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

My question is to the Minister for Home Affairs. Will the minister update the House on the progress of the US settlement arrangement and how the government's strong border protection policies have contributed to this success? In what ways could conflicting proposals undermine these positive outcomes?

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his question, and I want to thank all of my colleagues for the work they've done in supporting the government's position to keep our borders secure because, if you don't have secure borders, you cannot have a safe society.

I want to make sure that we don't see children drowning at sea. We saw, tragically, 1,200 people drown at sea when Labor was last in government. We saw 8,000 children go into detention and 17 new detention centres open when Labor was in government, because 50,000 people arrived on 800 boats. I'm pleased to inform the House that yesterday a further 19 people who Labor put onto Nauru left Nauru for the United States, bringing the total number of people lifted from Nauru and Manus Island to 286. It's important to recognise that all of the people that Labor put onto Manus and Nauru—we want to make sure that we can get them off as quickly as possible.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Members on my left!

Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

But we do know that, if there are new arrivals, as the Labor Party is proposing under its changed border policy programs, those new arrivals, which are a certainty under the policy that Labor is now adopting, will not be eligible to go to the United States under the agreement we've struck with the United States administration. That's important to point out because, in by-elections around the country at the moment, we see Labor candidates pretending to support the government's position on border protection when really they don't. And there's no better example than Susan Lamb, the Labor candidate in the Longman seat in Queensland, who does not support our border protection policies.

We know that Susan Lamb, in the seat of Longman, is promising a policy which would revert back to the disaster that operated under Labor. The Labor Party would undo each of the successful pillars of Operation Sovereign Borders, which has seen children no longer drowning at sea and no longer in detention. We've closed those 17 detention centres, and Susan Lamb and others should at least today start to be honest with the people of Longman that the Labor Party is promising a policy where boats will restart and kids will be back in detention. That is the reality of what Labor is promising at the moment.

The facade that the Labor Party put up at the last election no longer stands. The Left of the Labor Party is taking control of the caucus, and it is obvious that this Leader of the Opposition had lost control on border protection. And the people of Longman get it. They know that Trevor Ruthenberg is the only candidate in the Longman by-election that stands for strong border protection.