Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Hansard source

The coalition will be supporting this motion and I will be moving an amendment to the motion in my statements. This day has been a long time coming. I had to do a double take when I heard the minister announce that he was designating Nauru as a regional processing country. They are not words that I expected ever to hear from the government, given its constant demonising, denouncing and denying of Nauru for over a decade. That final decision is welcome but, as we have said on so many occasions, there is more to do.

This is a government that is making it up as it goes along. That is particularly the case when it comes to the issue of border protection and the incredible and unprecedented number of illegal arrivals by boat that have occurred under the course of this government. Today, Labor ends a decade of denials and of denouncing and demonising offshore processing on Nauru by voting to establish Nauru as a country for offshore processing. In doing so, it makes a very significant admission to the Australian people. It makes it through gritted teeth and after having been dragged kicking and screaming over years to this point. The admission it makes today, in voting to affirm this designation by the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, is that it got it horrifically wrong 4½ years ago when it abolished offshore processing on Nauru and the other critical measures of the Howard government.

Despite this motion, the government still refuses to go the full distance. This government cannot expect Howard government outcomes on border protection if it is not prepared to put in place the full suite of Howard government measures that worked to stop the boats. It simply cannot have that expectation, particularly when it refuses to back up what it says in this place with the resolve that is necessary, and that was demonstrated by the Howard government, to get the job done. This government is still engaged in a half-hearted solution. It is still engaged in dealing with this matter in less than half-measures. That is why I move an amendment to the motion. I move:

That the following words be added to the motion:

“and in addition to the opening of offshore processing on Nauru, calls upon the Government to implement the full suite of the Coalition’s successful border protection policies and:

(1) restore temporary protection visas as the only visa option available to be granted to offshore entry persons found to be refugees;

(2) issue new instructions to Northern Command to commence to turn back boats seeking to illegally enter Australia where it is safe to do so;

(3) use existing law to remove the benefit of the doubt on a person’s identity where there is a reasonable belief that a person has deliberately discarded their documentation; and

(4) restore the Bali Process to once again focus on deterrence and border security.”

The statement that the minister has tabled today contains some incredibly stark admissions. Let us be under no illusion about what the government is voting for today. This is the same policy that was implemented by the coalition. People transferred to Nauru previously were given visas, as the statement tabled by the minister today indicates. That happened previously. It will run as an open processing facility, as it did last time. People will not be able to apply for a visa in Australia unless the minister lifts the statutory bar under section 46A of the Migration Act, as occurred last time. All of this is the same.

The government talks of its no-advantage principle. We in the coalition operated on a disadvantage principle. Those on the other side of the House should know very clearly today that these words, 'no advantage', mean this: the average time for someone waiting in Malaysia to be processed and resettled in another country is five years. That came to me directly from the numerous refugees and asylum seekers I met when I went to Malaysia over a year ago. That was a common figure that was referred to. If the government wishes to disprove it I welcome it to do so.

Those opposite should know that they are voting today to establish offshore processing on Nauru. They need to know that they are doing that in the full knowledge that the policy they have adopted means that people can expect to wait on Nauru for five years.

If they are not prepared to vote for that, they should say so. They should come in here and say so in this debate now and they should form a different view. But they cannot leave this place and pretend that that is not what they voted for this afternoon. They are saying that people will be processed and resettled at a time that is no advantage over those who are waiting offshore in camps and other places who are similarly seeking assessment of their claims for resettlement in Australia. If it is as long as those people have been waiting in the Thai-Burma border camps it will be three generations, because that is how long the wait is for those who cannot afford to get on a boat. That is what this government is signing up to today.

It also contained some other stark admissions and is in stark contrast to what the minister himself was saying this time last year. On 12 September 2011 the minister said in this place:

We know Nauru will not work. We … know that it is an expensive option.

The government said on 2 November:

The opposition say that their approach—and it is—is to open a detention centre at Nauru. We disagree because all the expert advice to the government is that that would not form an effective deterrent.

On 18 June Minister Bowen said:

… the problem with Nauru is twofold. Firstly, it did not break the people smugglers' business model.

I am sure the member for Berowra would be very interested to know that all of those measures that he introduced when he was minister for immigration did not break the people smugglers' business model. It would be news to the people smugglers as well because they know full well it did not just break it; it smashed it to pieces.

In this statement today the minister said:

I think that designating Nauru to be a regional processing country may act as a circuit breaker in relation to the recent surge in the number of irregular and dangerous maritime voyages to Australia.

What has changed since this time last year? Nothing has changed. This is a government that make it up as it goes along. They are wedded to nothing; they believe in nothing. As a result, they can change their positions on whatever issue at any time they choose to do so. No wonder the Australian people know that this government do not stand for anything and do not believe in anything. Their handling of this issue of border protection only demonstrates that in spades.

In making their decision today and affirming this motion that the minister has brought forward they also need to take accountability for the decisions they as a government have made in this place. Four-and-a-half years ago they abolished the measures that worked. I note that in the minister's statement today he actually listed the consequences of those decisions by running through what has occurred since those decisions were made by this government. I noticed he used interesting arithmetic when he talked about how:

From 2002 to 2008 there were fewer than 10 boats a year.

That is true; there were a lot fewer than 10 per year. And:

The total number of passengers was fewer than 200 each year.

I will just inform the minister that between 2002 and 2007, the last six years of the Howard government, after all of our measures were in place, there were 16 boats and 272 people on those boats, which is fewer than three boats a year and fewer than 50 people per year.

The other matters were gone through in some detail. We are now up to almost 25,000 people who have turned up on this government's watch. We have well over 10,000 now who sit onshore in Australia today going through the system. That will leave a lasting and costly legacy for the Australian people for many, many years to come. I also note that a substantial number of lives have been lost at sea—704 deaths have occurred since October 2009. Here we are in September 2012 finally agreeing to restore offshore processing in this country.

The substantial financial and resourcing costs to the Commonwealth in dealing with the arrivals, the minister noted in his statement, is estimated to be in excess of $5 billion over the forward estimates period. We know already that the cost blow-outs were in excess of $5 billion over the last three years and we know there are more blow-outs to come because this is a government that has a budget based on an average of 450 arrivals per month and in some months up to five times that amount have arrived, and the minister and the Treasurer are yet to explain to the Australian people what the bill will be for their failure on our borders.

I note that the minister also said:

I also think that designating Nauru to be a regional processing country will make it more difficult for people smugglers to sell the opportunity to resettle in Australia.

I cannot recall on how many occasions the minister said exactly the opposite of that around this country, saying how having offshore processing on Nauru was simply a transfer station to Australia, never once admitting that less than half the people that went through the Pacific solution ended up in Australia.

He said in paragraph 27:

… I consider that the designation of Nauru to be a regional processing country is likely to have the effect that a greater proportion of visas will be given to offshore claimants than is presently the case. I think that this would result in a fairer and more orderly Refugee and Humanitarian Program, and one which is more likely to retain the confidence of the Australian people.

I welcome that admission. I have been making that argument for the last three years—that this government's border protection failures have in the last three years denied 8,100-plus people who have been waiting offshore a protection visa in this country. Their places have been denied them because of the way this government have run their border protection policy. The minister is right—when you run a policy like that, the Australian people lose confidence in the integrity of the refugee and humanitarian program. I believe strongly in it and that is why I am a keen advocate of border protection which protects the integrity of that program.

I note also that the minister said:

I think that the designation of Nauru as a regional processing country will encourage the development of further regionally integrated arrangements …

I again cannot tell you how many times the government consistently claimed Nauru was not part of a regional framework, was a one-off and could not possibly be part of any regional arrangements. This is the day of a backflip of historic proportions from this government. But backflips are not hard for this government when they do not believe in anything in the first place.

I note in paragraph 37 the minister has chosen not to have regard to the international obligations or domestic law of Nauru in making his statement today. The coalition had confidence to approve the designation of Nauru as an offshore processing country more than two weeks ago when we agreed to support the re-establishment of offshore processing. It was not hard for us to do because we have always believed in it.

We were prepared to do that because we knew Nauru was a signatory to the refugee convention. We were prepared to come into this place and designate it. Certainly the operational arrangements that would need to follow, as occurred last time, would need to be sorted through with the government of Nauru, but there was nothing preventing this minister from doing what he is seeking to do today more than two weeks ago. I wish he had, because in the last four weeks we have had around 2,000 people turn up, and the asylum lottery will begin now as the government seeks to decide who it will send to Nauru.

But, as I said earlier today, the key thing that has to happen now—and I urge the government not to mince its words on this but to be very clear in its communication and even more deliberate in its action and its resolve—is that everyone who turns up on an illegal boat from this point on must go to Nauru. That is what must happen. The government says the centre is ready to receive people, and send them there this government must. If it continues to obfuscate, if it continues to wriggle around on this issue, the people smugglers will take advantage.

I hope this measure will slow these boats but, as I said, this government cannot expect Howard government outcomes if it will not implement Howard government policies. That is why I affirm again the amendment that I have moved to this motion. This government must follow through and put in place a full suite of measures that worked—not to deal with its current half-hearted solution, not to deal in less than half-measures but to measure up, to go the full distance, to let those outside of this place, and particularly those thinking of getting on boats, that the policy has changed. It will be proven in its implementation. Under this government, everything costs more, takes longer and is less effective. So far offshore processing seems to be proving that point again. I hope the government will change things in the weeks ahead.

See this speech in context