February 21, 2024
GREG JENNETT: Shadow Home Affairs Minister James Paterson joins us now. Welcome back to the program Senator. I see you've been out making the point again that Labor plans to cut $600 million out of the border protection budget over the next four years. Is this an apples with apples comparison though, when you consider the point made by former departmental secretary Pezzullo that there's a clear distinction between projected spending and the actual spending that's required for operations here.
JAMES PATERSON: Well, the apples and apples comparison, Greg, is that the former Coalition government stopped the boats. The boats were not coming and therefore had an appropriate border protection budget to service the needs that we had at the time. Unfortunately, the boats have started again. We've had 12 boats in the last 18 months. Under this government, more than 300 people have attempted to make the journey to Australia. Two of those boats have broken through and made it to the Australian mainland undetected and returned again - a virtually unprecedented, unheard of event in the last decade. And so the cuts that the government is planning to do, which they very clearly outlined in their budget in May in black and white, anyone who's interested can go and look at it, shows that $600 million over the next four years is going to be taken out of the budget. And I don't think that now is a good time to be taking that kind of money out of the budget. The government's best defence is just ignore our budget. It means nothing. We're just going to disregard it and we'll end up spending more. Well, if that's the case, from where will that money be drawn? From what other programs will that money come? What other tax increases will they have to put through to fund this black hole that they've opened up in their own border protection budget?
JENNETT: If you want to get into tallying four year forward projections, I'm sure you'd be aware by now James Paterson, the government has done this itself, adding its forward estimates over four years and comparing it to the same period from the last Frydenberg budget. And it has overall allocations up in this area of border protection, up in Labor's favor by $470 million. Do you accept the accuracy of those numbers?
PATERSON: Well, the numbers by themselves are accurate, but it doesn't take into account three really important factors. First, as I said, we stopped the boats. They haven't. The boats have started again. Second, their budget includes the millions of dollars that now have to be spent monitoring 149 released detainees onshore. That's not going to offshore border protection. And finally, it doesn't take into account inflation. When you take into account inflation, actually, it's much more modest. And they are still planning to cut the budget going forward. And so we will have real reductions in border protection spending over the next four years unless the government changes its mind and increases funding. I hope they do. I hope in the upcoming budget we see a different set of figures going forward. I hope we see a rise in spending on border protection, because that is what's going to be necessary to defeat the people smugglers trade again, which has been encouraged by the Prime Minister's weakness, and particularly by him undermining the temporary protection visas feature of our successful Operation Sovereign Borders policies.
JENNETT: Yeah. Let's go to offshore processing again. I think a point you've been making elsewhere today, Senator, is that the government has- this is the allegation, no plan B if Nauru should fill up now, that would be, I think, involving a very large number of boats arriving if Nauru was to fill. But leaving that aside, isn't part of plan B shuffling established refugees to New Zealand for resettlement under the three year, 450 person plan? Wouldn't that be the plan B in the event of further boat arrivals?
PATERSON: Well, that's already a plan that's in place. It was the former Coalition government plan to resettle people in third countries including New Zealand, but also elsewhere in the world. And that's a welcome thing and that should continue if, people are found to be owed protection but can't be settled in Australia because of the means with which they tried to come to Australia. But we do need to have a plan B because unfortunately we've seen this movie before, Greg. This is exactly what happened last time Labor was is in office and we're not yet at the, you know, thousands of people, and the hundreds of boats that we saw when they were last in government, but that that can happen very quickly, particularly if people smugglers get a sniff, that their business model is live again. And that's what I'm worried about. And that's why I'm not convinced that only having Nauru as an offshore processing option is a viable one. We previously had PNG as an option. We have previously had Christmas Island as an option. Neither of those appear to be an option now for the government and I think that's irresponsible.
JENNETT: Just on the New Zealand plan. Who should take priority for resettlement in New Zealand? Those recently arrived, processed and found to be legitimate refugees on Nauru or others, long ago established as refugees. But here in Australia, on bridging visas, obviously I'll ask that question because they might be an odd incentive, might there? To people smugglers logically followed if it were the latest arrivals.
PATERSON: Yeah. I understand the point that you're making Greg. And we do have to be very careful not to give any people smugglers the incentive to sell this message that you might not find your way to Australia, but you could find your way to New Zealand too, which is a pretty attractive destination as well for people coming from difficult parts of the world. So you're right, we have to be very careful about that. I would defer to operational decision makers on whether those people should be taken first from the Australian mainland or regional processing, they are the ones best placed to make those decisions. But we can't afford to give any encouragement at all to people smugglers and the desperate people they sell their message to.
JENNETT: All right. Let's go to the international dimension involving Indonesia, I suppose we referenced it at the start of this interview, James Paterson, the Defence Chief. Angus Campbell met Prabowo Subianto in Jakarta overnight. Are you concerned that there might have been more lapses on the part of Indonesian police or maritime agencies recently, in their role, which has been incredibly helpful, I think, in heading off people smuggling boat departures from that archipelago. And if you are worried about it, should Ministers be taking this up with Indonesia to press the point?
PATERSON: I suspect the Chief of the Defence Force and the Defence Secretary were primarily in Indonesia to brief the Indonesian government on surface fleet review. And that's an appropriate thing to do. Indonesia's an important regional partner and security partner, and it's consistent with the sort of briefings that we offered them when we were in government on the AUKUS agreement when it was announced. I don't have any criticisms of the Indonesian government when it comes to border protection. They were an incredibly important part of the Abbott government's successful effort to stop the people smuggling trade. And it's in our shared interests. Neither Indonesia nor Australia wants that trade to start again. They don't want to be a stopover point for people smugglers or people seeking asylum in Australia, and all of us have a shared interest in defeating it. I don't think these boat arrivals that we have had in recent months on this government's watch is the Indonesian government's fault. It's really a fault of our maritime surveillance operations, which under this government are down 20% in terms of aerial surveillance and 12% in terms of the on water surveillance that were previously being conducted. It's no wonder that boats are slipping through. When we've got these, you know, really stark figures of drops in maritime surveillance.
JENNETT: And we'll keep an eye on that. I think there are some vague indications that the government might be working on an extra package of funding or support of some sort, we will follow that through if so. And thank you, James Paterson, once again, for joining us on Afternoon Briefing. We'll talk soon.
PATERSON: Thanks Greg.
ENDS
