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

I move:

That the Senate take note of the response by the Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (Senator Watt) to a question asked by Senator McKim, and the response by the Minister for Finance (Senator Gallagher) to a question asked by Senator Waters.

Here we are again today, talking about rushed, slipshod, xenophobic legislation introduced to fix last week's rushed, slipshod, xenophobic legislation. The Labor Party has clearly learned nothing from last week. Last week they handed over the keys to the bus to Mr Dutton, they handed over the rego papers of the bus to Mr Dutton and they handed over the steering wheel and all of the controls of the bus to Mr Dutton. The Labor Party let Mr Dutton confect a national emergency and put pressure on them, and then we watched the Labor Party engage in a craven surrender and trample refugee rights with hasty and xenophobic legislation. Here we go again. The same thing is going to happen this week.

Today proves beyond doubt that Mr Dutton continues to exert undue influence over refugee legislation, and immigration policy more broadly, from the opposition benches. The Labor Party never learns that when you try to appease people like Mr Dutton they will take everything you have to offer, then take another giant step to the right and go again, and he is going again this week. The Labor Party might as well just make Peter Dutton the minister for home affairs again and be done with it, because that is the level of influence he is exerting over the Labor Party which have now, of course, adopted the Liberals' policy on refugees, stateless people and trampling human rights.

The Labor Party talks a lot about making our communities safe, but in fact, the Labor Party's response to the High Court decision has been far more about making the Labor Party safe from Mr Dutton than it has been about making our communities safe. It's time that we in this parliament worked together to uphold human rights and refugee rights, not trample them.