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

I thank the senator for his question. Yes is the answer to the first one. In relation to the second—whether I remember the specific comments of the Prime Minister—the answer is no, but the substance of them is certainly correct. What the senator did not tell the Senate and therefore the Senate Hansard record or anyone who happens to be listening on replay is that those agreements made last year were made quite specifically limited to the Australian mainland. Nauru was quite specifically excluded from that. It is a surprise to me that the senator who could have and should have known that would come into this place and ask a question which might lead those who had not been following the debate to conclude that the opposite was the case. Senator, if you did not know that, you do now.

Nonetheless, what the Prime Minister said at the time is right. We certainly want to detain women and children as a last resort. That is certainly the case, and the changes we have made subsequent to June 2005 are proof of that. But Nauru was not a part of this agreement; it is another country. That is why it is called offshore processing.