Thank you for coming. This is obviously another grim day to our north. We've had two disasters at sea in less than a week as the boats just keep coming and coming and coming. Now, obviously, on a day such as today with Australian naval personnel racing to a disaster scene with merchant ships on the scene doing their best to help, our main concern is to encourage everyone involved in what is a difficult and a traumatic situation. The personnel from the emergency services deserve the full support of the Australian people and as far as the Coalition is concerned they certainly have that.

 

But I do think it is important, particularly with two disasters in less than a week, that the Australian Parliament do what it can to try to enable a stronger policy response. Now, I want to let you know that I will be going in to the Parliament at the conclusion of this press conference to seek immediately to introduce the Coalition's private member's bill to put beyond legal doubt the ability of the Australian Government to process illegal maritime arrivals in any country that has signed the UN refugee convention.

 

It seems to me that this is the common ground on which government policy can rest. This is the common ground across the Parliament. The Opposition has always supported offshore processing. We've always supported it. We've always supported offshore processing with protections. The Government has had a range of different positions. First of all it didn't support offshore processing. Then it did support offshore processing in countries that had signed the UN convention. More recently, it supports offshore processing at a country that hasn't subscribed to the convention, namely Malaysia, but it is common ground between the Government and the Opposition that offshore processing should take place at countries which have signed the UN convention.

 

So, in the light of this tragedy, we think, as a Coalition, that the Parliament should do what it can immediately to enable a stronger policy response from the Government. As you know, it is the Government's position that in the wake of the High Court decision, there can be no offshore processing whatsoever without legislation. Well, let's give the Government legislation that will put offshore processing beyond legal doubt under the circumstances which have the general support of the Parliament and that's in countries which have signed the UN convention.

As I said, this is a very difficult day. I think that all members of Parliament should be consulting their consciences in circumstances such as this. I've been consulting mine, Scott has been consulting his and we believe that the best thing we can do in the difficult circumstances that our country now faces is bring this legislation in to the Parliament that provides the common ground on which a stronger policy response can be based.

 

 

Mr Abbott, in light of this latest tragedy, do you think that tonight’s Mid-Winter Ball should go ahead and, if so, will you attend?

 

 

Look, that’s a matter for the organisers. It’s not a matter for me. It’s a matter for the organisers but if it does go ahead, I will certainly be making remarks appropriate to a sombre day such this.

 

 

Mr Abbott, your offer is not actually common ground or a compromise. The Government's solution involves Malaysia. Yours involves Nauru. This isn't a compromise as such. All you're doing is trying to bring forward a vote on the Coalition position. So, is it fair to say that you are still not offering compromise?

 

 

Well, I am seeking to find common ground and it is common ground between the Government and the Opposition that there should be offshore processing. It is Coalition's consistent position that it should be offshore processing with protections; protections which are best embodied by the UN convention on refugees. That is our position and certainly there is no reason why the Government cannot have offshore processing at one or other of the 148 countries which have signed the UN convention.

 

 

If I could just outline to you what it is we are introducing today. It is the Migration Legislation Amendment Offshore Processing (Protection and Other Measures) Bill and there is the associated statement of compatibility with human rights which is a requirement since the beginning of this year, and those statements will be available.

 

What this bill does is where the Government has sought to abolish the protections under section 198A, which requires human rights protections to be in place, which was the law when we went to Nauru that was the provision that the High Court found that the Malaysian people swap had violated. The Government's position was to abolish that provision. We are saying that if you abolish protections, they should be restored in an objective form, which is what the UN convention provides. That is why the UN convention is now necessary, because it replaces protections the Government was seeking to abolish. The bill also deals with the other matters that the Government included in their earlier bill regarding guardianship issues. So, the simple proposal in this bill is that protections can be in place; they can be in place today.

 

 

Mr Abbott, your policy is to allow boats to be towed back to Indonesia, a country that is not a signatory to the UN convention, presumably to be processed. Why won't you allow the Government to send people back to Malaysia, equally not a signatory, for processing?

 

 

Well, it certainly is our policy as a Coalition that the Government should have the option of turning boats around where it's safe to do so. But I'm not here today to bang the drum for the Coalition's policy. I'm here today to try to find common ground across the Parliament that could found a stronger policy response than that which the Government currently believes is available to it.

 

 

It’s a total stunt is it not, because there is not a shift in your position at all and you speak of common ground but you know, as everyone in this room knows, that Malaysia is not a signatory to the UN refugee convention and therefore you are ruling out in this legislation the Government's preferred option?

 

 

But what we've had since late last year is an impasse. We've had the Government saying, ‘You must adopt this position,’ the Coalition saying, ‘You must adopt that position.’ I am trying, with this legislation, to find a position which is common ground. Now, as well as Malaysia, the Government has proposed that we should have offshore processing in PNG. That certainly is something that would be well and truly permitted under the legislation that Scott Morrison and I are proposing to put into the Parliament straight away and that would be an important step forward. It would be a sign to the world, to the people smugglers and to their clients, that the Australian Parliament and people can move constructively in response to the developing crisis on our northern borders.

 

 

[Inaudible] you and Scott Morrison have said in the last few days that they could re-open Nauru tomorrow, so why do we need this legislation?

 

 

Because it has been the position of the Government all along that there can be no offshore processing whatsoever without a firmer legislative base than currently exists. That is why we should put this legislation through, we should put it through today, and we should allow offshore processing to take place in at least some countries and this legislation would allow offshore processing at Nauru, which has long been Coalition policy, at PNG, which is Government policy, and at other countries in our region, should they be willing to accept it, such as the Philippines.

 

 

Mr Abbott in practical terms, it means that offshore processing, if at all, would start at Nauru. You've received direct evidence from Andrew Metcalfe that Nauru wouldn't work, that tow-backs wouldn’t be achievable, in fact, they haven’t been done for nine years, and that TPVs were a danger to women and children. Is this what Australian voters can expect, that you simply reject expert advice?

 

 

Well, look, I’m just not going to get in to who might have advised whom when and when it may or should have been and I am sure Mr Metcalfe also advised the Government at the time of the dismantling of the so-called Pacific Solution and presumably his advice was not taken at the time by the Government. But we’re not the executive Government, we’re the Opposition. At this point in time, all we can impact is what happens in the Parliament. That’s all we can impact and what Scott Morrison and I are proposing is a way of giving the Government a firmer legislative basis for policy strengthening that it may then wish to act upon.

 

But you know that you could in fact do a lot more than this and don’t you think that your constituents given so many people dying, the people who vote for the Coalition would think it reasonable for you to move to the centre ground and embrace the compromise of what some of what you want and some of what the Government wants?

 

 

Well, I believe that we fairly and squarely occupy the centre ground. I think we fairly and squarely occupy centre ground between the Greens – who don’t want any offshore processing at all – and the Government which wants offshore processing without protections. We want offshore processing with protections. The Coalition has been absolutely consistent for a decade on this and we are allowing the Government to have a firmer legislative foundation on which to base stronger policies.

 

 

Tony, can I just add to that and also in response to the question. The bill proposed here is designed to have stronger border measures in place. We don’t want to see the continued compromise of our borders or of the human rights protections in this legislation and that’s what this bill is designed to do.

 

 

Are there any circumstances under which you would consider Malaysia including if the Government offered to reintroduce TPVs; not a review, you can have them. Would that get you over the line?

 

 

Well, we just think that Malaysia is a bad deal and look, I don’t want to be highly partisan today and I don’t want to reiterate the criticisms of the Coalition has made up hill and down dale about Malaysia, but the Coalition made them in good faith. We sincerely and passionately believe them and we don’t intend to change them.

 

 

What are the consequences if the Government today doesn’t accept your common ground?

 

 

Well, we are offering this common ground to the Government in the belief that they will want a stronger policy response to the developing disaster on our borders. Now, this gives them the opportunity to have a stronger policy response. It doesn’t give them everything that they want, but it does give them the opportunity to move very strongly back to the offshore processing that is part of their policy response, but which they say they cannot currently do.

 

So, what happens if the legislation is amended by the Government to add Malaysia and members of your backbench crossed the floor and support it?

 

 

Well, if the Government is serious about crafting a stronger policy response based on the united will of the Parliament, or the almost united will of the Parliament, I think they should act on the basis of the legislation that we are putting forward today.

 

 

The Government’s advice was that Malaysia and whether it would work or not would become clear very, very quickly. Why not let them try that and if it doesn’t actually work, then there is [inaudible].

 

 

Well, again, the point I make – and, if I can do it as unemotively as possible – is that Malaysia is manifestly inadequate for the scale of the problem we’ve got given that the Malaysia people swap was limited to just 800 people.

 

Thank you.

 

[ends]