John Hogg (President) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from Senator Parry proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion, namely:

The continued failure of the Rudd Government’s border protection policy.

I call upon those senators who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

I understand that informal arrangements have been made to allocate specific times to each of the speakers in today’s debate. With the concurrence of the Senate, I shall ask the clerks to set the clock accordingly.

Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Immigration and Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader in the Senate) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on this matter of public importance and have to say I just cannot believe the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship’s responses again in question time today and how he persists in this assertion that really there was no deal. Everybody in Australia knows that there was a deal, but he and the Prime Minister still persist in saying black is white and in trying to spin this as much as they can. I would like to pick up on a number of points that were made in the House. The Prime Minister, in this whole sad and sorry episode in relation to what has now become the shambles of our border protection and the breakdown of immigration policy, has not been honest and upfront with the parliament and the Australian people. With the ineptitude that we have seen in the Prime Minister’s handling of the relationship with Indonesia, it is not surprising to see that the President of Indonesia’s visit to Australia was cancelled. We have seen our Prime Minister hide behind spin, weasel words and his description of what is clearly a special deal as ‘non-extraordinary’. For a prime minister who craves control to now tell us that he knew nothing about this and nothing about the terms of the deal absolutely beggars belief.

The Prime Minister and the minister rail against comments in the Australian that are supposedly critical of them—and of course the Prime Minister dismisses the Australianbut I would like to point to the now growing tide of media commentary on this matter. Dennis Shanahan in the Australian on 18 November said that the Sri Lankans ‘will disembark because they have wrung a special deal from the Rudd government’. Greg Sheridan, again in the Australian on the same day, said:

For some bizarre reason Rudd keeps saying the people on the Oceanic Viking have not got a special deal. This simply defies the ordinary meaning of language and common sense.

Paul Kelly, again on the same day, said:

He seems to think almost any line can be spun and will be believed, even when it is nonsense.

Of course, the Prime Minister has this fondness for railing against the Australian as a so-called ‘right-wing’ newspaper, so let us look at other commentary. Tony Wright in the Ageand I would hardly call the Age ‘right wing’—said:

There was no special deal for the Sri Lankans, Rudd insisted.

Which, presumably, is why the last of them were content to leave the ship yesterday after refusing to budge for more than a month.

Annabel Crabb in the Sydney Morning Herald on 18 November said:

Against this crowded palette of lunacy, it’s almost possible to overlook lesser offences against human intelligence—such as the Prime Minister’s insistence that the Sri Lankan passengers disembarking the Oceanic Viking have not received any sort of special deal.

Annabel Crabb, again, said on 19 November:

A Denialist so shameless that he can stare barefacedly back at electors and his parliamentary opponents and deny, again and again and again, that a bunch of Sri Lankans currently being processed in record-fast time in Indonesia are not in receipt of any “special deal”.

In the Prime Minister’s own state, Dennis Atkins on 19 November in the Courier-Mail stated:

THE consensus view that the Rudd Government provided a special deal for the 86 asylum seekers on the Oceanic Viking is now stronger than the much-trumpeted world scientific agreement on the causes behind climate change.

Michael Gordon on 18 November in the Age said:

The truth is that the group was offered a special deal to leave the boat …

Of course, my favourite is the ABC. I do not normally rely on the ABC and I think senators know my record as far as the ABC goes but, goodness me, Prime Minister and Minister Evans, even the ABC’s Barrie Cassidy has said, ‘Just to say there is no special deal is silly.’

Even the Financial Review on 19 November said:

Mr Rudd’s refusal to give a straight answer to opposition questions on the asylum issue follows a consistent and unattractive pattern of behaviour.

The Prime Minister is in denial. Despite everything that has been said to us by the International Office of Migration, the Indonesian ambassador, the Sri Lankan ambassador, the New Zealand Minister of Immigration and even the Australian Federal Police, this Prime Minister still persists in denying that the changes to immigration and border protection frameworks in this country have resulted in pull factors which have now resulted in the arrivals that we have seen.

My question to Minister Evans today was about the current conditions on Christmas Island. At estimates it was made very clear to us that people would be moved from Christmas Island—in fact it is probably best if I quote Mr Metcalfe directly. He said:

I think the minister has made clear that, in the hypothetical, were a person brought to Australia before a protection visa had been granted to them, it would be at the end of the processing, where they were clearly on the pathway to a protection visa …

The point that I was asking the minister about was whether what we are actually seeing on Christmas Island at the moment is because of the sheer numbers of people and the conditions on the island. The difficulties that we are now seeing—on Saturday night we had a riot involving 150 men on the island—are symptomatic of a greater problem on the island. That is, in this perceived situation—no, not even perceived—we are seeing the reality that some asylum seekers are being treated more favourably than others and this is naturally creating more tension.

What we are seeing now with the situation on Christmas Island is that we are pushing them through a lot more quickly. The minister has assured us—at estimates we had assurances—that, no, security and other checks would be dealt with to the same standard. I am not sure that that is the case, because the minister today refused to even countenance that this fast-tracking system could result in standards not being met to the levels that we expect. The reality of the situation—what we will see—is that people are going to be fast-tracked through the system. This is now going to become the norm. People will simply land and, instead of waiting on Christmas Island until towards the end of the processing, they are going to be taken off Christmas Island very quickly and onto the mainland, which will have its own consequences.

The government says, ‘Yes, but we are only talking about a number of boats.’ There have been 54 boats since the government changed its border protection policies—and over 2½ thousand arrivals is not an insubstantial number—but what does that do for the broader picture of our immigration policy. What sort of message does that send out? Of course it sends the message not just for people smugglers who bring people out here on boats, but for people smugglers who are now in the rackets in relation to bringing people here by air. Today we see this article in the Australian, titled, ‘Refugees pay $40,000 to come by plane’. The article reads:

ASYLUM-seekers are arriving in Australia by air in numbers that dwarf boat arrivals, after paying people-smugglers up to $US40,000, for a package that includes airfares, false passports and forged Australian visas.

Do you know why that is happening? It is because we have laid out the welcome mat. We have laid out the red carpet. We have said in big bold letters, ‘We have softened our borders; we have softened our immigration policy.’ Therefore, it is open slather. When you dismantle the intricate framework that had become our immigration framework which was fair but firm under the previous Howard government through a whole series of changes—and the minister comes in here day after day but he does not tell the Australian public about all the changes that have been effected throughout his department, he does not tell us about the changes that have been made across 26 programs in his department, he does not tell us about messages that have been sent through the changes and the dismantling of the detention debt system, he does not tell us about the effect of the changes of the 45-day rule which means now that people will come here on visas—lo and behold, at a particular point in time they will turn around and say, ‘I’m going to claim asylum’ and then go through the whole process. Having worked in the past and done my fair share of immigration law I have watched these cases go on for years and years, clogging up our legal system, and that is what this means. This is the deception that the Labor government is perpetrating out there in not being upfront with the Australian public about the effects the dismantling of their immigration framework will actually have on the ground.

Recently, we had reports in the press about how well informed people are in places like Sri Lanka and Afghanistan about Australia’s immigration framework. Of course they are. They probably monitor it quite closely. The more we dismantle our system, the easier we make it and the more it is going to be a much faster system and a broader legal framework to enable people to take advantage of the situation and come in. Immigration has to be about order and process. We are a country of migrants. I am the daughter of migrants to this country. But millions of migrants came to this country and they came in through the front door. They came in in an orderly and organised manner.

This debate is about order and process. It is about the breakdown of order and process. It is about people. We have a system where we have a specific number that come in during a given year. Under our humanitarian program we are very generous. But every person that jumps the queue—people who have held our government to ransom in relation to what happened on the Oceanic Vikingwill be given preferential treatment. They are being given preferential treatment.

Today we see another example of how this is a special deal: the fact that we have specialists who have been flown in to help people specifically on this. I will not go through how I have asked for a series of documents to be produced. I would really like to see if the government is actually going to produce all the documents that I have asked it to produce, because I think those documents are going to show the extent to which this government has misled the Australian public in relation to the deal that it has done and, more importantly, the extent to which the Prime Minister knew about the deal and has, through his weasel words and his hiding behind quaint language, tried to evade answering the question. Of course, Minister Evans in this chamber has done likewise. He gets upset because I ask him the same questions. Of course he gets upset, because he does not answer the questions, so I will keep asking him, because the reality is that he is not being upfront with the Australian public and he is not being upfront with the Senate, and I am going to pursue that issue until I do get straight answers.

But, of course, in the end the reality is, as I said before, what we have heard from the AFP, from the Indonesian ambassador, from the UNHCR, from the asylum seekers themselves and from the Sri Lankan Ambassador to the United Nations. That is that it is the pull factors that have resulted not only in what is now a growing number—we have had 54 boats and over 2½ thousand people since the government dismantled its border protection framework—but in the fact that we are now seeing that increasingly we are going to get people coming in by plane and paying people smugglers for similar packages—the difference being that it is now US$15,000 by boat and US$40,000 by plane. So, if you can pay that, you will jump the queue.

Mark Bishop (WA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It has really been a remarkable feature of this opposition for the last two years that they have failed to develop and release any effective policies relating to topical discussions that have gone on for months and months and months in this place. You only have to look at the series of debates we have been having since November 2007 in the area of telecommunications and broadband, welfare and pension reform, defence funding and reform, electoral reform, industry policy changes and the CPRS—the list is virtually endless. In each of those major issues of debate from time to time, the government had a well-considered, well-thought-out, well-expressed policy arguing for change and reform, and in each of those issues the opposition, through its spokesperson at the time, had no position other than to nitpick, carp, oppose and eventually have no resolution.

As we have had two years of government, the government has got on with the implementation of its platform relating to significant pension reform, maintenance of employment at record levels, huge new capacities in schools, a fair go in the workplace and major progress in implementation of broadband reform—all done, it must be said, in the midst of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s. So let us address this MPI debate—this matter of public importance—in the context that I have just outlined.

In my contribution I want to discuss a number of key features that now are right to the front in this area of asylum seekers, border protection and border control: firstly, as is always important, the historical context; secondly, the factors driving the irregular movement of people down into the sea areas bordering the continent of Australia; thirdly, the key features of the Australian border protection plan which has been put into place over the last two years by Senator Evans on behalf of the current government; and, fourthly and fifthly, the health, security and identity checking for irregular maritime arrivals and the settlement services for holders of refugee and humanitarian visas.

Each of those topics was mentioned in passing but without any serious discussion by Senator Fierravanti-Wells. As her contribution to the discussion came to a conclusion, she said, ‘What is this debate about?’ She said it was about order and process. I would suggest that the debate about asylum seekers and people seeking to come to this country is really about four things, not just about order, process and whether the form has been filled out correctly. It is about an effective border control system, it is about a sound immigration system, it is about fairness to asylum seekers and it is about unrelenting opposition to people smugglers who cause all of these horrible circumstances to occur.

In terms of historical context, if one looks back over the last 30 years, there have been four or five major shifts in illegal immigration, in whatever form, down into this country. From 1976 to 1981 there were about 2,059 illegal boat arrivals under the then Fraser government. What was the cause of that surge? It was simply a result of the Indochinese refugee crisis, a massive outflow of refugees arising from the fall of the South Vietnamese government. From 1989 to 1993, when we were in government, there were 735 boat arrivals. What was the source then? The source then was mainly Cambodians fleeing conflict between the government of Cambodia at that stage and the insurgent forces under the Khmer Rouge.

During the period 1984 to 1998—including the last days of the Keating government and the first couple of years of the Howard government—there were almost 2,400 illegal boat arrivals. What was the cause of that? The people involved were mainly Sino-Vietnamese and Chinese seeking relief from economic hardship in the border areas of their own countries. The major increase in numbers occurred during the middle years of the Howard government, from 1999 to 2001, when there were 12,000 boat arrivals, including over 5,000 in 2000 alone. What was the reason for that temporary upsurge in boat arrivals of illegal immigrants coming into this country? Again, it was for a particular reason: mainly Afghans and Iraqis fleeing the brutal regimes in their homeland—the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein in Iraq. More recently the fifth major shift of boat people coming to this country has been as a result of the current stage of the Afghan civil war and the final stage and aftermath of the Sri Lankan conflict. Each of the periods of increases in the number of boat people seeking comfort in this country can be characterised into one-, two- or three-year periods arising from the breakdown of civil law and order in the homeland of a particular group of individuals. The factors that drove those people are clear: civil war, breakdown and economic dislocation, forcing them to flee and seek refuge in this country.

Senator Fierravanti-Wells tried to manufacture an argument that there were pull factors, not push factors, involved in people coming to this country. One has to make the obvious point that in the last two years, since the current government came to power, there has been a huge increase in recurrent funding for all of the organs of the state involved in border protection. In the order of $700 million in additional funding has been provided to police the sea lanes to the north and west of this continent. We have maintained the Christmas Island facility, we have regularly increased the number and timing of sea and air patrols, and, most importantly—as is never acknowledged but is understood by all who participate in this debate—we have maintained mandatory detention facilities around this country. Finally, via negotiations at an international level, we have tried to get agreement with nearby countries that they will not be used as a conduit to pass people from South Asia down through Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia into Australia. In terms of international factors, the pull factors that Senator Fierravanti-Wells referred to have to be understood in the context that 95 per cent of the policies of the previous government, in particular mandatory detention facilities, have been maintained.

If pull factors—the change in legislation, the change in government, having a new minister with responsibility for implementation of border protection measures in this country—are not responsible and cannot be responsible for the temporary increase in the number of people in boats coming to this country, one asks the question: ‘What is driving the increase that has occurred?’ We know what it is. It is the breakdown in law and order. It is the breakdown in civil responsibility arising out of the civil war in Afghanistan and the aftermath of the civil war in Sri Lanka, forcing people to come east and to come south. But what are the other push factors that have been involved?

As I said earlier, from 1991 to 2001, under the Howard government, Australia saw over 12,000 unauthorised boat arrivals. The government at the time did not claim that it was pull factors that were causing that movement, and indeed it was not. What was driving people in 1999 through to 2001 was a breakdown in civil administration in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Indeed, that has been well noted by all those who have participated in the debate. So what happened to the number of boat arrivals to Australia after 2000? They declined dramatically. The UN Secretary-General noted in a recent report to the Security Council that 2008 ended as the most violent year in Afghanistan since 2001. The increase in arrivals in more recent times, 2008-09, is due—unsurprisingly, it must be said—to the irregular movement of Afghan asylum seekers as a result of the ongoing warfare in that country. In 2008 there was an 85 per cent increase in the number of Afghani asylum seekers claiming protection in industrialised countries around the world. Australia is not immune from this global trend and is also seeing an increase in asylum seekers from Afghanistan.

The other country which is topical at the moment, Sri Lanka, is emerging from the aftermath of a long-running civil war—in the order of over 30 years—which has been brought to a conclusion in the last four or five months. Again, violence increased significantly in that country in 2008 and climaxed in the final stages of the war earlier this year. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimated that the number of people displaced in the final stages of the fighting exceeded 100,000. Indeed, it was said in answer to questions today in question time that the immediate demand for replacement of destroyed homes in the northern and eastern parts of Sri Lanka is in the order of 100,000 new units needing to be developed. So the increase in people seeking comfort in this country arises not from the pull factors identified by Senator Fierravanti-Wells in her contribution but from the breakdown in law and order, and the breakdown in civil administration due to the ongoing civil war in Afghanistan and the aftermath of the civil war in Sri Lanka.

In that context, it has to be said that the changes brought to bear by the current government in the last two years has resulted in Australia having one of the toughest and most sophisticated border security regimes in the world. We have a system of extensive air and sea patrols. We have excision and offshore processing. We have mandatory detention of unauthorised boat arrivals and unlawful non-citizens who pose a risk to the Australian community. The Rudd government has reinvigorated Australia’s engagement with regional neighbours to detect and prevent what can only be described as the insidious trade of people-smuggling. As I said earlier, we have committed $654 million to substantially increase aerial and maritime surveillance and detection operations in this region. That ongoing commitment to sustained border protection means that we have an immigration detention system that protects the Australian community and treats people humanely.

On that platform we were committed to reform and we were elected to implement a more humane detention policy. In the middle of last year the government announced seven key immigration detention values which have been the key principles given effect in the discussion that has occurred in this place over the last three or four months. The first of those seven detention values is that mandatory detention is an essential component of strong border control. The second is that to support the integrity of Australia’s immigration program, three groups will be and are subject to mandatory detention: firstly, all unauthorised arrivals for management of health, identity and security risks to the community; secondly, unlawful non-citizens who present unacceptable risks to the community; and finally, unlawful non-citizens who have repeatedly refused to comply with their particular visa conditions. The third of the detention values is that children, including juvenile foreign fishers and where possible their families will not be detained in an immigration detention centre—and that is a thing this government has set about and it is a key factor that this government is very proud of. (Time expired)

Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Since the first boat arrived under Labor’s watch in August 2008, day after day, week after week, month after month the Australian people have had to sit by and watch our strong border security regime unravel before their very eyes. Do they get any answers from the Rudd government as to why this is occurring? Do they get any answers from the Rudd government as to why we see boats being intercepted in Australian waters on almost a daily basis? Does the government stand up, take responsibility and tell the people of Australia how it is going to stop the boats from arriving? No, it does not. In this chamber we are subjected to, question time after question time, the minister indulging in his little game of the politics of avoidance. He avoids answering any question that the coalition puts to him about Labor’s failed border protection regime. What about the Prime Minister? Does he tell the people of Australia what he is going to do to stop the boats from arriving? Again, the answer is quite simply no. Malcolm Turnbull so correctly said:

All we get from the Prime Minister is a daily diet of weasel words, obfuscation and blame shifting. We have seen a Prime Minister, in an abject abdication of leadership, washing his hands of the responsibility for his own colossal policy failures.

When it gets too tough, what does the Prime Minister do? In good old Kevin Rudd style he reverts to Ruddspeak, speaking in verbal knots as he tries to slip and slide away from the answers to the questions—it is not that he cannot answer them—that he does not want to answer. Remember, this is the Prime Minister of Australia who, in response to questions about Australia’s strained relationship with Indonesia, said:

My dealings with President Yudhoyono ... are in first-class working order right across the spread of the bilateral relationship.

We all know what that means—that is nothing more and nothing less than Ruddspeak for: ‘I have stuffed up the relationship with Indonesia, but I don’t want the people of Australia to find out’. Mr Rudd is playing a very dangerous game with the people of Australia. He is failing to discharge his first responsibility as the Prime Minister of this country: to keep our nation secure. Mr Rudd knows this because he has put it on the Hansard record. He knows that this is the No. 1 fundamental responsibility of a government, but instead of taking that responsibility, instead of discharging his No. 1 fundamental responsibility, what does he do? Mr Rudd decides to play the game of politics of appeasement. He plays the politics of appeasement between the left and the right factions of his own party.

Mr Rudd’s policies are not being formulated in the national interest. His policies are all about appeasing the right and left factions of the Labor Party at the expense of the Australian people. Nowhere is the politics of appeasement more obvious than in Mr Rudd’s failure on border security. He deliberately adopts hardline language to appease the Labor Right when he uses the term ‘illegal immigrants’ to describe suspected asylum seekers. Then you have a complete contradiction from him: you have the decision to grant asylum to refugees from a boat that exploded near Ashmore Reef in April ahead of a coronial inquiry that will investigate whether or not the fire was deliberately lit. This can only be a move to appease the left of the Labor Party and to make the left-leaning minister happy.

We all know that the left wing of the Labor Party thinks that Mr Rudd’s stance on border protection is way too hard. And we all know that the right wing of the Labor Party thinks that he is being too soft. Therein lies the dilemma for our great Prime Minister, Mr Rudd. Who does he appease—the Labor Left or the Labor Right? We all know what a true leader would do. A true leader would put aside factional differences and govern in the interests of the nation. But Mr Rudd is not a true leader. He is self-indulgent. He continues to make policies to appease his own people at the expense of the Australian public.

The facts continue to speak for themselves. We have had—but wait, there’s more!—another boat arrive. We are now up to 54 boats and approaching 2,500 people since August 2008 when the Rudd Labor government began winding back Australia’s strong border protection regime. Worse than that, under Rudd Labor it is the asylum seekers who are now deciding who comes to this country and on what terms. This is despite the Prime Minister and the minister continuing to tell the people of Australia that they do not do special deals with asylum seekers. Let me tell you this: yes, they do.

Mr Haase, the member for Kalgoorlie, raised in the other place the case of Mr and Mrs Kemp, who came here from South Africa. They were granted working visas and they applied for permanent residency. But the problem for Mr and Mrs Kemp is that, because the Department of Immigration and Citizenship is in a state of disarray, they have actually missed some important time frames. They are now looking at having to leave this country because the immigration department’s resources have been diverted to looking after those who are getting special deals. They tried contacting the immigration department, but guess what? The department were too busy to actually speak with them. Yet we had a special deal offered to the Sri Lankan asylum seekers which said:

You could have assistance with your refugee applications.

Yes. A highly professional team of Australian officers will be working with you every day to assist you in the process.

What do you say to Mr and Mrs Kemp, who came here and did the right thing? Do you say, ‘Too bad. We don’t have a place for you because we are listening to what the people smugglers are saying’? The Prime Minister of this country needs to be upfront with the Australian people about the impact of his decisions on Australia. He deserves to be condemned.

Carol Brown (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A great deal of Senator Cash’s contribution was based on some apparent divide within the Labor Party. That is coming from the coalition on a day like today. Where are they at the moment? It could be a marathon running of their party room. I just want to remind Senator Cash what was said by coalition members when the coalition changed their policy on reintroducing TPVs—temporary protection visas. We know there were a number of coalition members who spoke out against that policy. There was the member for Kooyong, the member for McMillan, the member for Pearce and Senator Troeth—all coalition members. I understand that the Liberal party room was not even consulted on the policy. Senator Troeth was quoted in the Age newspaper as saying:

I’m sad and disappointed at the change of coalition policy.

She said it was sad and disappointing but not surprising. The reason why, I suspect, Senator Troeth does not find it surprising is because she has seen it all before. It is about the fear factor. It is about trying to demonise a group of people. We know that is the opposition’s policy. They have indicated that. They have sent out their emails to their caucus members saying that this is what they are going to do. They do not want to talk about policy. They are not interested in that. They are interested, on this issue, in demonising certain people.

We are back in this place and we have begun this week again as we began last week. It would have been good to get something fresh from those opposite but, no; those opposite have come into this place with the same old tired lines that we have heard over and over again. It is nothing more than the opposition using scare tactics and political scaremongering to create trouble on this very complex issue. We heard it over and over again all last week and we will probably continue to hear it until they decide that it is an issue that is not working for them. Unfortunately on such an important and complex issue they have gone for cheap political point scoring.

We have also heard this today from my colleague the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Senator Evans. He has provided those opposite with clear and concise answers on this extremely complex issue. It seems to me that, when those opposite do not get the answer they want to help them spin their political line, they then resort to the low road in an attempt to score those cheap political points. My Senate colleague Senator Bishop in his contribution here today talked about four issues that we are dealing with. I will highlight them again because it is very important to understand where the government are coming from. They were: (1) effective border controls; (2) sound immigration policy; (3) fairness to asylum seekers; and (4) an unrelenting opposition to people smugglers.

Senator Bishop was quite right in his contribution when he clearly articulated the government’s position. He clearly refuted the attacks by the opposition. Their attacks are all based on fear and scare tactics. So once again we are debating another MPI on this issue. We are not here debating something constructive; we are here of course for the opposition to try to create more mischief. Once again the motion that we are debating here today is another example of the opposition attempting to gain some political points. While those opposite will wallow in this attempt to sling mud, we on this side of the chamber are committed to enforcing tough border security programs.

First of all, let us get right to the crux of the issue regarding the Oceanic Viking. Right from the start let us be clear, as has been reiterated time and time again not only by the Prime Minister and the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship but also by many other government ministers, that there is no special deal for the asylum seekers on the Oceanic Viking. Contrary to what opposition senators like to think, and despite what those opposite might like to continue to spin to the public to gain political points, there is no special deal. Let me just recap the situation to clear it up again. The Australian government responded to a distress call on the high seas. This was a rescue situation. Did those opposite not want us to respond to this situation? Did they want us to ignore the calls for help? I certainly hope not. Then, under international law, the asylum seekers were transported to Indonesia. It was made clear to the asylum seekers that they would be disembarking there, and not in Australia as they wanted. That is what subsequently has occurred. No special deal has taken place. The asylum seekers have disembarked in Indonesia, as was the agreement with the Indonesian government.

Those persons disembarking the Oceanic Viking will now be assessed by the UNHCR and those persons found to be refugees will be referred by the UNHCR to countries for resettlement. This is directly in line with the normal processes which take place, so I am not sure where those opposite are getting this idea that a special deal has been done. Whilst those opposite continue to try and score cheap political points out of this complex situation, the Rudd Labor government remains vigilant about protecting our borders. A significant number of international push factors, as highlighted by Minister Evans this week and last week—and this was also highlighted by Senator Bishop in his contribution—are playing a major role in driving up the number of asylum seekers. As those opposite would be aware, international push factors have occurred in the past and they are currently occurring right now. So it is now more important than ever that we maintain appropriate actions to protect our borders.

As I have stated, governments in the past have also had to deal with push factors; and senators on the other side of the chamber would be well aware of this, because, after all, between 1999 and 2001, on the watch of the Howard government, we saw 12,000 asylum seeker arrivals. And of course back then the Liberal Party certainly did not claim that pull factors were the cause of the movement of so many unauthorised boat arrivals. How could they? It was aspects such as the brutal regimes of the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam Hussein in Iraq which were causing people to flee their own countries and seek asylum in other countries around the world. After the fall of the Taliban regime at the end of 2001, 2002 resulted in a large-scale voluntary return program of many Afghan people who were residing in Pakistan and Iran. Then, in 2003, Iraq was invaded and the regime of Saddam Hussein was brought to an end, and, not surprisingly, we saw a dramatic decline of boat arrivals in Australia. And so, push factors, such as the ones which saw an increase in boat arrivals between 1999 and 2001, are starting to become prominent once again and have caused an influx of asylum seekers entering our waters.

In fact the UN Secretary-General highlighted these factors in a recent report to the UN Security Council where he stated, ‘2008 ended as the most violent year in Afghanistan since 2001.’ This was backed up by General David Petraeus of US Central Command, who indicated that violent unrest in Afghanistan has risen by 60 per cent compared with last year. According to the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, the armed conflict intensified significantly throughout Afghanistan during 2008 and during the first six months of 2009. This has consequently seen a rise in the number of civilian casualties and a reduction in the area of humanitarian space. Thus it will come as no surprise to anyone that increased irregular movements by Afghan asylum seekers have occurred as a result.

In fact in 2008 there was an 85 per cent increase in the number of Afghani asylum seekers claiming protection in industrialised countries worldwide. It is worth noting, especially for those opposite, who seem to be deniers of push factors, that this was the largest increase seen among the major countries of origin for asylum seekers. The UNHCR highlighted this by stating that applications for asylum in industrialised countries by Afghans were actually up by 52 per cent during the first half of this year compared to the same time last year. We all know that Australia is not immune from this global trend, and we have seen an increase in asylum seekers from Afghanistan requesting asylum here in Australia.

Another significant push factor, which we are seeing directly increase the number of asylum seekers entering our waters, is due to Sri Lanka emerging from the aftermath of a long-running civil war. Violence in Sri Lanka increased significantly in 2008 and climaxed in the final stages of the conflict earlier this year. The UNHCR estimated that the number of people displaced by the final stages of fighting exceeded 100,000. Again, it is clearly not surprising that there has been a spike in the irregular movement of Sri Lankans. In 2008 there was a 24 per cent increase in the number Sri Lankan asylum seekers claiming protection in industrialised countries worldwide. This trend has seen an increase in the number of Sri Lankans coming to Australia seeking asylum.

Whilst we have seen an influx of asylum seekers into Australia in recent months, the number of arrivals to Australia still remains low by world standards. The overwhelming majority of asylum seekers still head towards Europe. Amongst industrialised countries in 2008, 96 per cent of Afghan, 97 per cent of Iraqi and 82 per cent of Sri Lankan asylum seekers sought asylum in Europe. There were over 162,000 asylum applications lodged in industrialised countries worldwide during the first half of this year.

Australia has taken its share of those seeking asylum over the past two decades—in fact, this figure has averaged about 1.5 per cent of the total number of people seeking asylum around the world. What these facts and figures clearly tell us is that irregular boat arrivals are driven by significant push factors such as persecution and conflict. To help protect our borders from these push factors, the Rudd Labor government has maintained a tough and stringent border security regime since coming to office. In this year’s budget we committed $650 million to combat people smuggling. This was in direct response to the push factors I have already mentioned and which are currently resulting in a heightening of activity amongst people smugglers.

I place on record some of the funding initiatives we have put in place to combat people smuggling. We have included as part of the budget announcement $324 million to increase maritime patrols in our northern waters, as well as a funding increase of almost $63 million for aerial surveillance, including $16 million in extra funding to deliver two new aircraft to help patrol our coastlines for asylum seekers and illegal fishing activities. We have also committed $22 million over four years to establish a dedicated area in the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service to tow and dispose of those vessels we intercept.

The Rudd Labor government is committed to continuing to operate its strict border protection regime. We will stick with the processing of asylum seekers on Christmas Island and we will conduct security, health and identity checks on these people. These are the policies which are proving effective in helping to combat this complex situation.

Alan Eggleston (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The whole issue of what happened recently in Indonesia has to be regarded as being of the gravest significance to our relationship with Indonesia. As a result of the bungled handling of the refugee situation there, last weekend we saw the President of Indonesia, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, cancel a state visit to Australia. That is a very serious matter indeed. Indonesia is our closest neighbour and we have had a very long and sometimes stormy relationship. It has had its ups and downs and we have worked very hard to improve that relationship in recent years. But, as I said, last weekend we had the President of Indonesia cancelling a state visit to this country. That was no doubt a result of the fact that the President regarded the way he and his country had been treated by the Rudd government as less than satisfactory.

Whether or not the government is prepared to accept it, it is quite obvious that Mr Rudd has been very clumsy in his handling of Indonesia and he has obviously deeply offended the Indonesian government. Mr Rudd claims and somewhat trades on the fact that he is an Asian specialist. He claims a special relationship with China. He speaks Mandarin, as we all know. Yet we hear that these days the Chinese government say they much preferred dealing with Mr Howard because, although Mr Howard did not speak Mandarin, he had a very simple and straightforward view of the relationship with China. It was very businesslike and they could deal with him and trust that what he had to say was a bond which would be followed through.

Here we have Mr Rudd causing a ruction in our relationship with this very important country of Indonesia, our closest neighbour, with a population of 220 million, to the point that the President cancelled a state visit. I can only express great concern that this relationship has been damaged and that the very significant degree of engagement which the Howard government established with Indonesia on people smuggling may well be compromised by the actions of the Rudd government during the recent episode where a boatload of people were left for nearly a month on a ship in the Riau Islands.

The government denies that there was any sort of special deal with Indonesia over how these people would be handled, but I recall hearing that they would be off the boat and into some sort of assessment facility within a very short time. Quite obviously, there was more to that arrangement than we were told publicly and the Indonesians feel let down by the failure of the Rudd government to honour an agreement, even if we do not know the full details of it. There are 42 million refugees in the world, I am told. It is an awfully large number of people. Australia has always had a responsible policy on refugees within the context of our controlled immigration policy.

Australia has never had an open door. In recent years we have developed a policy based on skills and we have taken, variously, between 80,000 and 150,000 immigrants a year. We also take around 15,000 refugees, who we accept from United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees camps, where these people are assessed in terms of their identity—it is very important to know who they are—and in terms of their criminal records and their security records. That is a very orderly way of taking refugees, and Australia in fact takes a higher percentage of refugees in its overall migration program than many other countries in the world. So we have a very fine and respectable program and record there.

But something has changed in the last few years. If you look at the records of boat arrivals, it is very interesting. In the early part of the 2000s there were in fact no boats. In 2002-03, for example, there were no boats and no refugees arriving by sea. In 2003-04 there were three boats with 82 people. In 2004-05, still during the Howard government, there were no boats, no refugees. In 2005-06 there were eight boats, 61 refugees. In 2006-07 there were four boats. In 2007-08, there were three boats. But then you come through to 2008-09, when there were 22 boats with 1,039 people, and so far this year 22 boats and 1,029 people. So obviously something is different and that difference has to be the approach of the Rudd government.

The Rudd government’s policies on our borders are obviously weaker in terms of border protection, and the people smugglers who make a business of bringing people to Australia in boats obviously think that under the Rudd government it is going to be easier to get these people to Australia and that there will be a better opportunity for refugees to come in by irregular means. This is very sad, because of course those journeys over the ocean in small boats are very dangerous. Lots of people drown and it is certainly not good for the government to have weakened our border protection policies. I think the Rudd government has a lot to answer for in that regard.

Annette Hurley (SA, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The time for discussion has now concluded.