers only 65. The largest number of asylum seekers arriving in Australia in any one year was highest in 2001—under the previous government—when 5,516 asylum seekers arrived in 43 boats. The largest vessel to arrive in Australia under the Howard government had 359 people in it. The Tampa of course had 433 people on it.