Amanda Vanstone (SA, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the senator for the question. Yes, I have noted some comments at least in relation to independent assessment. I also remind the senator—through you, Mr President—that the outcomes for a yes on Nauru in relation to the UN case load and the Australian case load, as I am advised, were pretty much the same. If not, the Australian case load—that is, that done by Australian departmental officials—was about the same. In other words, they got as good an outcome as the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees would give them. So I take note of all those pieces of information.

Senator Kirk, you mentioned a number of cases out of the many thousands you know that the immigration department handles onshore. It might be a matter for reflection that those cases happened despite the fact that there is a legislative framework around which those cases are handled. There are migration series instructions; there is the human rights commission and the Ombudsman. Onshore handling of these cases is one of the most regulated, reviewed and spotlighted areas of government policy. Senator, the proposition you put to me is that you want more regulation in another area; yet you raised by your own example that that will not always produce the ideal outcome. We aim for the ideal outcome; of course we do. But when there is a system that aims for an ideal outcome, how does it do that? It focuses on it when it gets a problem. With respect, Senator, you have asked a question about offshore processing and related it back to onshore processing. Sorry, it seems to me to be impractical.