Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Hansard source

I thank Senator Edwards for his question. I am pleased to advise the Senate that this morning the High Court of Australia handed down its judgement in the matter of Plaintiff S156/2013 v Minister for Immigration and Border Protection & Anor. In a unanimous decision—and a very short decision—the court found as follows.

The regional processing provisions in the Migration Act are consistent with the Constitution and are therefore valid laws. The decision to designate Papua New Guinea as a regional processing country and the minister's decision as to whether IMAs should be taken to PNG or Nauru were both lawful. The High Court's decision means that IMAs will continue to be transferred to regional processing countries and their claims will be assessed and processed in those countries.

In relation to the second part of the senator's question, I confirm that the High Court ruling has no impact at all on Operation Sovereign Borders and the continuation under the Abbott government of offshore processing. Offshore processing clearly works. I will again go through the figures to remind those on the other side of the success of the policies that they failed to implement. To date, it has been 181 days, or almost 25 weeks, since there has been a successful people-smuggling venture to Australia. There has been no life lost at sea in that time, unlike the thousand people who were confirmed dead under the former government's policies, which were wholeheartedly supported by Senator Hanson-Young. It is a little ironic that it is Refugee Week isn't it, when Senator Hanson-Young supported policies that ultimately resulted in the deaths of 1,000 people. In terms of the number of people who arrived between 20 December 2012 and 18 June, 12,632 people—(Time expired)