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

I, too, rise to support the amendment moved by my colleague, Senator Brandis, and in doing so will take the opportunity to respond to some of the points made by the minister, and by Senator Hanson-Young.

In responding to the minister's—or parliamentary secretary's—comments in relation to what Senator Brandis had to say, I think the response can be summed up by this: the comments were nothing more and nothing less than from someone who clearly comes from a government that is weak on policy, and someone who is clearly representing a government that has no spine at all when it comes to securing Australia's borders. The speech that was given by the parliamentary secretary in relation to the comments made by Senator Brandis were excuse, after excuse, after excuse, after excuse as to why this government refuses to take steps—not only just steps but steps that have been proven to work under the former Howard government—to ensure the security of Australia's borders.

The parliamentary secretary also said in his comments that Senator Brandis himself had made some outrageous comments. The only thing outrageous about the debate that we are having today is that in not supporting the amendment put forward by the coalition, the government clearly does not have a view on the fact that in excess of 33,600 people have now arrived in Australia by boat under their failed border protection policies. That is the only outrageous thing about this debate! Clearly, the parliamentary secretary does not see as outrageous what Senator Brandis put squarely on the record; that is that we only know of some of those people who have perished, unfortunately, whilst trying to undertake the perilous journey to Australia. We do not know how many have actually died as a result of the loosening of Australia's strong border protection regime.

The parliamentary secretary also said that the government does not support the opposition's amendment, and that the only reason the opposition moved the amendment was to make a political point. Nothing could be further from the truth. The parliamentary secretary will know that these bills were referred to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee and that that committee reported on 12 September 2012. Coalition senators provided a dissenting report and they stated in the dissenting report:

…this legislation may represent a surreptitious attempt to remove the Commonwealth's power to turn back unauthorised boats as part of an effective national border control policy.

The term 'surreptitious' was used because agency witnesses before the committee were unable to state whether this power is preserved in the bill. So for the parliamentary secretary to say that the coalition moved this amendment merely to make a political point, I can only assume that either he or the advisers who are allegedly advising him have not read the legislation properly and do not properly understand the implications of the legislation that is currently being debated. The reason that Senator Brandis, on behalf of the coalition, has moved the amendment that is currently before the Chair is to ensure that this legislation is not read down in a way that brings into question the undoubted power of the Commonwealth to refuse entry into Australian waters or, if necessary, to tow back unauthorised maritime arrivals.

In his second reading speech, Senator Brandis indicated to the chamber that we would be looking for bipartisan support for our amendment. Why would Senator Brandis state that we would be looking to the government to support our amendment? The answer is quite obvious: because turning back the boats was actually Labor Party policy. It was the policy that the former Prime Minister of Australia—now the former Foreign Minister of Australia and merely backbencher, Mr Kevin Rudd—took to the 2007 election. Indeed, on the eve of the 2007 election Mr Rudd told the Australian newspaper:

… Labor would take asylum-seekers who had been rescued from leaky boats to Christmas Island, would turn back seaworthy vessels containing such people on the high seas …

To quote Mr Rudd:

"You'd turn them back," he said …

That was the policy the then Labor opposition, under former opposition leader, Mr Rudd, took to the 2007 election—a policy whereby if they were elected they would turn back the boats. That might give us an indication as to why Senator Brandis said he would expect bipartisan support for this amendment. But perhaps the policy of former Prime Minister, former Foreign Minister and now merely backbencher, Mr Rudd, was not enough to convince those on the other side that they should support this amendment.

Let us put on the table what the current Prime Minister—and, again, I use that term very loosely—Ms Gillard had to say about the policy of turning back the boats when she was the shadow minister for immigration. This is what the current Prime Minister said on 3 December 2002 about turning the boats around:

We think that turning boats around that are seaworthy, that can make the return journey and are in international waters, fits with that.

What the Prime Minister, the then shadow minister for immigration, was referring to was statements that we had made issuing new instructions to Northern Command to commence to turn back the boats when it was safe to do so. Let us look again at what Ms Gillard said:

We think that turning boats around that are seaworthy, that can make the return journey and are in international waters, fits with that.

So the Prime Minister herself supported turning the boats around when she was in opposition; yet we have a parliamentary secretary standing here today, responding to an opposition amendment which would assist both the current Prime Minister and the former Prime Minister to ensure that their former policies are implemented, and stating that the only reason Senator Brandis moved this amendment was to make a political point.

Parliamentary Secretary, with all due respect, I think the only person making a political point here is the parliamentary secretary himself. Like on so many things, members of the Labor Party take one thing to an election and then, when they are elected, do a complete turnaround and implement something else. This is a government that has continually said for a number of years that it 'wants to stop the boats'. However, if one were to do an analysis of statistics to date, two scenarios arise. Labor either does not mean what it says—which I put some credence on, given that it is the party that said there 'would be no carbon tax under a government that I lead' only, once it was elected to power, to completely change its mind on that issue—or, alternatively, it is incapable of doing it. I am not quite sure what is worse.

Is the Labor government totally incapable of securing our borders or has it yet again completely misled the Australian people? Why do I say that? Let us look at the statistics. The total number of arrivals since November 2007, when Mr Rudd was elected to government, is now 33,600 people. The total number of boats to arrive since November 2007 is 576. The total number of arrivals since polling day on 21 August 2010, bearing in mind that Ms Gillard was the leader of the Labor Party at that election—and one of the reasons Ms Gillard was the leader of the Labor Party was that former Prime Minister, Mr Rudd, had failed to stop the boats and Ms Gillard was going to stop the boats—is 423 boats carrying 26,251 people.

I am sure that, in his response, the parliamentary secretary may well tell the chamber that turning back the boats does not work and that is why the government will not support the opposition's amendment. Again, let us look at the facts, the actual statistics in relation to turning back the boats when implemented with temporary protection visas and offshore processing. As Senator Brandis pointed out to the chamber, we admit that in the early 2000s there was an influx of boats to Australia. Unlike the current government, the opposition does not shy away from that. We say, 'Yes, there was a problem.' It is as simple as that. It is not nearly as bad as the problem that the current government is facing. In fact, the total number of boat arrivals under the Howard government pales into insignificance compared to the total number of arrivals under this government. But we openly admit that in 2000 to 2001 approximately 54 boats with 4,137 people arrived. The difference between us and the Labor Party, however, is this: we took strong and decisive steps to implement policies that would secure Australia's borders, that would show those coming here illegally that Australia as a sovereign nation would dictate who comes to this country and the manner in which they come. Guess what? Our policies worked.

The statistics back that up as a fact. After the implementation in 2001-02 of the former Howard government's strong border protection policies, in 2002-03 the number of boat arrivals dropped to zero, with the number of people arriving in Australia being reduced to zero. One boat arrived the following year with 82 people on it. Zero boats arrived in the following year with zero people. This government says that it wants to stop the boats. If it truly means that, we expect the government to take the opportunity to support the coalition's amendment when it is finally put, because this amendment has been proven to assist in stopping the boats.