Andrew Wilkie (Clark, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

Much has been said and written about the Home Affairs Legislation Amendment (2025 Measures No. 1) Bill 2025, and I applaud my crossbench colleagues for doing a much better job than I would ever be able to do to explore particularly the legal dimensions of the bill. It is entirely understandable that the speeches that have been given by my colleagues have been needed, because this bill would be a fundamental departure from how Australian law currently operates by removing the right to natural justice. That we would even contemplate that, let alone have a bill before us, beggars belief and diminishes our country. But, because my colleagues have spoken at such length about such matters, I actually want to focus on some other dimensions of this that are perhaps a bit more gritty.

I was very pleased that the member for Indi spoke about international law, and that's where I'll start my contribution. If this bill becomes law, Australia will be in clear breach of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. The Rome statute was a statute agreed upon by our predecessors in this place and ratified by our predecessors in this place when they agreed that the forced removal of someone to a third country is a crime against humanity. That might sound a bit overly dramatic, but that's what we are contemplating today—to bring into law something that would have Australia stand guilty of crimes against humanity. This is another case of where we think that international law only applies to countries like Russia or China or Syria or Iran and that international law doesn't apply to good countries like us. It doesn't apply to the United States. It doesn't apply to Israel. It doesn't apply to Australia. It only applies to the countries that we want it to apply to. That is completely and utterly unacceptable, and that should worry us a lot. We should be the first country in the world, as an important middle power, to be advocating for international law and the rule of law, which have served this country so, so well ever since the end of the Second World War.

The other point I'll make is how this stands to be such a gross misuse of public funds. For a group of about 280 people, for there to be a political fix—let's face it: the government's in a hole. They've got to do something about this cohort. They're not getting much cooperation from the opposition, who sees everything through the prism of political opportunity. The government's in a hole, so it's going to throw, over a few years, about $2 million of Australian taxpayer money at each of these approximately 280 people. That's an appalling misuse of public funds. That should alarm us. Even the people who want to be rid of this cohort of people should at least be worried about how we're spending this money, and we're going to be giving it to a country which, when I look at a recent Transparency International report—they surveyed Nauruans, and 50 per cent of Nauruans surveyed said that they thought the Prime Minister and the officials in the Nauruan government are likely to be involved in corruption. But yet we're going to hand over $400 million in year 1 and, I think, $70 million every year after that for, presumably, as long as any of this cohort of people are living in Nauru. That's appalling. In fact, I'd liken it to a form of colonialism that we even think we have the right to ask the Nauruan government to take these people and that we are able to bring such financial force to bear to effectively force them to take these people.

I'm reminded of a previous life more than 20 years ago now. I remember reading a cable that came back to Canberra from our top diplomat or one of the diplomats in Nauru, and the cable explored all of the money and the assistance that we were pouring into Nauru. I can still remember the last sentence of that cable from more than 20 years ago, and it said, 'We have bought Nauru.' And you know what? We're doing exactly the same again. I think it is a form of colonialism.

I also want to pick up on the point that the member for Ryan made. The member for Ryan, I think bravely, raised the issue of racism. I note that the comment was withdrawn, but I don't think we should be so quick to—I wasn't doing so, but I don't think other honourable members should have been so quick to jump on the member for Ryan for floating the idea that there's an element of racism here. I put the question back to my colleagues. It's a genuine question. Would we be reacting the same way if this group of people had come from other countries? Admittedly, a lot of the other countries would take people back and would accept them being sent back, but not all. If these people in this cohort had come from other countries, would the government or the community have the same emotional response to this? I think it's a question that needs to be explored.

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