Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Immigration) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Deputy President. If we were to put the question to Minister Shorten, one can only imagine what his answer would be. It would be a resounding, ‘Yes, Ms Gillard, the current Prime Minister from the Australian Labor Party, is finished.’

Let us now look at the question in the context of today’s matter of public importance debate on securing Australia’s borders. Again, without a doubt, the answer to the question has to be a resounding yes because, when it comes to protecting Australia’s borders, Gillard Labor, just like Rudd Labor, has failed the Australian people. This government has shown that in the few short months since it was elected it has absolutely no agenda whatsoever when it comes to protecting Australia’s borders. This is a government that has clearly demonstrated to the Australian people that when it comes to irregular maritime arrivals it lurches from one problem to the next. This is a government that, just like the former Rudd Labor government, has no solution to the mess it created when it chose to roll back, in August 2008, the Howard government’s proven strong border protection policies.

Based on Prime Minister Gillard’s performance to date, the Australian people may well be entitled to ask: ‘Why did the Labor Party axe—or politically execute—former Prime Minister Rudd when Ms Gillard’s policies are worse than the former Labor government’s policies?’ The former Labor government was an absolute disaster when it came to border protection. Now, under Prime Minister Gillard, Australia’s border protection policy is in complete, total and utter tatters. To those on the other side who say, ‘No, no, no, it’s not in tatters; that is the coalition’s scaremongering on the issue of border protection,’ I say let us look at the facts. Let us look at the statistics in relation to irregular maritime arrivals, because the arrival of the latest boat, with 42 people on board, means that more than 9,013 people have arrived unlawfully by boat since the Labor Party changed the coalition’s strong border protection policies. This year alone, more than 5,978 people have arrived unlawfully in Australia. That is a border protection policy that is in absolute tatters.

What is even more interesting is that even the Labor Party did not actually believe that the numbers would be that high. We know this because in the May 2010 budget the government allocated $327.5 million for offshore asylum-seeker management—and here is the crunch—based on an estimated 2,000 irregular maritime arrivals for the 2010-11 financial year. That was an underestimation by any stretch of the word.

Mr Deputy President, do you know how many people have actually arrived in the four short months since this new financial year commenced? It is 2,320. And we know that the numbers will continue to rise. Did the Labor Party reflect that in the MYEFO? No. They are absolutely kidding themselves if they think that their budget forecast of 2,000 irregular maritime arrivals for the 2010-11 period is in any way reflective of the number of irregular maritime arrivals who are actually going to come here.

At the end of the day, it is the Australian people who will suffer because of Labor’s failed border protection policies. It is the mums, it is the dads, it is the taxpayers in Australia that are now going to have to brace themselves for a massive budget blow-out under this Labor government. That is because Labor’s costings do not reflect the true indication of the potential costs because of their immigration failures.

Australian taxpayers should be bracing themselves for a budget blow-out that could potentially be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Despite their continued rhetoric—and we heard it in question time today: ‘We will be bringing the budget back into surplus’—that is an absolute fantasy. Based on just the potential budget blow-out from their immigration failures alone, there is no way that the Gillard Labor government can bring this budget back into surplus in the time frame that is referred to. What is so sad for the Australian people is that moneys that could have been spent by this government on building new hospitals, building new roads, on employing more doctors in rural areas, supporting our troops currently on missions overseas and helping Australian pensioners, will all need to be diverted to pay for the Labor government’s failures when it comes to border protection.

None of these failures need to have occurred. Why? The coalition have proved that it is possible to stop people-smuggling, that it is possible to stop the boats. We did this when we were in government. But this is the prerequisite: as a government you need to have the stomach to make some very, very tough policy decisions and then you need to have the guts to stand by those decisions. And that it is something the Labor government is completely unable to do.

It just gets worse and worse for the Labor government. Recently we have had the decision of the High Court which has absolutely slammed Labor’s processing system and has sunk any remaining credibility whatsoever in relation to Labor’s policies for processing unlawful maritime arrivals. The decision will no doubt open a door and the Australian people will now see a flood of appeals by failed asylum seekers. None of this was budgeted for in the 2010-11 costings. Yet again, this is another catastrophic example of Labor’s complete and utter failure to control Australia’s borders.

Again, the High Court decision need not have happened. Why? The government could have, and should have, considered the coalition’s Nauru option. Unlike the government’s offshore processing regime which is now in complete tatters, the coalition’s offshore processing regime on Nauru remains intact despite the High Court’s decision. The Labor government needs to swallow its pride and pick up the telephone and speak to the President of Nauru and discuss reopening the detention centre there. The coalition can only say it so many times. But the Labor government will not do that. And do you know why, Mr Acting Deputy President? Because the current Labor government—just like the former Labor government—do not have the stomach, they do not have the guts, to take the tough decisions when it comes to protecting Australia’s borders. Only the coalition is prepared to take strong action, tough decisions, implement strong and tough policies and then stand by those policies to ensure that we stop people-smuggling.

If you do not stop people-smuggling you do not stop people’s lives being put at risk. Those on the other side just do not seem to understand this. The coalition wants to stop people-smuggling. The coalition wants to stop people putting their lives at risk. To do that you need to implement tough policy. If Labor are serious about cleaning up the mess that they have created, they will restore the coalition’s tough immigration and border protection policy regime and stop the boats.