Don Farrell (SA, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Sustainability and Urban Water) Share this | Hansard source

It did not stop the boats, because we are still getting these boats now. This problem did not go away with what John Howard did. He sought to use the tragic circumstances of the 438 Afghan asylum seekers on the Tampa for his own political purposes. It was not about border protection; it was about getting him re-elected in that 2001 election.

What is tragic, quite frankly, is the fact that the opposition would use today of all days to raise this issue in the parliament. Overnight, we have read about the very tragic circumstances off the Javanese coast in which a number of apparent asylum seekers seeking to come to Australia lost their lives. It is a tragedy that the opposition, just as they did under John Howard at the time of the Tampa, are seeking to use this issue to score what are nothing other than cheap political points. It is distressing to the people of Australia and to this parliament that instead of focusing on policies that might solve the present difficulties off the coast of the Indonesia they have decided to use this opportunity to score these cheap political points. And we have seen that time and time again.

The reality is that the opposition has no effective policy on border protection and so they seek to criticise our policy, a policy that will clearly act as a deterrent, that will be effective and that will solve the problem that we find ourselves facing. It would seem that the only time that the opposition supports offshore processing is when it is done their way, the Nauru solution.

Senator Bushby interjecting—

What do we know, Senator Bushby, about the Nauru solution? What are the experts telling us about the Nauru solution? Senator Bob Brown's motion amending NOM 507

Senator Bushby interjecting—

You will have your opportunity, Senator Bushby, to speak on this subject in due course, if you are on the list. What we are being told about the Nauru solution is that it is both costly and ineffective. We want effective border protection solutions. What we know about the Nauru solution is that it is costly and ineffective. To resurrect that Nauru solution would not be cheap. We are looking at over $1 billion in operational costs alone. And that does not include all of the inevitable spending on infrastructure that would be required to resurrect the Nauru solution. The opposition have been told about the Nauru solution. They have been told in very clear terms that Nauru is not a silver bullet solution. More importantly, it will not break the model of the people smugglers and their dreadful trade. Just as we know it will not work, the opposition knows that it will not work and will be expensive. The government has the solution, the Malaysia solution. The Nauru solution is the wrong one. We are talking about it costing more than $1 billion to resurrect the Nauru solution.