|
November 24, 2023
MATTHEW PANTELIS: Minister, good morning. Thank you for your time.
JAMES PATERSON: Good morning. Thank you for having me.
PANTELIS: Have you heard any further regarding this group?
PATERSON: There's very little detail available right now other than limited media reports because the government, frankly, is not being transparent and upfront about how these people got here, who they are, where they've come from, what their status is, and when the government knew about it. And frankly, I think that the public deserves better than that. This looks like the first arrival on Australian shores of an illegal maritime arrival in many, many years. And frankly, the public deserves to know what’s happened here.
PANTELIS: Do you think, I mean, we've had a few illegal immigrants arrive. Have we not, by boat over the last few years.
PATERSON: There's been ten attempts to arrive here by sea in the last 18 months since the Labor Party won the election in May '22. But is the first one that broke through and reached the Australian mainland. It's actually very rare for a boat to reach the mainland. And very concerning that it's done so. We're supposed to have extensive surveillance and offshore maritime patrol to prevent that happening and identify these boats much earlier in their journey and turn them around and send them back to their destination, where they've departed from. So, the fact that this one got through, whether it is an illegal fishing vessel or a people smuggling venture, is very, very concerning.
PANTELIS: All right, is that surveillance still going on at the same levels as in the past when we had boats coming every second week?
PATERSON: Unfortunately, under this government, there's been $600 million of cuts to border protection and the Australian Navy is being called on more often than ever before to supplement the lack of resources provided to the Australian Border Force. Our maritime surveillance flights are nowhere near what they should be. They're not meeting their targets and they haven't been on time under this government and that's a real concern and that's why things can slip through the cracks. But the other reason why I think things have slipped through the cracks, is that this government provides an incentive for people to do so, they took a commitment to the election to abolish temporary protection visas, which is one of the key pillars of the successful Operation Sovereign Borders regime. They've been out there trashing offshore processing as a solution to people smuggling crisis, which worked affectively under the previous government. And they've cut funding to the Border Force and Operation Sovereign Borders policy. But no wonder there are people smugglers now trying to test this government's resolve.
PANTELIS: Do you think the High Court decision has played into the people smugglers hands?
PATERSON: It's certainly possible, because it has sent a message that if you are here in Australia, and particularly if you can't be returned home because you've committed a serious crime, then you can stay here and that's one of the very unfortunate unintended consequences of the High Court's decision. But the government's failure to be ready for that decision, their failure to be ready to legislate to protect the Australian community also sends a worrying signal that they are soft on border protection and that's going to be taken advantage of by people smugglers.
PANTELIS: Now, the other issue is visas from the Middle East. And we're being told the appropriate security checks are being carried out in thousands of visas handed to people fleeing the conflict between Israel and Gaza. At the moment, the figures from the government, they've approved 860 applications from Palestinians in just over a month, 1800 visas issued to Israeli citizens over the same period. Are the appropriate checks on people coming here, being carried out no matter where they're from, for that matter?
PATERSON: Well, the government is claiming that they are, but they haven't explained what those security checks are and how they've been able to be done quickly in such a short period of time. It's only the last six weeks that these visas have been issued in and in the case of Gaza, it's obviously a jurisdiction where we do not have an Australian government presence on the ground. It is not a functional state. In fact, it's a state run by a terrorist organisation and so how could they possibly do adequate security checks on such a large number of people in a short period of time? The government hasn't explained that. They've just tried to brush this away by saying they've followed normal procedures. Well, I think Australian people want to know what are those normal procedures, what steps have been taking place and what guarantee do we have that there is no threat posed to the community?
PANTELIS: Should the Australian Federal Police get involved here? Is there a need to watch people coming in on these visas? Surely not.
PATERSON: Well, that's a matter for the government to explain they've granted these temporary visas to these people. If they do come to Australia, not only will they have the benefit of being in Australia on their temporary visas, but they'll also have the opportunity to then claim asylum and seek humanitarian visas to stay here permanently and it looks to me like this has been done in a very rushed fashion. And so I think Australian people are entitled to be concerned about that and the government has to reassure the public that every possible check has happened that should happen and that every possible safeguard will be put in place if and when the people arrive on shore.
PANTELIS: Now, the High Court's decision to scrap detention for people coming here on visas and particularly the government and certainly your party too, concerned about the character of the people that have been released most recently. What needs to change? What legislation needs to be put in force? And ok, changes have been made to legislation in the last week, we understand that. But is that enough? Do we do we need a whole review of the Immigration Act to ensure that we are up to speed and keeping people who have dubious character away from the general population?
PATERSON: I'm glad that we were able to force the government to pass that legislation last week in the Parliament and to significantly toughen up the conditions that are imposed on the detainees now released into the community, which as of yesterday at number 116 and may be growing again today. But I don't think it goes far enough. I think they need to go further. Some of these detainees committed very serious violent crimes while they're here in Australia. They've have been tried and convicted of those crimes. They include murder, they include rape, they include child sexual abuse. And for the highest risk among that cohort, I think we have to have the option of re-detaining them and I think the best way to do that is to introduce either a preventative or continuing detention regime. We already have this in Australian law when it comes to high risk terrorist offenders. It recognises that they pose a risk to the community and often can't be released safely in the community. Some of those people fall into similar categories here and I think those laws could be adapted and applied to that cohort too.
PANTELIS: Are you going to move in Parliament to head down that path?
PATERSON: Well, we're calling on the government to do so. Only the government has the resources to do the drafting, the complex legal drafting required, but they've now had plenty of time. It's been almost two weeks since we first started calling for these sort of laws to be introduced. They have the whole department ready to go on these sort of things. They should be able to introduce this legislation when the Parliament sits again on Monday.
PANTELIS: All right. James Paterson, thank you for your time today.
PATERSON: Thanks for having me.
ENDS
