Speech to ALP National Conference
27th April 2007
Thank you, delegates.
I support the amendments moved by Duncan Kerr and John Sutton but cannot support the last amendment just moved then by Avis Meddings.
Delegates, no one should see our position on the excision of Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) and Ashmore Reef as being some triumph of pragmatism over principle.
Wanting to stop a repeat of SIEV X is good compassionate policy. Wanting to make sure that we do not create an environment again where you get the numbers 146, 142, and 65. The number of children, the number of women, the number of men who drowned on that vessel and making the mistake where that vessel was heading.
It was heading from Indonesia, in the opposite direction to the rest of Australia because, due to an accident of colonial history, Christmas Island was close and it was in Australia’s migration zone.
The reason I gave at the beginning of this debate for us getting rid of the policy of TPVs was because that policy encouraged people to put their lives at risk on the high seas. We didn’t know it at the time we supported it, but the results are now in.
The results are now in and show that when the TPV policy was introduced, the number of people putting their lives at risk on the high seas went up. But the results are also in that when that number plummeted completely coincides with the when we supported the excision of Christmas Island, Ashmore Reef, and Cocos (Keeling).
The Government has gone on with some crazy ideas since then. They have excised a further 3000-4000 islands. We would return them to the migration zone because these arguments don’t apply to that.
Last year the Government tried to excise the two islands that were left. One is called Tasmania. The other is called the mainland. And Labor was right to oppose that because this argument didn’t apply.
But for Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) and Ashmore Reef, we should not pretend that we are not taking the compassionate option. It is good Labor policy to try to make sure that people come here in a way that is safe.
Any policy that encourages people to put their lives at risk on the high seas, no matter how well intentioned, it is one that we are right to oppose and I urge the conference to oppose that amendment.