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

My question is to the Acting Prime Minister. In light of the fact that over 250 boats, carrying 13,000 people, have arrived illegally in Australia since August 2008, will the Acting Prime Minister now admit that the government was wrong to abolish the Howard government's proven border protection regime that provided an effective deterrent for six years? Don't Australians deserve better than this divided and directionless government?

Wayne Swan (Lilley, Australian Labor Party, Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

All the evidence shows that it did not provide an effective deterrent. That is why we need a regional solution. We take our advice from the same people who advised the previous government. They have advised us that what we need at the moment to break the people smugglers' model is a regional solution, and we want to proceed—and are determined to do so. That is why those people opposite should put the national interest first and join with us in supporting a regional solution.