Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Let me start by acknowledging the member for Scullin and his genuine commitment to these issues and his very kind personal reflection on me. I have great respect for the member for Scullin, but, on this issue, I think we will find ourselves on very much opposite sides. I want to start by looking at the history of this issue and go a bit deeper and a bit longer than the member for Scullin did in his contribution. I go back to the end of John Howard's period in government and remind this parliament that, when John Howard left office, there were four unauthorised maritime arrivals in detention and no children. That's the truth of what happened at that time. On election eve, Kevin Rudd, the opposition leader, said that he backed John Howard's strong border protection policies, but that is not what he proceeded to do when he sat on the Treasury benches. As a result of the policies that Labor brought in during their time in office, over 50,000 people arrived by boat, on 800 boats, and 1,200 people drowned at sea. I never want to forget those people, because they are lives that were needlessly lost because of the failure of the Labor Party's border protection. Eight thousand children were detained. In July 2013, at the end of the Labor years, there were 10,201 people in detention, including almost 2,000 children. Seventeen detention centres needed to be reopened as a result of these failed policies, and the border protection failures cost the taxpayer $17 billion. These are the things we never want to see restart in Australia; we never want to return to this. These policies came about because the Labor Party was not prepared to undertake the tough measures that this government has been able and willing to bring into place that have stopped the boat arrivals. These include the turnbacks, where it's safe to do so, offshore processing and temporary protection visas. These are tough measures, hard measures, but they are measures that have stopped the boats coming and deaths at sea. They are measures that I am proud to support. They've also seen the closure of 19 detention centres and the removal of all children from detention. That's, again, something that we should be proud of in this parliament.

What does having a border protection program that actually works allow you to do? It restores public confidence in immigration. That's so important and it allows you, as a result of the restoration of public confidence, to be more generous about your humanitarian program. We went from a period under Labor where we had 13,750 refugees to a period now where we have 18,750 refugees. We've increased the number of refugees from the Syrian conflict, allowing us to take 12,000 refugees. You cannot incorporate people in those situations unless you have public confidence in the program. That is why the tough border protection policies that we've taken and put in place have been so important.

The member for Scullin is wrong to say that this matter is unresolved. For people who are genuine refugees, there is the option, if they wish to do so, to be repatriated to their home country or to go to the United States. So far we have resettled over 870 people in the United States. The benefit of our policies is that we've stopped the criminal gangs, we've stopped the people-smuggling gangs, which are looking at what Australia is doing every single day and for any signals that we might restart that particular proposal again.

On Nauru and Manus, in particular, it's important to remind people that every child has now been removed from Nauru and, of the remaining adults on Nauru or Papua New Guinea, none are in detention. They all live in the local community, and the overwhelming majority are single males. Over 140 of them have been found not to be refugees. As I said, the government is happy to help, including booking and paying for their return travel, if they wish to voluntarily return to their country of origin.

On the New Zealand offer, the government appreciates this offer but remains focused on completing the United States resettlement arrangement. As I say, this has been a positive arrangement with 870 refugees resettled and further departures expected in the coming weeks and months.

We are committed to ensuring that people smugglers cannot exploit any resettlement arrangement to market illegal maritime arrivals and illegal maritime ventures and try to bring people in through the back door of New Zealand. Any potential resettlement arrangement must not undermine our ongoing efforts to combat people smuggling. This has been absolutely vital in terms of restoring the reputation of Australia's migration program both here and abroad, and I commend the government's program.

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