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

Well, have a listen to this utter disgrace of a debate, these utterly disgraceful speaking points from both sides of this chamber. Let's all take a deep breath and understand what happened a couple of weeks ago. A very small number—40 people; a tiny number—of vulnerable and desperate people arrived in Australia by boat without visas in order to ask us for protection and to ask us for our assistance. And instead of our response and the ensuing national debate being about how we could actually help them, what we could do to support them—a debate that would have been in line with Australian values like generosity, compassion and decency—we have had the debate framed exclusively around this so-called massive threat to our borders and to our national security.

Those folks are not a threat to our borders and they are not a threat to our national security. The reason the debate is framed in that way is because it suits the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Dutton. He is a political vampire who feeds on people's suffering. It's what gets him out of bed in the morning and what leads him to believe he can win the next election, if he weaponises enough migrants and enough people seeking asylum in this country.

Then, of course, the compliant media—led by News Corp but by no means exclusively News Corp—jump in, credulously report Mr Dutton's frame and suddenly you have the Labor Party trying to outdo Mr Dutton on border security. This is how we destroyed thousands of lives in offshore detention. This is how we exiled thousands of people to Manus Island and Nauru, where they were murdered, where they were raped, where their children were subjected to sexual abuse and where they were attacked by the armed forces of Papua New Guinea.

This is the race to the bottom that weaponises people seeking asylum and destroys thousands of lives. The media's complicit. The Labor Party's complicit. And it's driven by the Liberal Party, because it is their political aim to get these outcomes, not because anyone is prepared to actually take a decent step and help support vulnerable people who seek our protection.