Nick McKim (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister representing the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection (Senator Cash) to a question without notice asked by Senator McKim today relating refugees.

Last Friday this government hit another new low in its disgraceful treatment of refugees and people seeking asylum on Manus Island and Nauru. Having cut off drinking water, food, electricity and medicine to the desperate and vulnerable people in its care, the government decided enough was enough. Immigration minister Peter Dutton decided that his prisoners on Manus Island had defied him for long enough. Of course, in a courageous, peaceful protest, under incredible pressure, as they were starving and dehydrated as a result of the Australian government withdrawing the essentials of life, the many hundreds of brave men on Manus Island held out for weeks. Their peaceful resistance, under the most extreme provocations, is one of the most inspirational examples of nonviolent action that the world has ever seen. But, of course, Mr Dutton decided enough was enough and the Papua New Guinean government jumped when he asked them to and drove the starving, dehydrated and defenceless prisoners on Manus Island out of that prison with metal rods.

Make no mistake, Mr Dutton's actions are those of a tin-pot dictator who has no respect for his fellow human beings, let alone the rule of law, the convention against torture or the refugee convention. I've gone on the record recently and described Mr Dutton as a racist, a fascist, a monster and a serial abuser of human rights.