Mrs Bronwyn Bishop (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from the honourable member for Corio proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The failures, made clear overnight, of the minister to be open with the Australian people about the progress of Australia’s asylum seeker policy.

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places

Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Let me start by making one clear point: there has been no reduction in the boat arrivals today compared to where they were at immediately prior to the federal election. In the two weeks prior to the federal election, four boats came to this country. As far as we know, in the last 14 days there have been at least five boats that have come to Australia—albeit we cannot be completely sure because we will not know exactly until Friday. Let us be clear: in the two weeks prior to the election, when Labor was still in power, there were four boats that had arrived. In the two weeks to today, that figure is now five.

The piece of policy which has changed the game when it comes to stopping the tide of boats from Indonesia is the PNG arrangement. There was almost a 90 per cent reduction in the numbers of people arriving at the time of the PNG arrangement before the election. Indeed, in some weeks, there was more than a 90 per cent reduction. This is an inconvenient truth for the now government but that is the truth indeed.

We hear the government out there talking about 75 per cent reductions or that they are out there stopping the boats but the simple fact of the matter is that prior to the election, compared to now, there has been no reduction in the flow of boats from Indonesia. The PNG arrangement, July 19, and other important measures such as the refusal of automatic visas on arrival for Iranians entering Indonesia—a matter that was negotiated through cooperation by the then Rudd government in Indonesia—are the issues, the pieces of policy, which have changed the game.

This is an evolving area of policy. What we have on the government side are people who are inexperienced and who have found themselves in a time warp, believing that the policies that existed in 2001 such as TPVs, turning back the boats and the Pacific solution would represent a solution to this problem in 2013. The fact of the matter is: had all of those policies stayed in place after the Howard government, they would be dealing with the issue as this country faces it in 2013. The contemporary solution to the contemporary problem has been the PNG arrangement and other measures such as what was negotiated for Iranian arrivals in Indonesia. That was the game changer.

All we have seen from the government since the election are bells and whistles. We have seen a language edict issued requiring officials of the Department of Immigration and Border Control to now refer to asylum seekers as 'illegals'. We had that in October. We now have a grand operation sovereign border. We have seen the militarisation. We have seen weekly briefings but there is nothing in all of this which amounts to a hill of beans of substance, nothing at all.

What we have seen is a culture of secrecy. What we have seen from this government—

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

Less boats

Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

No less boats—is an attempt to have the military answer its questions. What the minister has sought to do is set up a situation where it is a general who is arguing the government's policy against the opposition. Let us be clear: the information management strategy which the government is adopting now is a purely political decision.

We are not reflecting on the general and that is precisely the point. The minister would love for a situation where there is the opposition debating a general but the fact of the matter is the minister cannot run away from the fact that the way in which information is being managed is a political decision. The minister has come into this place during question time and on seven separate occasions, an eighth today, refused to answer questions on the basis of operational matters. It says everything about the standing in which this government holds the parliament and the contempt of this government for the Australian people. All we have had is a refusal to answer questions here.

When there are briefings on those Fridays, limited information is given. By the way, we need to remember there is a big difference between a press conference and the parliament. If the minister were to mislead a press conference, it would be a bad article. But if you mislead parliament then you lose your job. That is why it is so important the parliament remains the pre-eminent place by which the government is held to account. That is why it is an appalling state of affairs that we have the minister coming into this place day after day and simply refusing to answer questions on the basis of things being operational matters. This reached farcical levels last night when Lt Gen. Campbell was in fact able to answer a precise question that the minister himself had been asked last week when the general confirmed that there had been no boats purchased from Indonesia, none. When asked that question in this place last week, the minister unequivocally said that was an operational matter that he could not answer, but the general could answer it last night. What that says is this: Lieutenant-General Angus Campbell has shot a bullet right through the concept of operational matters. It is completely dead as an idea and it says everything about the fact that that was a political idea. It was never an idea which went to the question of whether or not there was indeed any operational reasons why this information could not be provided to the Australian people. The real reason why there is secrecy about the way in which this government is pursuing its asylum seeker policy is because, the ridiculous commitments that they made prior to the last election they have not been able to fulfil. No boats have been turned around. Indeed on the first attempt, as far as we are aware, of trying to tow a boat, the boat breaks up and it sinks. That is how this government defines a matter being safe to do so. No boats have been turned around. No boats, as far as we are aware, have been towed back.

We learnt last night that no boats have been bought from Indonesia—none; absolutely none. So that is why we have got secrecy here to hide the fact that the policies which this government took to the last election are not being fulfilled today. But to top it all off, what we have also seen is that the relationship with Indonesia in relation to asylum seekers must be maintained on a cooperative basis. This is our neighbour. This is the country from which these boats are coming. It is plain common sense that we will not be able to make progress in relation to asylum seeker policy unless we have a positive, cooperative relationship with Indonesia. That relationship has been handled with total ineptness in the context of asylum seekers by this government.

We had the coalition before they even became the government announcing the turn-back-the-boats policy—or talking about it—and, in response, they elicited the very unusual circumstance of the Indonesian foreign minister Marty Natalegawa saying:

… such a policy would constitute a unilateral type of measure that we do not support.

We have a situation where in relation to the boat buyback policy, again before the election, we had Mahfudz Siddiq of the parliamentary commission for foreign affairs in Indonesia saying:

This is really a crazy idea, unfriendly, derogatory and it shows lack of understanding in this matter

That is what the Indonesian government was saying in relation to the coalition before the election about the policies that they have sought to but have not implemented since the election. They sought to dictate terms to Indonesia and in the process egg has ended up on their face. Indeed when they had their stand-off with Indonesia between 8 and 9 September, within 24 hours, they had backed down—no resolve at all on the part of this government.

You look at the Liberal Party policy. It says this:

An incoming coalition government will treat the border protection crisis as a national emergency and tackle it with the focus and energy that an emergency demands.

We have seen nothing other than a lack of resolve. We have seen nothing other than a lack of competence. They sought to differentiate on the issue of competence at the election, but there has been none of that here. All we have seen is inexperience mixed with arrogance, and that is a dangerous cocktail and it has left the policy in disarray.

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

I welcome the opportunity to debate this topic today, because it gives me the chance to once again provide further updates on the progress that the government is making on the commitment we made to the Australian people which was to do one thing—that is, to stop the boats. We gave that commitment. We set out the arrangements we would put in place to do that and we are progressing with implementing our measures to stop the boats.

There is one thing that there is no secret about and it is this: in the first eight weeks of Operation Sovereign Borders, the number of people arriving illegally by boat compared to the eight weeks before the introduction of Operation Sovereign Borders has declined by 75 per cent. It is actually more than 75 per cent; it is almost 80 per cent.

I know that the shadow minister wants to claim two weeks out of more than 300 as evidence of the previous government's record. What the shadow minister needs to understand is that the previous government is responsible for their entire record in government. Their entire record of government is one on this issue of cost with a record budget blow-out of more than $11.5 billion. You want to talk about paying for boats: the Australian people were paying for the boats that came to Australia under the previous government with a blow-out of more than $11.5 billion.

We went from $85 million a year with the Department of Immigration and Citizenship—as it was then—prior to this previous government abolishing the measures that worked, and that went to an annual cost of more than $3 billion a year. That was the cost.

There is the chaos of more than 50,000 people that turned up on over 800 boats that illegally entered Australia—the chaos that we saw in our detention network: the riots, the fires, people standing on roofs, immigration officials being forced to stand up on boxes in the middle of roof cavities talking to rioting and protesting detainees, and ministers refusing to take them down. They were embarrassed into action when the New South Wales Police just turned up one day when protesters went and stood on the then minister's roof and they were down within hours. The chaos that the Australian people had to endure under the previous government's failures was absolutely galling to them, and they tossed them out because of it.

There is the tragedy that occurred as a result of the previous government's failures and that tragedy existed in two specific areas—and I referred to one of them yesterday: the fact that under the previous government's policies, which thankfully are no longer policies, every single person who arrived illegally in Australia by boat and was given a visa by that government got a permanent visa. That is bad enough. That was the reward and the incentive that that government ran for their entire term.

Above that, every single visa—and there were more than 15,000 of them by the way that they handed out; more than 15,000 invitations for others to follow—took the place of someone waiting in a camp or an even more desperate place somewhere else. More than 15,000. That has changed. But then there is the tragedy of the more than 1,100 people who are dead. I know that no-one in this House does not believe that that is a tragedy and no-one on this side of the House, whether they sit here now or when we sat on the other side, draws a direct line between those two events. But it did occur and that is why this government are getting on with the business of implementing the measures we know are necessary to do exactly what we promised—that is, to stop those boats coming.

I can report on progress. The joint agency task force brings together more than 15 different agencies to ensure a single-minded application of all the government's will, resources and programs to focus on the issue of putting an end to this madness that occurred under the previous government's administration. Those opposite like to mock Operation Sovereign Borders. That means they have failed to learn the lessons of their failures in government and they still just do not get it—that you need to apply the full will and resolve of a government to solve this problem.

There has been already been extensive ministerial-level engagement within the region to put in place a regional deterrence framework. This government understands that you do not make your own borders stronger by encouraging others into the region; you need to make the region's borders stronger. You do not run a regional cooperation approach which invites people into Indonesia that says if you make a secondary move beyond your country of first asylum and if you get to Indonesia, we will create more places for you so more of you can come. I can assure you the Indonesian government is not excited about the idea of being an asylum magnet courtesy of Australian policies. They already know too bitterly the experience of that because the previous government got rid of the policies that worked.

The communications messaging that goes up into source and transit countries has been increased and we have given it the budget to do that. The maritime operations of this government are different to those under the previous government. Those members opposite and all members in this place, based on the statements of Lieutenant General Campbell, will know why I can go no further into that. We are doing things differently on water and people who are trying to get to Australia know it.

The tempo of deterrence and disruption activities that is taking place throughout the region not just in Indonesia—and we are incredibly grateful to the Indonesian government—has been increased. We are ensuring that those who are out there, particularly our Australian Federal Police, who are working cooperatively with governments throughout the region, no longer have to borrow from Peter to pay Paul to ensure they can do their job. The previous government drew down the resources available to those working offshore to disrupt and deter people smugglers where they are transiting. That has been changed. They are supported and they are getting the resources they need to do that job. That is why we are now stopping more than double the number of people getting here by boat. So our disruption and deterrence activities and the additional support that we have given are ensuring that every week more people are being stopped coming here than those actually getting here.

The offshore processing arrangements have been put in place to work, not to fail. The previous government was dragged kicking and screaming to offshore processing. They do not believe in it. They never did. That is okay. They do not think it is a policy. They never did. They had to be dragged kicking and screaming. They used to come into this place and stand at this dispatch box and say why Nauru would not work, why Manus Island would not work and why offshore processing was inhumane, and all of these things. They refused to do it and they abolished it. But they were dragged kicking and screaming to do it and when they brought it in, they did it under protest. But they did not back it up. Fewer than one in 20 people in that first implementation of offshore processing actually went to offshore processing. That is not how it was designed to work. We have changed that. We have made sure there are no exemptions to offshore processing, absolutely none. That was not the case under the previous government. There is a 48-hour rapid transfer process so that people do not get to settle in here, as was occurring under the previous government. They go straight to offshore processing. That is how you run offshore processing.

The capacity of our offshore processing centres in the first 100 days will be double what we inherited from the previous government. That is what a government does when it believes in its bones about these policies. The border protection policies that are being implemented by this government are the ones we believe in. The Australian people sent the previous government a very important message about the policies they implemented—that is, the Australian people did not trust them in their hands.

The Australian people know that we believe in border protection. The Australian people know that when it comes to border protection, those measures will always be more effective in the hands of a coalition government than they could ever be in the hands of the Labor Party and their good friends the Greens. They know the coalition stand for strong borders. They know that to have a strong and important immigration program the Australian people have to have confidence that our borders are secure. That is what we are introducing. That is what we are delivering. Arrivals illegal by boat are down more than 75 per cent and that is the message that this opposition do not want to hear. (Time expired)

Michelle Rowland (Greenway, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Communications) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am pleased to rise in support of this matter public importance. I commend the shadow minister for bringing this to the attention of the House. As we on this side of the House know, the substance of this MPI is one that is not lost on our constituents. It is one that is being raised regularly, that this is not the government that they voted for. They did not expect and they do not deserve the level of secrecy that is going on here. It is certainly something that they did not anticipate and that is coming through loud and clear. I know that my colleagues are getting exactly the same feedback from their local electorates.

It is very important, first, to look objectively at what has happened in this portfolio over the last couple of months. It is important to look at the facts. Look at the period from 19 July 2013—when the policy changed; the catalyst for this policy change and still the policy today—and the two weeks before the election, only four boats arrived as a result. Anyone who tries to claim credit for anything other than a successful policy in response to that policy change is totally wrong and the facts demonstrate that. When we look at 19 July when the former minister for immigration and the then Prime Minister reached an agreement, it was implemented immediately and had immediate results. In the month after that arrangement was put in place there was a 40 per cent reduction in boat arrivals.

Those opposite talked a big game. They talked a really big game when they were in opposition. They were pushing each other out of the way to stand in front of a billboard—all those billboards—telling how many boats had arrived. They said they were going to buy them. They were going to turn them back. Well, what happened? Now they are hiding them. The minister is not in the chamber but it would not make any difference if he was because he does not answer questions anyway. It has gone from 'stop the boats' to 'hide the boats'. Quite seriously, this is the same side that claims credit for a policy—I remember very clearly, and I am sure the shadow minister would too—that they said would not work when it was announced last July. Now they are taking credit for it.

What happened? Today's minister and the then shadow minister, the member for Cook, panicked. You could see the panic when this policy was announced. He said, 'They've got an arrangement; it might work.'. So what did he do? He thought of another three-word slogan: 'Operation Sovereign Borders'. Three-word slogans might have cut it when you are talking the big game in opposition but now the adults are in charge and don't they act like adults. Operation Sovereign Borders took an extraordinary step of conflating two very separate issues that are quite clearly problematic today, as has been exposed in Senate estimates—conflating immigration and defence.

Let us be clear about this. The only thing Operation Sovereign Borders does is invoke these parameters of a military exercise quite clearly to censor information and mask all these failures of the coalition's policy. I refer—do you not to take it from me—to the Australian Defence Association who warned of this occurring. They said: Opposition Leader Tony Abbott's plans to appoint a senior military commander to attack people smuggling and boat arrivals have been dismissed. It is not conducive to informed public debate to militarise discussions of what remains unequivocally a civil law enforcement issue.

It is no wonder we have Lieutenant General Campbell getting up in estimates and stressing that he does not want to be involved in the political process. He said, 'I am not involved in the political process.'. I stress again: 'I am not involved in the political process.' Unfortunately for him, this is what he has been dragged into—nothing more than a change in media management. Boat buybacks: a failure. How many? Zero. Boats to be towed back: we know they have tried to tow back one and they destroyed it—real geniuses, this government. And the minister daily failing to be upfront with the Australian people. Well, the Australian people are on to it. (Time expired)

Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The hide of the opposition in moving this MPI! The hide of you! You oversaw one of the greatest public policy failures in the history of the Commonwealth, unravelling the successful Howard government initiatives to stop people-smuggling. Let us remember what happened during the time of the Howard government. When John Howard left office, do you know how many people were in detention who had come by unauthorised boats? Was it 10, was it 100, was it 500 or was it 1,000? It was four.

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—Four!

Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Four people had come in an unauthorised manner by boat and were in detention during the time of the Howard government. How many had come over the last five years of the Howard government? Was it 10,000? Was it 20,000? Was it 50,000? No. It was 300 people who had come illegally by boat in the last five years of the Howard government. You oversaw one of the most graphic public policy failures in this country: spending more than $11½ billion, wasting the taxpayers' money; more than 800 boats; more than 50,000 unauthorised boat arrivals. We had the tragedy in our relationship with Indonesia over the Oceanic Viking . We had the so-called East Timor solution where you did not consult the Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao, and then you had the so-called Malaysia Solution, which was disallowed by the High Court.

In contrast, we had a successful policy. So what have we done since coming back to office? We have done a lot to stop the boats. We have already put in place Operation Sovereign Borders and, as we heard from the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, in just the first eight weeks of Operation Sovereign Borders the number of people coming in an unauthorised manner by boat compared to the last eight weeks of your government is down 75 per cent. We have temporary protection visas—TPVs—working back; we have much better cooperation in offshore processing; and we have re-established our humanitarian visa program to ensure that people who need those visas actually get them.

Then our Prime Minister made a successful visit to CHOGM where he announced that we are going to give a couple of patrol boats to Sri Lanka. Who do you think came out in support of that? Was it the Leader of the Opposition? No. Was it the shadow minister for foreign affairs? No. It was Bob Carr. Bob Carr came out in support of the Prime Minister doing something to stop this illegal people-smuggling trade by giving a couple of patrol boats to Sri Lanka.

It has been said by those opposite that there is a lack of transparency. I can tell you now that in this weekly briefing we are providing information to the Australian people that is consistent with an effective policy to stop the boats. You do not want to provide the people-smugglers with information that can be used to ply their evil and destructive trade. Do not take my word for it. Listen to Lieutenant General Angus Campbell who said about announcements in relation to providing information on the nationalities of those who are coming illegally by boat, or the locations of those boats: 'These announcements arm people-smugglers with information to convince people to get on boats.' What about the former chief of the Australian Defence Force, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, who said last Friday:

… the military way of doing things is to operate with a higher degree of operational security to keep the people smugglers on the back foot, and I think that's really why there's a need for operational security, and that's why things are the way they are at the moment.

This is an uncomfortable debate because those opposite try to portray us as being cruel on people who are coming to this country in an unauthorised manner. But what we are doing is protecting Australia's sovereignty and ensuring that the people smugglers cannot ply their evil trade. You opposite were neglectful in government and now you are neglectful and failing your duty as the opposition. We have stopped the boats before; John Howard proved what an effective policy it was. We will stop the boats again. We will defend Australia's national sovereignty and defend Australia's national interest.

Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I offer some simple statistics. In the two weeks prior to the federal election, 26 August to 7 September, the number of asylum seeker boats that arrived in Australia totalled four—four boats. Why is that? Quite simply because Labor implemented a policy of a regional resettlement arrangement, a cooperative arrangement with an important partner in Papua New Guinea that sent a strong message to people smugglers and those seeking to come here by boat that if you come here by boat you will end up being processed in Papua New Guinea. It was a clear signal that the policy worked. Over the last two weeks, how many boats have come to Australia: a total of five that we know of, that have been reported in the media. And how is cooperation with one of our nearest and dearest partners going on this important policy issue? It is going remarkably well!

This is an absurdity. This policy has become an absurdity. Here we have a minister of the Crown responsible for this particular area of policy refusing to answer questions regarding our nation's border security, regarding our nation's security policies, regarding our nation's immigration policy, regarding our nation's foreign affairs policy and regarding our nation's fiscal policy when it comes to relations with asylum seeker issues. This has affected the confidence of the Australian people in this parliament. It is an abysmal absurdity and a contempt for the procedures of this parliament, because under the Westminster tradition it is question time under which a minister is accountable to the Australian public, to the people, for the department and the policies that are administered by that particular minister. That is not occurring under this government, under this minister. We have seen that contempt continue over recent days with this minister refusing to comply with an order of the Senate to produce documents relating to on-water operations in his policy area and his department since the election, refusing to comply with an order of the parliament. The contempt continues.

Many Australians may not think that this is such an important thing, but it is in this respect. Public funds have been expended on this policy. Taxpayers' money has been expended on this policy and those opposite are refusing to tell the Australian people how that money is being spent and indeed whether or not that money is being effectively spent and whether or not that policy is being effective. The period set aside for accountability in this parliament on questions of expenditure is being ignored by the minister and ignored with the implicit approval of the Prime Minister. He refuses to answer questions regarding the cost of this policy. He refuses to answer whether or not this policy is actually working.

It was reported by News Ltd this week that a Customs boat had to rescue 40 asylum seekers after the Customs boat had attempted to turn that boat around and tow it back and it broke in half. This was ignoring the warnings of the previous government about the failings of this policy, ignoring the warnings of the Navy. What is reported is that that occurred—risking, I might add, the safety of our naval personnel. It is a very important issue for the Australian public. What was the response of the minister when he was asked by the shadow minister to confirm or deny that that event actually occurred, that Australian naval personnel were put in harm's way in implementing a policy of this government? His answer was that he refused to tell the Australian public—an insult to the parliament, an insult to the people of Australia.

What is the reason that the minister has given? He says that this is a military operation. He says that this will compromise the security of the operation. I draw to the attention of the parliament this fact: since 2001 dedicated Australian service personnel have been serving in Afghanistan, serving our nation, putting themselves in harm's way. Since Labor came to government we instituted a policy of reporting to this parliament on an annual basis on the success of those operations, on the expenditure that was undertaken in that particular military operation. But this government is refusing to come into this parliament and report to the Australian people on the success or otherwise of another military operation. Shame on you for showing utter contempt for this parliament and disrespecting the Australian public.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is very interesting to follow the member for Kingsford Smith, who obviously remains in complete denial about the facts in relation to this matter. Our history records that Labor's policy of undoing the Howard government's policies on asylum seekers and border protection is the most monumental policy failure we have seen in our nation's history. But the real disaster, the real failure, was not so much on their tragically flawed original decision when they came to office in late 2007. The real disaster was the non-decisions of the Labor and Greens government when they continued on with those policies, failing to admit their mistakes when the disastrous consequences of those policies were obvious to every Australian. We know what they were: 800 boats, 50,000 arrivals, a budget blow-out of close to $12 billion. But most tragic of all was the deaths of 1,100 people that the policies of the people sitting on my right caused.

The previous Labor government turned the seas around Christmas Island into a graveyard, a graveyard of over 1,000 souls. This mob should hang their heads in shame. You should hang your heads in shame, you should be cringing with embarrassment and you should let us get on with cleaning up the mess that you created.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Hughes will resume his seat. I was about to bring his attention to the use of the word 'you'—and it has been happening on both sides during this MPI. By referring to 'you' as the occupier of the chair in this case, you are not referring to me. So I, once again, remind the House that the use of the word 'you' is a reflection on the chair and is grossly disorderly. I call the member for Hughes.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you, Deputy Speaker. What the opposition fails to understand is that we are currently in a military operation to stop the boats and, most of all, to stop the deaths at sea. No government would give a running commentary on operational details of the fight against the Taliban. Likewise, we should not be giving operational details of our fight against the people smugglers. We have seen the Greens and Labor become the best friends of the people smuggler. But with the change of government we—

Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Agriculture) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I find that extremely offensive and I ask the member to withdraw.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Hughes would assist the chamber if he would withdraw that reflection.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Deputy Speaker, to assist the chamber I withdraw.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Hughes has the call.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We need to look no further than the words of Lieutenant General Angus Campbell, a lieutenant general in our armed services. He has made it very clear the importance of the way information is released on this matter. He has made it very clear as to why these protocols are in place. He has said: they give advantage to the people smugglers if we were to release this information; they will provide people smugglers with material that may be used to manipulate or confuse their customers; it would undermine our regional relationships necessary to deal with this problem; and, most of all, it would endanger our people.

That is why the government is taking the steps that we are taking. But, most of all, we need to remember when it comes to secrecy the policies of the previous Labor government. Remember when they were releasing people on bridging visas out into the suburbs of our cities, our state police commissioners specifically asked and wanted to know where those people were being released and the previous Labor government refused to provide that information. They refused to provide information to our state police commissioners about where people were being released into our society, because they wanted to look after their safety.

Andrew Giles (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a matter of public importance at two levels. It is about an important matter of public policy, but it also goes to the very heart of our democracy. This is not the government the Australian people elected on 7 September; this is a government of secrecy. And it is that secrecy which goes to the heart of this debate, which I am very glad the shadow minister for immigration and border protection has brought on. We have heard a lot of rhetoric and a lot of abusive language but no facts. There are two issues at play. There are two questions we have to ask. Firstly, what do we know? One thing that we know is that the PNG resettlement program was working. That is an uncomfortable fact for those in the present government. It has been raised three times in this debate.

Mr Craig Kelly interjecting—

And the fact that the member for Hughes or anyone else says it louder does not make it not true. The PNG resettlement solution was working. We know that. What is the other thing that we know? The present government and the present Minister for Immigration and Border Protection are not interested in telling us what they are doing. Why? There are some big fig leaves. He will give us 10 minutes of a history lesson. We have had a history lesson from other members opposite—plenty of history, plenty of discussion about the work of previous governments. But in here we hear nothing about the work of this government. We hear 75 per cent, we hear nearly 80 per cent but, in this chamber, we hear no more.

Why, I ask members, could it be? What possible inference could we draw from the fact that we are hearing nothing about the towbacks and the buybacks? What possible reason could the minister have for not having in his folder the answers which demonstrate the success of his policies? I think it is pretty clear there is only one inference that can be drawn.

I am a new member in this place and I may be very naive, but I have read House of Representatives Practice and I would refer members opposite to page 543, which states:

One of the more important functions of the House is its critical review function. This includes scrutiny of the Executive Government—

yes, scrutiny of the executive government, Minister—

bringing to light issues and perceived deficiencies or problems, ventilating grievances, exposing, and thereby preventing the Government from exercising, arbitrary power, and pressing the Government to take remedial or other action. Questions are a vital element in this function.

Members will be pleased to hear that. And further:

It is fundamental in the concept of responsible government that the Executive Government be accountable to the House. The capacity of the House of Representatives to call the Government to account depends, in large measure, on its knowledge and understanding of the Government’s policies and activities. Questions without notice and on notice … play an important part in this quest for information.

I think this is a very important passage, which goes to the heart of this debate. But it is very difficult for me, a naive new member, to reconcile this description of responsible government with the present government's performance. On eight occasions the minister has refused to answer direct questions. What is the fundamental point of having a minister who is not accountable and responsible to this parliament? What is the point of having a minister? It flies in the face of centuries of responsible government and makes it impossible for the people of Australia to determine the performance of the policies that he is so eager to claim credit for. With the repeated refusal to answer questions, the only inference anyone here can draw, the only inference the Australian people can draw, is that buybacks and tow-backs are not working and the policies of the previous government, including the PNG resettlement solution, are working.

There is something unsettling and even Orwellian about this government, going to the very title of Operation Sovereign Borders and the militarisation of civil policy, to debate management motions and operational matters and this failure to disclose anything in this debate on this matter of great public importance. This is treating parliament with contempt. This is treating the Australian people with contempt. It is surreal. May I suggest in future that the media strategy comes after the public policy, that the media strategy comes after the responsible minister treating this parliament and the Australian people with the respect they deserve.

Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I say to the member for Scullin: welcome to this chamber. I am willing to take you up on your suggestion. Indeed, the media policy should follow the public policy. It is a very good suggestion. If you wanted an example of a government change denier, I think the member for Scullin just gave us a snapshot of the denial that is going on in the Labor Party today. Usually a government will get up and say something like, 'We had a great three years,' 'We had a great last term,' 'We had a great last six years,' or 'Prime Minister Gillard and Prime Minister Rudd were great prime ministers; what great policies they did.' But, in summary, the argument of the member for Scullin, the member for Corio and the member for Greenway is: 'We had a great two weeks. In fact, in that final hour of our government we were nailing it. If you just gave us a few minutes more, we could have stopped every boat in human history—one more minute, 60 more seconds, 10 more seconds, and we might have got to it'! In this chamber we all know the reality is very different. Member for Scullin, you are a little naive, by your own admission. It was 300 weeks.

When we first came to government, we had to deal with the legacy that we inherited, just like every other government that comes to office, just like the Labor government when they came to office in 2007 had to deal with the legacy that they inherited: a working border protection system, four people in detention, no boat arrivals, a problem that had been solved, a problem that had been fixed. At that time we saw Prime Minister Rudd wanting to walk both sides of the compassion and toughness street. There are two approaches you can take to border protection: you can be tough and firm or you can be compassionate. The Greens embody compassion, and they have an integrity to their position. They say: 'Open the borders. Let them in.' The Liberal Party has always said: 'We want to be tough and firm on this, to be fair, because of the terrible tragedy in terms of lives that comes with this problem.' Prime Minister Rudd said: 'We're going to try and do both. We're going to tread both sides of the compassion and toughness street.' By trying to do that, he unravelled the tough policies that the Howard government had put in place, creating the problem.

The member for Corio spoke about a contemporary problem and a contemporary solution. I say to the member for Corio: the contemporary problem was the Labor government and the contemporary solution was the last election. Everyone has seen what has been going on here. We are happy to have this debate in the House every day, because things had to change. The last six years were an example of policy failure, the most graphic policy failure—amongst a series of policy failures—by any government in this country's history. It came at a great cost, because we had so many boats that were not turned back, with loss of life—1,100 deaths at sea, we think; budget blow-outs of $11 billion; 800 boats arriving; and people smugglers in business. This is sophisticated organised crime, and the last government failed to understand that. While Prime Minister Rudd used to get up and talk tough on people smugglers and say they are a great evil that have to be dealt with, his government's policies deliberately unwound a working system and enabled people smugglers to get back into business, causing the very problem that they sought to solve.

Now those opposite get up in this place and say we are doing something different and attack the fundamentals of what we are doing, which is different. Yes, it is different. It is the policies we took to the election. It is the policies we put in front of the Australian people. It is different. It is tough. It needs to be given time to work. It is already starting to work, but the opposition's only interest here is to undermine the newly working policies of a new government. They are government change deniers. They come into this chamber in denial that the government has changed, in denial that it was actually the Labor Party, the previous government, that was the problem. The Australian people have elected a group of people to provide the solutions, and we are providing those solutions. These MPIs and this line of questioning every day are designed to do nothing more than to undermine the approach of the government. Given the serious nature of this matter, that is a very unethical thing to do.

I say once more to the member for Corio: do not come in here anymore and tell us about the glorious last two weeks of the Rudd government. You might have got your glorious leader back into office in the final few weeks, but it was not that glorious. You had six years. You created the problem, and this government will create the solution.

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Much emotion comes into this debate in Australia, both inside and outside this chamber. I want to be clear about a couple of things. I shifted my views on this topic after taking part in the Christmas Island tragedy inquiry. That process, during which I watched the footage of young people drowning, really hardened my heart, I guess, in terms of understanding how tough this has to be when you are in government and dealing with those people that come across the sea. Obviously no-one would want to have statistics where you have one in 20 people drowning—no-one on either side of the chamber. I would never suggest that. I have seen people stand up in this chamber and cry when talking about this, because it is quite an emotional thing. I remember the member for North Sydney saying:

I will never ever support a people swap where you can send a 13-year-old child unaccompanied to a country without supervision—never. It will be over my dead body. How dare people?

I remember that particularly, and I quote that from the Hansard. It is an emotional topic.

Let us be realistic about this. We do not want one in 20 people drowning. Politically, it works for any party to make sure that the Australian people are not concerned about the number of those who are coming across the sea. They are not illegal. Let us get that straight. We signed a treaty, and while we are still a signatory to that treaty they are not illegal. I refute that suggestion every time I hear the Prime Minister say it. This is why I deliberately use the words from the second verse of the Australian national anthem, which refers to them as the people 'who've come across the seas'. Every time we sing that second verse we should remember that. Anyone who is a parent would know that we would do whatever we could to put our children in a safer place—whatever we could! In fact, there are seven million Australians who did that; they put their children in a better place.

While preparing for this debate, I thought it appropriate to go back to some of the recommendations of the expert panel on asylum seekers. I did hear Minister Morrison quoting some of the words of Angus Huston in the media lately. As people might recall, Air Chief Marshal Angus Houston, Paris Aristotle and Professor Michael L'Estrange prepared this report for the government. I return to their recommendations. The first recommendation talks about broad characteristics which both sides of the chamber would agree on. I tick both sides for that. Recommendation 2 says 'increase Australia's humanitarian program', which we did, from 13,750 up to 20,000, with a commitment at the election to go to 26,000. We are now on this side of the chamber. Obviously, those opposite are committed to decreasing it to 13,750.

Let us look at some of the other recommendations. Recommendation 3 talks about regional cooperation. That is a big focus. I think you have to put a black mark in the copybook of those opposite for that one. Recommendation 4 talks about bilateral cooperation on asylum seeker issues with Indonesia. Today Indonesia just downgraded their relationship with Australia—so a big cross through that recommendation. Recommendation 5 says 'develop its vitally important cooperation with Malaysia on asylum seekers'. The quote I read out was about the debate on the Malaysian people swap. I have a vague recollection that those opposite actually voted with the Greens to knock it off—but maybe I am misremembering that.

Pat Conroy (Charlton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You're not, mate

Graham Perrett (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is what happened. People who have made speeches today on this issue sat with the Greens to knock off that people swap because Malaysia was not a signatory to the UN convention on looking after asylum seekers. They sat with the Greens on that policy. Then it comes out today—

Honourable members interjecting—

Well, my understanding from the media is that we have had unaccompanied minors sent to Nauru, when the minister is actually the guardian of those minors. It is a difficult job, I would imagine, to be the minister making that decision. How can you look after the best interests of those children by sending them to Manus Island or to Nauru or, if it does come about, into an Indonesian program? That has been reported in the media. The reality is that we have had 225 years of people coming across the seas to this country, and there has been an irrational fear of other people coming from across the seas ever since that started. (Time expired)

Andrew Nikolic (Bass, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Corio has the audacity to bring on this MPI, despite his role as a member of the former government that dismantled border protection policies which work. Well may he leave the chamber, because that was a shameful dismantling. There were 50,000 arrivals, over 800 boats, 1,100 deaths at sea and a blow-out of $11.6 billion in border protection costs. The member for Corio talks about a time warp. I know that we have recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of Dr Who. Perhaps the member for Corio is hoping that Australians will be transported back in time to pre-2007, when we had good governance and we did not have a boat problem. I think that is a forlorn hope.

The opposition simply does not understand that stopping people smuggling is not about providing daily media opportunities. Information released into the public domain is simply used by people smugglers and their agents in Australia to dupe desperate people into embarking on that perilous and often fatal voyage on the high seas. This is about a sensible, prudent, compassionate but, above all, resolute and consistent approach to managing this problem, in concert with our friends in Indonesia and other countries.

Yes, we are dealing with people—poor, desperate people—but we are also dealing with a multimillion dollar, sophisticated international criminal organisation that trades in people's lives. The way to prevent crime is very simple: it is to attack those who are the masterminds, and the masterminds here are the people smugglers. Is the shadow minister for immigration so naive as not to appreciate that these people have the most sophisticated communications networks? Does he not realise that every piece of information given out by an Australian government is quickly used by them to attract more customers?

I have had the privilege of serving this country abroad in some of the places from where these people come. The people smugglers go to their villages and towns and directly promote their evil trade. They use public commentary and spin to attract more unsuspecting customers. The government will be accountable for our policies, and the success of this policy to date is evidenced, as we heard, by the fact that in the first eight weeks of this government compared to the last eight weeks of the former government there has been an almost 80 per cent reduction in boat arrivals.

But the former government, of which the member for Corio was a senior minister, should also be accountable for their failure in the same area. If Labor had a shred of credibility on this issue some people might listen to them, but they do not. Perhaps they should give the government, the ADF and the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service the opportunity to tackle this people-smuggling trade unhindered. I would encourage the member for Corio and his colleagues to reflect on the reasons why governments and agencies like Defence and the department of foreign affairs necessarily protect information. He should reflect on Australia's dimensions of national power, its diplomacy, the informational element of national power, the economic element of national power and, in extremis, the military element of national power.

Good governments do not run thrice-daily news conferences to crow about how they are exercising their elements of national power, because to do so subverts their ability to achieve diplomatic, informational, economic and military effects.

As someone with experience in operational security matters, I can tell you that the reason we do not follow the former Labor-Greens government lead in this regard is that we are determined to protect the integrity of our operations. The member for Greenway demonstrated no understanding of how inter-agency operations are conducted—with the lead agency and supporting agencies. I suggest that she look at that framework. As we have heard from Lt Gen. Houston, running complex, multi-agency military operations is first and foremost about achieving your mission and ensuring the safety and the force protection of our troops. It is about denying information to our adversary and cycling through the decision process faster and more thoroughly than they do.

The member for Kingsford-Smith invoked the name of our troops in Afghanistan. I have served in Afghanistan. Lt Gen. Angus Campbell was recently the commander in Afghanistan. My daughter has done two tours of Afghanistan and every one of the people who has served there would tell him that operational security matters. Those on that side of the House should realise it, and let us get on with fixing the problem they have created.

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The discussion is now concluded.