Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Gilmore for her question. It is a very important question, because, as all Australians know, we must protect our borders. If we do not have integrity at the Australian borders, then we cannot provide assurances to the Australian people about their security. During Labor's seven years in government, they completely and utterly lost control of our borders. Fifty thousand people and 800 boats came during Labor's period in government. And not only that but Labor ripped out over $700 million—

Mr Champion interjecting—

from the Australian Customs Service—

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

and our Border Protection services. This government has restored that funding. We have put significant amounts of funding back into the Australian Customs Service, back into Border Force, and we will keep our borders strong. This is for a couple of reasons—not just because we want to stop the boats, not just because we want to stop people drowning at sea and not just because we do not want our detention centres filled with children, as they were under Labor, but also because we want to stare down the scourge of terrorism and we want to stare down—

Mr Giles interjecting—

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

those people who would seek to import methamphetamine, ice and drugs into our country. Yesterday the Prime Minister—

Ms Chesters interjecting—

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

the Minister for Justice and I went to visit some of our front-line officers to talk about the work that they are doing every day. They have increased the number of checks at our borders. They had a 75 per cent cut to cargo screening and a 25 per cent cut to sea-cargo screening under Labor; but, as we discussed yesterday, we have restored the screening at our borders. What does that mean for mums and dads across the country with teenage kids? It means that we are blocking drugs, as best we can, from coming into this country.

Ms Chesters interjecting—

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is what it means for parents who are worried about their kids going out on a Friday night or going out on the weekend and being faced with people peddling drugs. We are doing everything we can as a government to restore integrity to our borders; and the Labor Party, if they were re-elected at the next election, would seek again to rip money out of our Border Protection forces.

I spoke about the counter-terrorism units the day before yesterday. The Prime Minister made reference to them in his answer today, as did the foreign affairs minister. With $50 million of funding from this government, we have been able to set up counter-terrorism unit forces within Border Protection at the eight international airports. That is the reason we have been able to identify these young people who would seek to go to the Middle East and who would seek to fight in those conflicts in Syria and Iraq. We are stopping those kids because we have restored the funding. Labor would rip the funding out.