Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to oppose the motion. The Greens are not part of the push to rush this legislation through the parliament quickly, which is clearly what the government and the coalition are intent on doing. The display we had in question time today was the Minister representing the Prime Minister being unable to answer straightforward questions, namely: does this mean indefinite detention? Does the government mean 10 years for people to be in a detention centre on Nauru? The Minister representing the Prime Minister refused to answer those questions.

There are so many questions associated with the proposed legislation that have not been answered, and it is unlikely that they are going to be answered in the time frame. We are dealing with people's lives here. This is a very serious matter. In fact, it is an insult to those people who have risked their lives and who are actually seeking asylum to think that this parliament would just race a piece of legislation through here without clarity for anyone as to what it actually means for those people or, indeed, what it actually means in relation to our own migration law and what conditions might apply in terms of human rights to the people who are involved.

The Greens do not support this race and rushing. It is an obscene rushing through the parliament of a political fix which will have enormous ramifications for the lives of many thousands of people. I do not think that that is an appropriate way for a parliament to behave—certainly not, if this parliament races this through without the answers to questions even as straightforward as those my colleague asked: does this mean indefinite detention for 10 years? What does it mean? What does it mean for children? We know that the minister is repudiating his responsibilities as guardian for unaccompanied children. What does that mean for orphaned children coming here as refugees? Where are they going to go? Where are they going to be locked up? For how long? What does this advantage/disadvantage actually mean? And why is it not cruel to do that?

We do not support this. The answers are not on the table. The Houston panel, in their briefing to the Greens, indicated that there would be substantial opportunities for disallowance and they indicated that there would be substantial opportunities for framing the conditions in those determinations, and yet clearly none of that is on the table. I do not think that even the Houston panel will be happy with the way that the government is just racing this through and saying, 'Let's just do it. Let's just get people to Nauru by the end of the week. Let's get them to Manus Island. Let's send people in tents'—for goodness sake—'Let's dispatch the defence forces.' We have heard people talking today about the cuts to defence and yet it seems we have millions to spend to send the defence forces and tents to Nauru and to Manus Island. Those facilities are very battered and not in good condition, yet it seems that we do not care. We can just send people there in tents. The defence forces are saying, 'We don't have the capability to act as police'—if you like—'and guard these refugees.' As if these people have not been punished enough already.

So we do not support an obscene rushing of this legislation through the parliament. I think the parliament will live to regret it. We will find in months hence bits and pieces of amendments coming back to try to fix up mistakes. But it will be at the expense of people's lives, if not their quality of life. What we are also going to find is that it is going to land us with huge costs in compensation in the longer term as people are treated very badly in this chaotic rush just to send them out of sight and out of mind into indefinite detention. That is a very bad way for a parliament to proceed. That is why we do not support this obscene suspension and this obscene changing of the hours to force through a piece of legislation. I do not believe the Manager of Government Business in the Senate can actually give me an answer to the question about whether people will be detained 'indefinitely' or for 10 years. Nor will she be able to tomorrow, and yet we are going to be in a situation where we will have both the coalition and Labor passing legislation without being able to answer basic questions about what this actually means for people's lives.

I would also note that in normal arrangements when parties talk about how they might change the hours there is negotiation across all parties. I note with interest that this did not happen on this occasion. I think that is also symptomatic of a rather dirty deal that has been stitched up to race this through the parliament to the detriment of people's lives. That is why we are opposing it.