Senator DASTYARI (New South Wales—Deputy Opposition Whip in the Senate) (12:31): Mr President, I take this opportunity to share with other colleagues in congratulating you on your recent elevation to this esteemed post. While a lot has been said—and probably a lot is still to be said—regarding some of the circumstances towards the end of Senator Parry's term as President, I want to echo the words of those on this side of the chamber and the other side of the chamber who speak of him as an incredibly distinguished, decent and good-humoured being—and I know you will share in this, Mr President. Aside from politics, all senators felt that he was an advocate for all of us. Mr President, I wish former Senator Parry the best in his future endeavours and I congratulate you on your elevation to this esteemed position.

I am pleased to rise on behalf of the opposition to speak on the Treasury Laws Amendment (Housing Tax Integrity) Bill 2017 and the Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Fees Imposition Amendment (Vacancy Fees) Bill 2017. This legislation is to do with issues around housing affordability. As my colleagues said last night, Labor supports this legislation and does not oppose the passage of it. However, we are not under any illusion that these measures will do anything for housing affordability. I note that this is an issue many members of the Senate have been very passionate about—and it would be remiss of me not to acknowledge my good friend Senator Jacqui Lambie, who has just walked into the chamber.

Senator Lambie, there has obviously been a fair bit of media speculation over the past few days. I want to echo my personal view, which I know is the view of many senators across the political divide, that your contribution is a tremendous one. You are an incredible human being. You may be someone who on different policy areas at different times some of us haven't always agreed with, but what you have achieved and what you've been able to contribute, and the life experience that you have brought into this chamber, has made the Senate a better place. I seek leave to continue my remarks at a later hour.

Leave granted; debate interrupted.

Senator LAMBIE (Tasmania) (12:34): by leave—I haven't been able to sleep for days, ever since my citizenship has had a question mark next to it. There is no question mark anymore. It's in place—in an answer in black and white, courtesy of an email sent by a bureaucrat sitting at his desk on a London afternoon.

Anyone who knows my father will be shocked to think of him as anything else than an Aussie. He loves his footy, and to this day he's still heavily involved in his local country football club at Turners Beach in Tasmania. My dad believed my grandfather renounced his British citizenship years ago, but following the resignation of my former colleague and fellow Tasmanian, Stephen Parry, I knew I had to double-check. I received confirmation this morning that my grandfather hadn't in fact renounced it. This makes my dad a Brit by descent and, therefore, it makes me one too.

It is with great regret that I inform the chamber and my colleagues of my resignation. I have been found to be ineligible by way of dual citizenship. I love my father to death and hope not to blame him for this. He has done nothing for which to apologise, and he has been my strongest supporter, my loudest cheer squad and my closest adviser. It's not because of him that I'm leaving this place; it's because of him that I'm here in the first place.

I've worked hard to be a voice for those who don't often get much of a voice in this chamber. Veterans fight hard for this country and they shouldn't have to fight their government when they get back. Politicians on both sides of the house talk about helping those on welfare, without ever actually having experienced what it's like to choose between spending your welfare payment on either school uniforms or school lunches. The same politicians who spend their days making speeches and writing books about how they support Western civilisation don't do a thing to support pensioners. Voters must look at their options in despair.

I'm proud of what I've achieved here: I'm proud that my vote secured more funding for Tasmanian schools; I'm proud to have secured a feasibility study into expanding hydro into Tasmania; and I'm proud to have won a fair pay deal for our Australian Defence Force. I'm proud to have been the single vote that torpedoed a savage package of welfare cuts. Unlike some in this place who say they are for the battler, I actually refused to deliver the budget into surplus by driving struggling families into further poverty. I'm also saddened that I didn't get to achieve so much of what I was working to achieve; I couldn't help everyone who needed my help. It's my greatest disappointment in my time here.

I don't know what will happen next, personally or politically, for me. The government may be tempted to use my absence as an opportunity. To do so would be a mistake, because while I may not be here, the Jacqui Lambie Network should still be represented, just as those who voted for the Jacqui Lambie Network deserve to have their votes represented. That's why I want to let the position of the Jacqui Lambie Network regarding upcoming legislation be known. The Jacqui Lambie Network does not support the government's agenda to strip away the power of workers to stick up for themselves. For that reason I'm indicating that for pairing purposes the Jacqui Lambie Network's position should be taken to be that of the Leader of the Opposition on legislation relating to industrial relations, amendments to the Fair Work Act and changes to superannuation law and related procedural matters.

For pairing purposes, the Jacqui Lambie Network's position should be taken to be that of the Leader of Derryn Hinch's Justice Party on legislation relating to the drug testing of welfare recipients and placing those who fail drug tests onto a form of income management other than the cashless welfare card specifically. The Jacqui Lambie Network believes that the Medicare levy and the NDIS play an important role in protecting the most vulnerable in our society. The Jacqui Lambie Network's pairing position on upcoming legislation and related procedural matters should be taken as that of the Leader of the Australian Greens. And the Jacqui Lambie Network's position on the Regional Investment Corporation should be taken as that of the Leader of the Opposition.

Regarding changes to the Marriage Act, I have always maintained that the purpose of a plebiscite is to hear what the public wants. If we don't listen to the public, the whole exercise has been needlessly indecisive, painful, expensive and extremely cruel. As such, the pairing of the Jacqui Lambie Network should be taken to be that expressed by the simple majority of Tasmanians as represented in the postal survey. Regarding upcoming legislation to introduce a First Home Super Saver Scheme, the position of the Jacqui Lambie Network for pairing purposes should be taken as that of the Leader of the Government in the Senate. Regarding the upcoming Veterans' Affairs omnibus bill and related amendments, the position of the Jacqui Lambie Network for pairing purposes should be taken as that of the Leader of the Nick Xenophon Team.

Before I close, I would also like to thank my staff, who, at many times, have been my bloody saving grace, I'll tell you. You've proven yourselves to be loyal. You are wonderful. You are hardworking. And I would never have got this far without you. If you need a reference make sure you come and see me, because I'm going to give you the best one you've ever had!

There's so much more I wanted to do here, and I hope to get another chance to keep going at it. But the truth is: that's not up to me. I don't know what happens next. There's a state election I'm focused on, and I'll be helping my team do what they need to do to take the fight to some of the parties that have taken Tasmanians for granted. Beyond that, there'll be more to say, but, for now, I just want to say thank you—thank you for giving me the opportunity to be in here. And I'll tell you: you guys aren't as bad as they all say, although I'll keep telling them that! One day I do hope to be here. Actually, one day, I don't really care which side it's on, I do hope to come back, and, when I am back, I hope my dad's here too, cheering me on, like he's always been—my partner in crime. There'll be no ding next time, but, until then, I'll leave it to you. But, once again, thank you so much, and it's been an absolute pleasure to represent my country again—just not, this time, in uniform. So thank you.

The PRESIDENT (14:00): I inform the Senate that I have received a letter from Senator Lambie resigning her place as a senator for the state of Tasmania. I table the correspondence. It being 2.00 pm, we will move to questions without notice.

Senator CAMERON (New South Wales) (15:01): I move:

That the Senate take note of the answers given by the Minister for Employment (Senator Cash) to questions without notice asked by Senators Cameron and Watt today relating to the minister’s attendance before supplementary Budget estimates hearings of the Education and Employment Legislation Committee.1 Motions to take note of answers

This is a minister with no credibility, this is a minister who has misled the parliament on at least five occasions, this is a minister who refuses to accept any accountability and this is a minister who uses every opportunity in this place to slander decent working people while she presents herself in this place by hiding, by not answering any questions and by not being accountable to the Senate. This minister is an absolute disgrace. This minister sacrificed her own minder, one of her own senior staff, to save her own skin. That's what this minister did. She has got no credibility and no capacity to stand up here and argue any point on industrial relations portfolios, because she is an absolute fraud. She will be found out. She can run all she likes, as she is running out of the chamber now—she can run out of the chamber, but she will be held accountable. She will be held accountable by the Labor Party and she will be held accountable by the Senate because this minister has basically misled this place on at least five occasions.

The minister gets up today, when workers have been locked out by their employer for month after month in Queensland, and simply regurgitates a rumour based on no evidence, saying that workers in a small town claimed that they would rape the children of any worker who didn't support strike action. That's the level that this minister has got to. She has no credibility and absolutely no sense of decency. If she had any sense of decency whatsoever, she would be providing her resignation to the Senate now. When we see good people leaving the Senate and we see Senator Cash still here, it is no wonder the public is sickened by this rabble opposite, led by a weak Prime Minister. She comes in here day after day making up allegations against trade union leaders and against workers defending their jobs and defending their right to put food on the table for their family after being locked out for month after month.

This minister has got no right to be here after misleading the Senate the way she has. She has not gone anywhere near ministerial accountability. She has not gone anywhere near being accountable to the Senate. She has simply mouthed here allegations that there are no proof of. What she wants to do every time she is asked a serious question is to try and denigrate Labor members, trade unionists and workers out there trying to defend their job. That is common for this mob over here. This lot don't care about workers' rights or decency in the workplace. They simply want workers to be subdued by the employer, come to work every day and accept what the employer says. That's the style of this mob over here.

For a minister to come here and refuse to answer any questions—this is a minister who can't keep her mouth shut when she is on her feet attacking trade unions. But when she is asked a question about her credibility, about her behaviour, she can't sit down quick enough. She has absolutely no credibility as a minister and absolutely no credibility as a member of the government. She will continue to mislead this Senate because she has got nowhere to go. She was offered, day after day, to come and make herself accountable, and she has refused to do so. She has got no courage, no commitment to the Senate, no credibility as a minister. She is a disgrace and she should resign. (Time expired)

Senator ABETZ (Tasmania) (15:06): Can I first apologise to all those listening and to those in the gallery for the ugly display to which they were subjected to for the past five minutes. It was a display coming from a man, a senator, who sought to defend the criminally convicted Luke Collier at Senate estimates with over six dozen questions. Guess who Luke Collier worked for? Oh! The CFMEU. When we tell the truth—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Sterle ): Senator Abetz, just resume your seat. Senator Cameron, a point of order?

Senator Cameron: A point of order. This is in relation to 193. The member should not have any imputations of improper motives or personal reflections against a member or a senator. That's exactly what this minister has done. He has got no evidence of this. I have on two occasions indicated why I was asking questions. This minister should be made to withdraw.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator Cameron, that is a debating point. Senator Abetz.

Senator ABETZ: Just for those listening in, I actually happened to be the minister at the table whilst Senator Cameron was asking question after question to try to assert the integrity of one Luke Collier who is a criminally convicted individual who worked for the CFMEU. There was a protection racket going for this individual. Now, talking about the minister, Minister Cash, it was accused during question time that the minister was 'in hiding'. That would be like saying Uluru is in hiding. It sticks out. The minister is here and ready, willing and able to answer any specific question that senators had. Indeed, the opposition were given the opportunity of six questions, and all they asked were, 'Why are you in hiding?' when she was clearly, transparently, not in hiding. She was there and present, willing and able to answer specific questions. But, of course, the Labor Party, knowing they had no more material, had nowhere else to go, and so they just threw the slur. That is the way that they do their business.

In relation to the protection of workers, which Senator Cameron sought to clothe himself with, let me remind the Australian people that he is a frontbencher in a party led by a former trade union leader, Mr Shorten, who has threatened the Australian people to run Australia like a trade union. Now, how do people like Mr Shorten and the trade union movement run a trade union? Well, ask Kathy Jackson; ask Craig Thomson; ask Bruce Wilson—ask Mr Shorten, the member for Maribyrnong, in fact, because what he did was a dirty deal to cut the penalty rates of the Chiquita Mushrooms workers to ensure that his union got money at the expense of low-paid workers. The only people that have cut Australians' penalty rates have been Mr Shorten and the Australian Workers' Union. Indeed, the most recent decision of the Fair Work Commission in relation to penalty rates—and let's get the history here—was as a result of deliberate amendments forced through this place by the dying Labor government, when Mr Shorten was the minister, to ensure that penalty rates were specifically looked at. Who looked at those penalty rates, Mr Acting Deputy President Sterle? None other than people hand-picked by Labor onto the Fair Work Commission, appointments that I opposed and had indicated to Mr Shorten that I thought were not appropriate. Nevertheless, all of the people on the Fair Work Commission were hand-picked by Labor. Under Labor's legislation and by Labor's own hand-picked individuals, this decision was made. Why? Because they got mugged by the evidence, and the evidence is overwhelming: the higher the penalty rate, the fewer people employed in certain sectors. Might I add: we're not talking about nurses, ambulance people or fire brigades; we are talking only about the hospitality sector. They were mugged by the fact that that costs jobs.

Here we have a social justice decision out of the Fair Work Commission designed to give more Australians the opportunity to work, and what does Labor do? They say, 'We will seek to legislate to ensure that more of our fellow Australians stay on the scrap heap of unemployment.' And they claim to be the social justice party. Who do they lead-off with in this debate? The chief defender of the thugs in the CFMEU that Senator Cameron seeks to champion day after day at Senate estimates and in this place. You could never accuse Senator Cash of hiding, and it also highlights that Bill Shorten is unfit for government. (Time expired)

Senator CHISHOLM (Queensland) (15:12): It's no surprise that they'd send Senator Abetz in to talk about this issue, because he has really been the architect of the witch-hunt and pursuit of their political opponents that we've seen from those opposite now for more than four years. The reality of this situation is that it's actually the witch-hunt that they've had and the agenda that they've pursued that have unravelled with the overreach by Senator Cash and her office. I will come back to that in more detail, because I want to outlay some of the facts that we've seen that were outlaid by Senator Cameron—and I'm sure Senator Watt, behind me, will touch on them. They were two of the inquisitors that we saw in Senate estimates when Minister Cash failed to answer the questions, and failed to answer the questions in Senate question time as well. She may be here, but she certainly isn't answering the questions.

With Senator Cash, the reality is that she has no credibility, misled the Senate on five occasions, refuses to be accountable for ministerial standards, refuses to answer questions now in this chamber and is also refusing to attend another hearing of the estimates before parliament rises so that that can be further scrutinised. That's her record in this regard; that's the record of Senator Cash. It is unacceptable for the leader of government business in here to try to defend that. But there's a broader element to this, and that's the motivation of this government and the conduct of this minister.

Since coming to power more than four years ago, the government and the minister have spent millions of dollars pursuing Labor, pursuing a royal commission and targeting their political opponents with a whatever-it-takes attitude. The fact that they tipped off the media in regard to a raid on the AWU—I don't think that's the first time they've done it. This is really at the heart of what they have done. They use any opportunity, through this, to pursue their political opponents. They've done it, I'm sure, through the royal commission and, indeed, we've seen it in this chamber since I got elected last year. You'd get up and you'd see the front page of the paper: there would be a smear on a union or an individual that would be, no doubt, led by Senator Cash—they'd be there high-fiving in their office. Then the senator would come in here, take a question and smear again. That's what we've seen. This has been the tactic from those opposite. They've done it for four years. For four years they have pursued this, and it is now in tatters. The credibility of this attack is now in tatters. They pursued their political opponents through a royal commission. They did that, thinking it was going to impact on the last federal election campaign. They called a double dissolution on industrial relations issues, yet they never mentioned them again. We've seen over the last month that the credibility of Senator Cash, the lead attack dog on these issues, is in tatters. She didn't get a dixer on it this week—she's been focused on other things. That speaks volumes for how the government sees this and why it had to send in Senator Abetz to try to rebuild its attacks in this regard.

We know from the conduct of the staffer who tipped off the media is that there's no doubt that was encouraged within Senator Cash's office. They pursued a political strategy where they would tip off journos, to give them the heads-up, in trying to build a case against their political opponents, using every lever that they had to do it. I dare say they have, to quote a former Labor senator, a 'whatever it takes' attitude when it comes to pursuing their political opponents. That's what Senator Cash was responsible for. That's what her office was responsible for. What did they tell the Prime Minister? Did they fess up to him and say what they were up to when they met before question time? They let the staffer go, they threw him under a bus, but won't actually front up and give the answers that we are demanding and that the Australian public deserve to know in regard to this issue.

We'll continue to pursue Senator Cash and the others in regard to this, and we will continue to highlight the fact that the smear campaign against their political opponents that they've been pursuing now for four years is in tatters. In Senator Cash they've got a minister who has been at the forefront of this and who has no credibility. They've got a minister who is refusing to answer the questions that we are putting to her in regard to this, both in this chamber and through Senate estimates. And they've got a minister who should live up to the ministerial standards and make the decision to resign, because that is the only way the government can have credibility when it comes to workplace issues and governance in this country.

Senator BROCKMAN (Western Australia) (15:17): I think the only thing in tatters in this chamber at the moment is the credibility of the opposition, because what we've seen here is a continuing attack on an effective and highly credible minister of the Crown, one who is performing very ably in her role and who is revealing what the populace of Australia knows about the Australian Labor Party, the current opposition, and its leader: that the links to the union movement are corrosive and destructive.

We've seen the evidence presented by Minister Cash—credible, extensive evidence—to Senate estimates hearings revealing she was not aware of the AFP raids until they occurred and were reported in television coverage. Senator Cash made it very clear that she was not aware that her staff member had made the tip-off. She was informed, in fact, that there was no such tip-off. Senator Cash has been completely upfront and honest. She has appeared before Senate estimates hearings on this topic, she has presented herself in this place and we have seen extensive questioning from the opposition that has got absolutely nowhere. Why are the opposition continuing their attack on this highly effective and credible minister? Because they are running a protection racket for their leader, Bill Shorten. They're running a protection racket on donations to his own election campaign and on donations made to GetUp! when he was national secretary of the AWU. There are very important questions to be answered in this space and the answers have not been forthcoming from the Labor Party. They attack Minister Cash and they continue their attacks even when the results are proven to be so ineffective in this place.

We've seen so many examples of union members' money being wasted on unauthorised expenditure. Recently there was a union official given a 13-month sentence for spending union members' money on things like hen's parties, botox, kitchens and other personal expenses. And everyone in this place remembers Craig Thomson and what he was using the Health Services Union credit card for.

This use of union members' money should be of absolute concern to the Australian Labor Party—to the opposition in this place—but they don't seem to care. They just want to attack Minister Cash; they want to try to run their protection racket on Bill Shorten. What have we heard from the trade union royal commission? The trade union royal commission said:

The conduct that has emerged discloses systemic corruption and unlawful conduct, including corrupt payments, physical and verbal violence, threats, intimidation, abuse of right of entry permits, secondary boycotts, breaches of fiduciary duty and contempt of court.

That is the finding of a royal commission, and the reason why the opposition continues to attack Minister Cash is because it doesn't like the findings of the royal commission. It doesn't like the efforts of this government to crack down on union corruption—to pass laws banning secret payments between unions and big business.

In the past, millions of dollars of dodgy payments changed hands in exchange for unions selling down workers' pay and conditions. They didn't like the introduction of the ABCC: they didn't like the re-introduction of the ABCC, the industrial watchdog on the block of the building industry, making sure that we try to reduce the level of criminality and negative tactics in the building industry. We've seen massive hypocrisy on penalty rates, where we've seen low-paid workers sold down the river by their union bosses. It's a disgraceful fact that, as a union boss, Mr Shorten cut deals to lower penalty rates, including in the retail and hospitality industries by the same rate the Fair Work Commission is now applying for workers on the relevant awards.

They stripped penalty rates from low-paid cleaning workers at Clean Event, with no compensation. This is why the opposition continues to attack Minister Cash, one of the most effective and high-quality operators in this place.

Senator WATT (Queensland) (15:22): I also rise to take note of the answers of Senator Cash during question time. It was very interesting: up until a couple of weeks ago, the last sitting week or so, every day during question time we became used to Senator Cash coming into this chamber—usually on the back of a report that, coincidentally, she'd managed to get into a News Corporation paper that very day—to launch an attack on unions and working people, often based on very flimsy evidence. But it has been very interesting this week that Senator Cash has not decided to do that. She came in today and gave some answer about a question in the portfolio that she's representing another minister in. She has stayed well away this week from her traditional attacks on unions.

Now, why would that be? The only reason is that she at least has the self-awareness to understand that from estimates onwards not one person in this country takes anything that she says about unions seriously. The fact that she has launched a partisan campaign, based on flimsy evidence and using every arm of government available to her, against unions and working people was exposed at estimates, once and for all. And from that day onwards, everything that she says about unions, working people and the Labor Party no-one will ever believe again.

Let's just quickly remember what happened during estimates. We were all heading into estimates expecting to be asking questions of Minister Cash about her disgraceful handling of the other arm of the government against unions, being the ABCC. We all remember her own hand-picked appointment, Nigel Hadgkiss, who had to resign from his position in disgrace. We barely even got to that in estimates. There we were, ready to ask some questions about that, but Senator Cash and her office managed to concoct something even bigger still—an even bigger distraction from the affairs of the ABCC—and that was in the form of the AFP raid on union offices and the now notorious tip-off to the media by her own office.

It's well-known now that Minister Cash was asked about this over and over again during estimates, and on at least five occasions she misled the Senate committee as to what she knew and what her office had done in this entire affair. She had opportunities time and time again through that estimates proceeding—during lunchbreaks, morning tea breaks and afternoon tea breaks—she had every possible form of technology known to humankind in front of her and she was on it all day asking all sorts of questions of her office, but she never took the opportunity to ask her office whether the evidence she was giving the Senate was accurate. Do you know why? She didn't want to know the answer. She knew there was something going on there that she didn't want to know the full facts about. We can take only at face value the minister's answers when she said she was not aware that her own office had tipped off the media about the impending police raid on union offices, but there are so many questions that remained unanswered by this minister. They were not answered properly in estimates in any of the sessions. She was unavailable for the follow-up session and is now not making herself available for another estimates session until parliament rises for the year. Even today she has continued to refuse to answer these very legitimate questions that people all around Australia want answers to. She has still not answered, either to the committee or to the Senate, whether other members of her office were aware of the fact that the media were tipped off.

I asked Minister Cash about this on numerous occasions at the first and second estimates committee hearings, and each time she said she was unable to answer. I made it very clear that I wanted to know from her, beyond the one staff member who has resigned in disgrace, which other members of her office were aware that the media had been tipped off about the impending police raid. She has still not answered that question. She didn't answer it in estimates twice and she wasn't able to answer it and wasn't prepared to answer it here in question time again today. Beyond her own office, we still don't have answers as to what role the Prime Minister's office had in this affair. She wouldn't tell us at estimates and she won't tell us here in question time whether members of her office had spoken to the Prime Minister's office about the fact that they were tipping off media. She doesn't want to talk about that, because there's something she's still keen to hide, and today she wasn't prepared to tell us why she hid the truth from the Prime Minister. On the day this story broke she attended a question time briefing with the Prime Minister and misrepresented what one of the shadow frontbenchers, Anthony Albanese, had said on radio. She has been asked repeatedly: why did she mislead the Prime Minister? She continues to say no. We are not going to give this matter up. (Time expired)

Question agreed to.

Senator DI NATALE (Victoria—Leader of the Australian Greens) (15:27): I move:

That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Attorney-General (Senator Brandis) to a question without notice asked by Senator Di Natale today relating to section 44(i) of the Constitution.

This constitutional crisis engulfing the government calls into question the very legitimacy of this parliament and strikes at the heart of the community's confidence in our democratic process. People right around the country are looking at this parliament and they think it's a joke. It has become a laughing-stock. They look at the response to the dual citizenship crisis, and they see politicians lying, back-pedalling and obfuscating; they don't see politicians standing up, coming clean and recognising that people in this place have a responsibility to the Australian community. We saw someone today do something which has been quite unique throughout this crisis: Jacqui Lambie stood up, copped it on the chin, recognised that there were questions around her eligibility and resigned. She did it quickly, didn't leave questions lingering, got legal advice, got confirmation from the relevant authorities and did the right thing, the honourable thing, the decent thing. She follows in the path of Senator Waters and Senator Ludlam who, when they were caught up in this crisis, also did the right thing and the honourable thing. They didn't seek to blame other people or to make excuses; they copped it on the chin, took responsibility for their actions and resigned.

There are a few things that I would like to say about the matter. The first thing is that no-one would question Jacqui Lambie's, Scott Ludlam's, Larissa Waters's or, indeed, Barnaby Joyce's or Fiona Nash's commitment to Australia. No-one would suggest that they have divided loyalties, and no-one would suggest that they are people who are somehow torn in their allegiance to this country. The reality is that section 44 was written for another era. It's a relic of the past. It's no longer fit for modern, multicultural Australia. This is a nation made up of people from right around the world, which is something we should be immensely proud of. Our Constitution was written at a time when there was a real concern about people having divided loyalties, but that is not the case anymore. When it comes to section 44 of the Constitution and the idea that a dual citizenship is the arbiter of somebody's allegiance to Australia, we know that we have a problem.

I think that people like Larissa Waters, Scott Ludlam, Jacqui Lambie, Barnaby Joyce and the others who have been caught up in this are Aussies and that they do express a deep commitment to Australia, and no-one would question that, which is why it's so important that we need to see reform of section 44 of our Constitution. We do need that reform to happen. We do need to commit to doing that. We do need to undergo a process. I was encouraged, it must be said, by the answer given by the Attorney-General who expressed a similar view and said that this was now under active consideration by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters. That is a good thing. But let's also remember that, while it's there in our Constitution, it is all of our responsibility to uphold it.

The Constitution is our founding document. It's the foundation of our democracy. If we can't adhere to the Constitution then we shouldn't expect ordinary people to follow the rules that we set for them. The reality is that we can't have two standards: one for people inside this building and another one for people outside this building. That is why the response from the Prime Minister on this issue has been appalling. He initially instructed the High Court that they would adhere to his interpretation of the Constitution and then set a completely different standard for his ministers—one stood aside, yet Barnaby Joyce continued in his role. We saw the former President of the Senate sit on information after confiding in government ministers for weeks, and we have now seen the spectacle of John Alexander resigning as a result of his dual citizenship status.

The reality is that we need an audit. We need to put this mess behind us. We need to restore faith in our democracy, because right now people right around the country are looking at this parliament and saying, 'You are a joke.'

Question agreed to.

Senator KIM CARR (Victoria) (15:42): I move:

That the Senate—

(a) acknowledges the failure of the Abbott-Turnbull Government to manage offshore processing arrangements and secure other third country resettlement arrangements for eligible refugees;

(b) notes the United States of America refugee resettlement agreement will resettle up to 1 250 eligible refugees from Manus Island and Nauru but that some eligible refugees will miss out on the opportunity to resettle in America;

(c) acknowledges former Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced an agreement with Prime Minister John Key on 9 February 2013 at the annual Australia-New Zealand Leaders' meeting that:

   (i) New Zealand would resettle 150 refugees annually from Australia, including refugees from Manus Island and Nauru, and

   (ii) the first refugees would be resettled in 2014;

(d) notes that, if former Prime Minister Tony Abbott had not withdrawn from the agreement, as many as 600 refugees would have been resettled in New Zealand by now;

(e) acknowledges the inquiry and report of the Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee, Serious allegations of abuse, self-harm and neglect of asylum seekers in relation to the Nauru Regional Processing Centre, and any like allegations in relation to the Manus, and in particular, recommendation 7: "The committee recommends that the Australian Government give serious consideration to all resettlement offers it receives, including the Government of New Zealand's offer to resettle refugees from Papua New Guinea and the Republic of Nauru. Further, if particular resettlement offers are considered unsuitable, the Government should clearly outline the reasons";

(f) notes New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has renewed the offer to Australia to resettle 150 refugees from Manus Island and Nauru;

(g) notes Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has failed to explain why he will not accept New Zealand's offer to resettle eligible refugees from Manus and Nauru; and

(h) calls on the Turnbull Government to immediately accept New Zealand's offer to resettle refugees from Manus Island and Nauru and begin negotiating appropriate conditions, similar to the United States refugee resettlement agreement, to ensure people smugglers do not exploit vulnerable people.

Senator McGRATH (Queensland—Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) (15:42): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator McGRATH: The coalition government is committed to Operation Sovereign Borders and the policies that have kept children out of detention and prevented deaths at sea. The government will not be lectured to by the Labor Party on border protection. Australians have not forgotten the Labor-Greens border disaster, which saw 50,000 people arrive on more than 800 boats. The tragic mistakes of those opposite saw 8,000 children placed in detention and at least 1,200 lives lost at sea. The government will not repeat Labor's mistakes. Given the close ties between Australia and New Zealand, any resettlement of refugees in New Zealand would have serious implications for Operation Sovereign Borders. The coalition will not weaken our borders and never implement policies which risk putting people smugglers back into business.

The PRESIDENT: The question is that notice of motion No. 552, moved by Senator Carr, be agreed to.

Senator McKIM (Tasmania) (15:53): I move:

That the Senate—

   (a) notes that:

      (i) in 2013, the New Zealand Government first made an offer to Australia to resettle 150 refugees sent by Australia to Manus Island and Nauru,

      (ii) New Zealand Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Jacinda Ardern, has confirmed New Zealand's commitment to resettle 150 refugees sent by Australia to Manus Island and Nauru, stating that the offer remains "firmly on the table", and

      (iii) Prime Minister Ardern will again raise her country's offer to accept 150 refugees sent by Australia to Manus Island and Nauru when she meets Prime Minister Turnbull at the East Asia Summit in the Philippines this week; and

   (b) calls on Prime Minister Turnbull to accept New Zealand's offer to resettle 150 refugees sent by Australia to Manus Island and Nauru.

Senator McGRATH (Queensland—Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) (15:54): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator McGRATH: The coalition government will not weaken Australia's border protection measures. Senators will recall the tragic consequences of the last time the Australian Greens dictated border policy in this country, where 1,200 men, women and children drowned at sea and 8,000 children were placed in detention. No-one would be on Manus Island or Nauru if it were not for the disastrous policies of the Greens. If Senator McKim truly cared about the welfare of those on Manus and Nauru, he would get behind the government's US resettlement arrangement and stop counselling asylum seekers to act against their own best interests.

The PRESIDENT: The question is that notice of motion No. 561 standing in the name of Senator McKim be agreed to.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (15:59): I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that the Australian Greens website claims that the President of the United States of America "was elected on a platform of racism, division and fear" and that "his time in office so far could easily be confused for that of a fascist dictator";

(b) discourages honourable senators from making emotive statements of this nature about Australia's allies as they do not assist bilateral relations; and

(c) expresses its respect for the free, fair and democratic presidential election decision of the American people made on 8 November 2016.

Senator DI NATALE (Victoria—Leader of the Australian Greens) (15:59): I seek leave to amend the motion as circulated in the chamber.

The PRESIDENT: Is leave granted? It has not been circulated?

Senator DI NATALE: It is straightforward. I could read it out, if you like.

The PRESIDENT: If it is straightforward, feel free to read it out.

Senator DI NATALE: Thank you. I amend the motion by omitting in subparagraph (a) the words 'fascist dictator' and substituting the words 'belligerent, narcissistic, petulant, misogynistic, racist, ill-informed fool who poses a significant threat to global peace and security'.

The PRESIDENT: Is leave granted to move the amendment?

Leave not granted.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (16:00): I seek leave to make a brief statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator BERNARDI: I would ask that Senator Di Natale refer to his Greens colleagues by their appropriate titles rather than such pejorative slurs in the future.

Senator DI NATALE ( Victoria — Leader of the Australian Greens ) ( 16:01 ): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator DI NATALE: Mr President, really, we are talking about a man who poses a major threat to the security of not just our nation but, indeed, the world—the planet. This is a man who is goading the North Koreans into a nuclear conflict. This is a man who just recently was congratulating Mr Duterte, the leader of the Philippines, a man who has been involved with extrajudicial killings. Approximately 12,000 people are now dead in the drug wars in the Philippines. People have been killed without trial. We are seeing police involved. In fact, Mr Duterte himself was bragging about stabbing a man as a young person. Out here is the President of the US congratulating him, lauding him for his policies. I think to call him belligerent, narcissistic, petulant, misogynistic and racist is bang on the money.

Question negatived.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (16:02): I ask that general business notice of motion 548 standing in my name for today relating to the victims of communism be taken as a formal motion.

The PRESIDENT: Is there any objection to this motion being taken as formal?

Senator Gallagher: Yes, there is.

The PRESIDENT: There is an objection to the motion being granted formality, Senator Bernardi.

Senator GALLAGHER (Australian Capital Territory—Manager of Opposition Business in the Senate) (16:02): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: The question I'm being asked is: is leave granted for Senator Gallagher to make a short statement?

Senator Bernardi: On a point of clarification, if formality has been denied, then I could seek to suspend standing orders. If Senator Gallagher would like to make a short statement before this motion is taken as formal, I'm happy to accede to that. But, if the Senate wants me to suspend standing orders, I'm happy to do that, too.

The PRESIDENT: Senator Bernardi, I can only deal with what is before the chair. Formality has been denied to your motion. We have a request from a senator seeking leave of the Senate to make a short statement. Is leave granted? Leave is granted for one minute, Senator Gallagher.

Senator GALLAGHER: Thank you, Mr President. Labor has denied formality to this motion today because we believe issues such as the one raised by Senator Bernardi in motion number 548 should not be dealt with by a simple motion of the Senate. It relates to matters of international political history across a number of different countries. We believe that, if you're moving motions like this, there should be the opportunity for substantive debate on the issue by other senators. That is why we do want to cooperate with Senator Bernardi. We notice that there is often a number of motions from him across a wide range of issues. We do like to work with Senator Bernardi but we also feel it's important that when there are motions being put like this where other contributions could be made, or should be made, about these topics they should be dealt with not in general business notices of motion but rather through matters of public importance, private senators' time or general business time.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (16:04): I seek leave to make a brief statement in response.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator BERNARDI: Thank you, Senator Gallagher. I do appreciate your extending of the olive branch of cooperation. However, these things are not debated on a regular basis in matters of public importance or at any other time because people on that side of the chamber, including the Greens and yourselves, seek to game the system to prevent the crossbench from actually getting their motions up. Those of us who only have one vote only get to put one submission in, whereas you, the Greens and others put multiple submissions in, trying to game the system.

Opposition senators interjecting—

Senator BERNARDI: So, please, don't lecture me about the opportunities to debate these things. If you want to debate these things, let's have a discussion about it and a debate about it. You can perhaps put the motion in about the merits of communism tomorrow, if that's what you feel like—right? But the fact is that this is an ideology that has destroyed hundreds of millions of lives and you don't want to have a motion where we say that it's terrible and that we should be condemning it.

Senator McGRATH (Queensland—Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) (16:05): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator McGRATH: The government is disappointed that formality has been denied in these circumstances. The government agrees that the teachings of Lenin and Marx are completely inconsistent with the values of liberal democracy and freedom. We note the significant numbers of refugees who have come to Australia, fleeing communist regimes, and acknowledge the significant contribution they have made to Australian society.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (16:06): Yes. The third time strikes a charm! I move:

That the Senate supports repealing the Student Services Amenities Fee.

Senator McGRATH (Queensland—Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) (16:06): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator McGRATH: The coalition strongly opposed Labor's repeal of the voluntary student unionism laws passed under the Howard government. For many liberals and conservatives, guaranteeing students the basic right to freely associate and not be forced to join or to contribute funds to a student union has been a lifelong principle.

The PRESIDENT: The question is that notice of motion No. 549, standing in the name of Senator Bernardi, be agreed to.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (16:10): I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that 31 October 2017 marked the 500th anniversary of the Reformation triggered by Martin Luther;

(b) also notes that, in Australia and around the world, this anniversary was commemorated, including for the first time in history by Catholics and Protestants together in joint ecumenical events;

(c) further notes the significant social, political and religious changes that occurred throughout Europe as a result of, and in response to, the Reformation;

(d) recognises the benefits to Australian students from learning more about the Reformation in the school curriculum;

(e) further recognises the significant contribution of the Reformation to the advance of literacy and freedom of thought, conscience, belief and religion; and

(f) calls upon honourable senators, the House of Representatives and the Federal Government to uphold those freedoms in their legislative deliberations.

Senator McGRATH (Queensland—Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) (16:10): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator McGRATH: The Reformation was a turning point in the history of Western civilisation. A key element in the revised national curriculum places a renewed emphasis on the impact and significance of Western civilisation and Australia's Judaeo-Christian heritage, values and beliefs.

Question agreed to.

Senator BERNARDI (South Australia) (16:12): I move:

(1) That the Senate notes:

(a) the auspicious date of 15 October 1529 on which the Ottoman Empire's Siege of Vienna was broken;

(b) that, despite the lifting of the Siege of Vienna, violence and oppression against liberal-democracy and other faiths by Islamists has continued into our own time; and

(c) the creation of the croissant by the coffee houses of Vienna to celebrate the defeat of the Army of the Crescent.

(2) That the Senate calls on members and senators to enjoy a croissant with their coffee this week in solidarity with the defenders of liberalism and freedom.

Senator McGRATH (Queensland—Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister) (16:12): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator McGRATH: The government is pleased to note the breaking of the siege of Vienna on 15 October 1529 and is happy to encourage all members and senators to enjoy a croissant today, tomorrow and in the future in remembrance of this important occasion. However, to link this historical event to the present challenge of violent Islamism and the threat it poses to liberal democracies and other faiths is not accepted by the government. Violent Islamist extremism presents one of the most insidious and immediate national security challenges of our time, globally and within our own community. Over the last three years this government has embarked on the most comprehensive program of counterterrorism law reform in a generation to ensure the safety of the Australian people from terrorism.

The PRESIDENT: The question is that motion No. 551, standing in the name of Senate Bernardi, be agreed to.

Senator ABETZ (Tasmania) (16:18): I move:

That the Senate—

(a) affirms the independence of the Australian Electoral Commission;

(b) rejects allegations that the Australian Electoral Commission is partisan or unprofessional; and

(c) expresses full confidence in the Australian Electoral Commissioner.

Question agreed to.

Senator SINGH (Tasmania) (16:18): I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

   (i) 14 November 2017 is World Diabetes Day,

   (ii) the theme of World Diabetes Day 2017 is women and diabetes,

   (iii) diabetes is the epidemic of the 21st century where, according to the International Diabetes Federation, 199 million women are currently living with diabetes worldwide,

   (iv) in Australia, diabetes is the fastest growing chronic condition:

(A) around 1.7 million Australians have diabetes and 280 Australians develop diabetes every day, which is one person every five minutes,

(B) diabetes is the leading cause of preventable blindness in Australia,

(C) there are more than 4,400 amputations every year in Australia as a result of diabetes, and

(D) the total annual cost impact of diabetes in Australia is estimated at $14.6 billion,

   (v) type 1 diabetes mellitus, which accounts for 10 per cent of all diabetes diagnosis in Australia is an autoimmune condition (not lifestyle-related) affecting nearly 160 000 Australians and is one of the most common chronic diseases affecting children in Australia,

   (vi) people diagnosed with type 1 diabetes require insulin for life to manage their diabetes and live with the reality of hypoglycaemic fits, diabetic ketoacidosis and even death, along with the long-term health impacts, and

   (vii) because of this, type 1 diabetes is responsible for significant financial and emotional burdens on the afflicted, their families and the community;

(b) welcomes the Government's investment in diabetes treatment and research, including the provision of free continuous glucose monitoring devices to eligible children and people under the age of 21 years with type 1 diabetes; and

(c) calls on the Government to extend this much-needed support to pregnant women and adults with severe hypoglycaemia and limited awareness of their condition who have never been able to afford the technology, and the improvements in their health and safety it would give them.

Question agreed to.

The PRESIDENT (16:21): I inform the Senate that at 8.30 am this morning 11 proposals were received in accordance with standing order 75. The question of which proposal would be submitted to the Senate was determined by lot. As a result, I inform the Senate that the following letter has been received from Senator Whish-Wilson:

Pursuant to standing order 75, I propose that the following matter of public importance be submitted to the Senate for discussion:

'The refusal of the LNP and the ALP to solve the humanitarian crisis on Manus Island that they created.'

Is the proposal supported?

More than the number of senators required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

The PRESIDENT: I understand that informal arrangements have been made to allocate specific times to each of the speakers in today's debate. With the concurrence of the Senate, I shall ask the clerks to set the clock accordingly.

Senator McKIM (Tasmania) (16:22): There's no other way to describe what is currently happening on Manus Island than as a humanitarian calamity. There are people entering their 15th day today without access to drinking water, food, electricity and much-needed medication, thanks to the instruction given by the Australian government and the Australian Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, Peter Dutton, to cut off the essentials of life, beginning on 31 October, to well over 600 people. We've then seen Papua New Guinea police and Papua New Guinea immigration personnel go into the camp, overturn water containers, drain precious drinking water into the dust and, yesterday, deliberately drill holes in every water container they could find to stop the detainees from being able to store any rainwater they are able to catch.

This is a humanitarian calamity of bipartisan making. Remember, it was the Australian Labor Party who put every single one of these people on Manus Island in 2013. It is still unexplained why over 1,400 people who were actually on the same boats as the people that are currently on Manus Island and Nauru are here in Australia on various categories of visas, most of them living in the Australian community, while there are still over a thousand on Manus Island, in Port Moresby or in Nauru who are like the corpses that used to be impaled on the walls of medieval cities. It is a sickening, disgusting situation that is a result of a cruel, bipartisan lock step on immigration policy in this country.

Make no mistake: the world is watching in horror. The BBC, Al Jazeera, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Radio New Zealand, The New York Times—the list goes on of these global institutional media organisations who are reporting on these humanitarian crises.

Of course, it is the Liberal Party that have been running the detention centres on Manus Island and Nauru with extreme prejudice, in the most punitive and cruel way that they can, since they came to government, but the reason we still have these crises existing is that the Labor Party has forgotten itself. It's forgotten its roots. It's forgotten its compassion. It's forgotten its tolerance. If there is anything left in the famous light on the hill that Ben Chifley used to talk about with such fondness, that light is flickering; it is guttering; and, if it's still alive, it is in imminent danger of extinction.

Today I call on Labor Party members—and there are many good members of the ALP, senators and MPs who represent the ALP in this place, who we all know do not in their hearts support this policy—and I say to them: I'm pleased that you're speaking out. We are pleased about that, but it's not words that are going to solve this policy crisis; it is votes in this parliament that will solve this policy crisis. It is bums on seats that make laws in this place. It is the Labor and Liberal parties together who created this emergency by voting in favour of the cruel amendments to the Migration Act in 2013, and it is the Labor Party who have it within their capacity now to solve this issue.

If Labor stood up and voted with the Greens to end this humanitarian nightmare that well over 1,000 people are living on Manus Island and Nauru, the Liberal Party would not be able to stand up against it, because we know that the majority of the Australian people do not support what is going on on Manus Island and Nauru. Poll after poll has shown that over the last couple of weeks. We are seeing civil disobedience in ever-increasing numbers, and we will see more people engage in peaceful protest and civil disobedience in coming days and weeks. So I say to the Labor Party members who don't support this: thank you for speaking out, but please, please, vote with the Greens to end this humanitarian calamity.

Senator O'SULLIVAN (Queensland) (16:27): It's often not what the Greens say when they speak; it is about the things that they ignore. The Greens often come into this place and argue that laws should be broken. In this case, the good senator forgot to mention that these events are as a result of a ruling of the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea, so it was an order. For the entire time that I have been here, these people have called for the closing of this detention centre, and, when the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea ruled accordingly that it ought to be closed, of course overnight their voice changed. So it is not just hypocrisy; it is a concerted effort on their part to mislead the people of Australia with respect to these circumstances.

Senator McKim—can I say to you, Acting Deputy President—continued to refer to these events as a policy of the government. This is not the policy of the government. This is the government respecting the sovereignty of a foreign nation and indeed a partner in the Pacific, in Papua New Guinea, and fulfilling its wishes as ordered by the Supreme Court.

But let's just get back to the beginning. Come back to the beginning. What happened here was not the making of the government of the day. Fifty thousand people arrived illegally on over 800 boats over a period of time. It was an issue that the government inherited. The policy to put these people on Manus Island was a Greens-Labor policy, and our government had to arrive in government with a mop in one hand and a bucket in the other to clean up this mess.

You would've noted, colleagues, that not once—not once, ever—have the Greens protested about the 1,200 souls being lost at sea. Not once did they ever mention it. They want to talk about a calamity. Twelve hundred men, women and children—people whose names we don't know, in many circumstances—perished at sea, under a policy that the Greens supported in this place for many years. There were over 8,000 children detained, not under this government, but under a Labor government, and it took this government to get these children out of detention. We were able to do that, despite resistance. We're all well aware of the famous evidence by the Human Rights Commission President, who admitted, virtually, to colluding with the Labor Party, while the government was in a transitional phase, to bring criticism and to bring an inquiry onto the incoming government about children in detention. That was despite the fact that, in the early periods of this government, we removed hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of children out of detention and got them to the smallest numbers.

These people on Manus Island have choices. They have an opportunity, many of them, to go to the United States. But we have, particularly, Senator McKim up there, falsely misleading these people, so that they are resisting the opportunities that they have. They can settle in Papua New Guinea. They can move to—

Honourable senators interjecting—

Senator O'SULLIVAN: Well, they've got the choice already. If they've been determined to be refugees, they can settle in Papua New Guinea or they can apply to go to the United States. As to all of this rhetoric that comes out of the Greens about going to New Zealand: they already know what will happen. That will re-open people coming on the high seas into this part of the world, and more men, women, and children—whose lives you do not and have not valued or ever recognised—will perish at sea again. More people will die.

So we've got these people at Manus Island who've got choices. We've had the government of PNG declare publicly that there are other facilities to which they can go today. So they can move to these facilities. As to the standards and the care that they will receive, that, to date, has cost the Australian government $11 billion. That's 11,000 million dollars to support these people. And here you would think that somehow we've left them with a fig leaf over their vital parts, that we won't feed them or water them and that we won't give them health and psychiatric support.

One of the things that has never been recognised is this: say I were a refugee or had determined myself to be a refugee, and I had fled my country and had come, via all sorts of routes, on the high seas, on boats that should have had 50 people on them but had 500 on them, and had gone through the immense trauma of that journey to this place, and had watched my brothers and sisters and mother and father and children die, nameless, with no ceremony, no grave and no place to rest. It does not surprise me that many of these people find themselves in a conflicted position. It does not surprise me that many of these people feel traumatised. And what has our government done? We have provided exceptional health and support services for these people—so much so that many Australians in need of health and psychiatric care do not get care of the same standard that these people get it and don't get it within the same time frame. And Senator McKim knows this. This is the problem. These facts are inconvenient. And that's why we hear him over here, bellowing like an old bull caught in a barbed wire fence. Seriously, Senator McKim—as to what you've tried to portray here, you've been a single voice. You don't have any support from your colleagues. They're all silent around this question.

Senator McKim interjecting—

Senator O'SULLIVAN: No; they're all here today to wave their arms around for 10 minutes while you speak, but they've been silent on this in the public. You are a minority voice, and often—as I've said about other colleagues in this place sitting opposite—you are simply an expression waiting for a thought to follow. You do not think through your statements, and you come in here with this confected anger that you've directed at the government, who have unravelled what was a humanitarian crisis—

Senator McKim interjecting—

Senator O'SULLIVAN: Mr Acting Deputy President Gallacher, I suffer from a condition called sensitive ear, and I have to step away from foghorns, and senators are interrupting me while I am speaking. I would ask that you ask Senator McKim to give me the respect that I give him.

There are difficulties up there. There are difficulties up there, because Senator McKim and his predecessor, Senator Hanson-Young, have being going up there consistently to stir these people up there. They go there to give them absolute false hope. They go up there to convince them to engage in civil disobedience—which, of course, is one of the tools in their tool bag. They want them to resist. He talks about communicating with them all the time and giving them advice. Why don't you release any communications that you've got—texts and emails—with any of these people in this camp, so that we can make an assessment as to what sound advice you're giving them or, more likely than not, not giving them.

Senator Rhiannon interjecting—

Senator O'SULLIVAN: Senator, fancy that coming from you! Fancy you suggesting to me that I'm not telling the truth here. I just asked a question, and you need to get your colleague to provide those communications so that this Senate can make a judgement on them.

Senator McKim interjecting—

Senator O'SULLIVAN: I had an old utility that had a squeak like that and I got rid of it, and the Senate ought to get rid of you. In closing, this government has set an example to the world in terms of managing what has been a very difficult situation that it inherited from Labor and the Greens.

Senator McKim interjecting—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Order on my left!

Senator O'SULLIVAN: Jiminy cricket, he makes a lot of noise, that fellow! All I can recommend is that everybody looks carefully at the facts. Have a look not at what Senator McKim and the Greens say; have a look at what they don't say, because, when the inconvenient truths are presented, their protests sound very, very hollow. (Time expired)

Senator SINGH (Tasmania) (16:37): You can determine the health of a democracy by how it treats some of its most vulnerable people. Some of those vulnerable people were asylum seekers who travelled to Australia on leaky boats some many years ago and sought asylum. It is now some five years on and those asylum seekers, men, women, and children, on Manus Island and Nauru have been languishing and have been treated appallingly by this government. They have simply been left and forgotten. As a country, we cannot abdicate our responsibility for what occurs on Manus Island. But the other thing we should not be doing is creating politics out of this—and that is exactly what the government have been doing for so many years now. They have been creating fear politics with the Australian people. This, of course, has led to these asylum seekers not being able to be settled in Australia; in fact, not being able to be settled anywhere.

These asylum seekers have indeed been forgotten by this government—so much so that the government has received incredible and ongoing criticism not just from civil society here in Australia, not just from the opposition and other parties, but also from the international community, and only as recently as a week or so ago, when the United Nations Human Rights Committee released its recommendations from its review of Australia's compliance with a key human rights treaty, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights—another breach of a treaty that we have signed up to, but there are so many more. One thing I learnt last year when I spent some time at the United Nations was that the one issue that we were absolutely pulled over the coals for as a nation, and rightly so, was how we were treating vulnerable people who sought asylum—how we were treating refugees.

It's obviously a very opportune week for Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull because he's at the East Asia Summit. He has that opportunity again to engage with President Trump and also with Prime Minister Ardern. Both the US and the New Zealand governments have offered and agreed to settle these refugees who are desperately seeking settlement so that they can rebuild their lives and get over the trauma that they have suffered. We are still waiting, of course, for the some 1,250 that the US agreed to settle to actually be settled. There have only been about 50. But I understand from the briefings I've received that that processing is going as it should be and, hopefully, will happen sooner than later. The other offer on the table came over a year ago—probably 18 months ago now—from the former New Zealand government, but it has continued under the new New Zealand Labour government, to settle some 150 refugees a year who are on Manus.

I've written to Minister Dutton and I've written to Mr Turnbull. Labor has been constantly asking this government to act on these settlement options. But it's refusing to do so. What does that say about this government? It says that it is quite willing to leave 600 men on Manus Island, potentially in a situation where their lives are at stake and where they're fearing for their ongoing safety. It is absolutely abhorrent to me and to everyone in the Labor Party that a government would treat another human being in this way. We do have a sense of humanity and that is why we have been constantly asking this government to act, whether it's on the medical care that those on these offshore islands have required in Australia or whether it's on the New Zealand settlement arrangement. We have constantly been calling on this government to act.

I say to the Greens: I'm sure that you have well-intentioned ideals in wanting this situation to be resolved. But attacking the Labor Party time and time again is not going to get you there. We know what the facts are.

Senator McKim: Vote with us then!

Senator SINGH: Senator McKim constantly comes into this place and gets out on the media streams, saying, 'Tell everyone the facts.' We know the facts. We know how bad the facts are. We don't need you to constantly tell us the facts. We have civil society out there telling us the facts. I've had umpteen briefings from the UNHCR. Amnesty International are at this moment waiting in my office to give me another briefing. We've had so many briefings. We know how bad it is, and we have made it so public that the government knows. What we need are solutions. We need solutions to this problem. So stop playing politics with the Labor Party because you make yourselves just as bad as the government in doing so. We know you're the protest party. You're not a party of government. But you need to make a decision. What government do you want at the next election? Do you want a Labor government or do you want a coalition government? Every time you attack the progressive side of politics, you do yourself a disservice in the sense that you are assisting the coalition to win brownie points. That is not helping the people on Manus Island, nor the people on Nauru. Giving them false hope does not help.

The Greens cannot resolve this issue. They can come in here, they can pass motions and they can get in the media, but they will not be in government. There is a two-party preferred system in this country, and at the next election either there will be a Labor government or there will be a coalition government. I know which one I'd prefer, and I certainly know which one the people in my Australian community—indeed, in my Tasmanian community—would prefer when it comes to the issue of refugees. If they want make a protest vote, they can vote for the Greens.

Senator McKim: You've got the same policies as the Liberals!

Senator SINGH: But if they actually want a government—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Gallacher ): Senator Singh, resume your seat! Interjections are disorderly. Senators are expected to be heard in silence. Senator Singh, please address your remarks to the chair.

Senator SINGH: I am someone in the Labor Party—and I'm not the only person in the Labor Party—who has taken a very, very active and compassionate role in relation to the rights and the plight of refugees and asylum seekers for years. I will not have the Greens come into this place and pretend that they are holier than thou with their moral virtues, that they are somehow going to resolve this awful situation when they simply have no power to do so. Moving a motion in this place is not going to resolve that. No matter how many tweets, Facebook posts and media stunts you do they are not going to resolve that, so grow up! Grow up, and start to work out how to create good policy. The dark green taint of Senator McKim gives Senator Richard Di Natale absolutely no support whatsoever. I'm sure he will soon realise that.

I think that the Greens, to be honest, are trying somehow to remain relevant in a time when they have become more and more irrelevant. The more they've moved away from the trees and tried to move into mainstream politics they have failed. So the only way that they continue to remain relevant is by wedging the progressive side of politics—by wedging the very people who have decency, who have humanity and who have care for people who sought out our protection, who sought asylum.

I am so sick of it. So many people on this side are sick of it. Why don't you actually attack the government? It's the government that is treating people so badly. It's the government that can change its policies. That's what we do! We actually address the fact that it's the government failing these people and that it's the government that needs to find solutions. Why don't you go to New Zealand and talk to new Labour Prime Minister Ardern about her offer and ensure that Malcolm Turnbull takes it up? No, you attack the Labor Party. That's the Greens. That's what happens when the Greens run out of ideas about how to continue to increase their vote numbers. Let's face it, we know their dishonest approach when it comes to this debate.

Well, here we are, in a situation that is a calamity. It is indeed a catastrophe, and I do fear for the lives of those men on Manus Island. I fear for their safety and I fear for their lives. And I will continue, day in, day out, to try to ensure that the government moves on this issue and settles these refugees so that this terrible situation comes to an end.

Senator DI NATALE (Victoria—Leader of the Australian Greens) (16:47): I rise to speak about what this matter of public importance is actually about, and that is about the fate of those innocent people languishing in a jail where water and sanitation have been cut off. It is a humanitarian catastrophe, a crisis that needs to be resolved, and resolved urgently.

We now have over 400 men enclosed in the former detention centre, where food, water, sanitation and medical supplies, including medication, have been cut off from these people. Now, as a doctor, I can only imagine what the health consequences of these actions will be. We are going to see the spread of disease as a result of the lack of access to clean drinking water and to sanitation. That is a sure thing if this continues.

We know that many of these people are traumatised. They have fled wars. They have fled persecution and trauma. These are traumatised people, many of whom are depressed and many of whom are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Their psychotropic medication has now been withdrawn. We know that the abrupt withdrawal of medication like that can precipitate suicide. We know that people will die. Anti-convulsant medication has been taken away from people with epilepsy. It is remarkable that here we are in 21st century Australia and we have a government that is prepared to inflict more cruelty and more trauma on innocent people who are suffering. These aren't just the words of the Greens or of refugee advocates. The United Nations and Human Rights Watch have said this. We've heard Amnesty International describe what has happened to these people as torture. They are all saying this is a humanitarian crisis.

Senator Ian Macdonald: Who is?

Senator DI NATALE: I just said. I'll take Senator Macdonald's interjection. The UnitedNations and Human Rights Watch define this as a humanitarian crisis.

More than a week ago we saw water, electricity and food supplies cut off. People have been told, 'You need to move out,' but we know from the UNHCR that the reported facilities that were supposed to be ready are not fit for human habitation. But that, of course, is not the major issue. The major issue is that we are asking people to come out of that detention centre and go into an environment where there are a number of people in the local community who simply don't want them there and who are prepared to use violence to resolve this conflict. The fear of these individuals is real.

I pay tribute to Senator McKim for having the bravery and the courage to go there and bear witness to what's going on. Senator McKim stands like a beacon in this place for being prepared to bear witness. It's remarkable that people in this place would accuse Senator McKim and others of inciting violence, as though these individuals have no agency and no capacity or, because these are people who are coming from another culture, somehow they're not capable of making their own decisions. It is remarkable. The time has come for us to accept, at the very least, New Zealand's offer of generosity to take those 150 people, and to ditch the deal with the US. For God's sake, let's show a bit of humanity and a bit of decency. Why can't we bring them here? Why can't we offer these people safety?

Senator IAN MACDONALD (Queensland) (16:51): What an inconvenient situation for the Greens political party that I just happened to be in Papua New Guinea last week. Some lawyers, no doubt egged on by Senator McKim—and the usual bunch of lawyers that we get at every Senate estimates committee—took proceedings within the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea. That court met just last Tuesday, the 7th. The claim by these people was that the closure was unconstitutional. They were seeking orders from the Supreme Court to restrain military personnel from taking over the naval base. They were claiming orders that food should be restored and electricity and water supplies should be restored. But, of course, that was opposed by the PNG government, who are the relevant government, on the basis that services were fully provided at the east Lorengau detention centre for refugees, at the west Lorengau detention centre for refugees and at the Hillside centre for non-refugees.

I know it's not possible in this chamber for me to use props or to show this photograph, but let me describe the photograph from The National, the newspaper of Papua New Guinea, which has a policeman pointing to the east Lorengau camp that has been set up. I can't show this, but might I say it looks like a 1980s motel in Australia. It's a long building. It looks to contain 50 or so rooms. It's hard walled with cement pylons, windows and air conditioning. It has panels on the roof for electricity. When the Supreme Court heard all of the evidence from reliable sources, it dismissed the claim, saying that there were alternative facilities available. All of the lies you hear from the Greens political party and GetUp! about this being a humanitarian crisis and that people are living in a hovel are completely unnecessary, because the PNG government has provided not one, not two, but three other facilities where there is water, there is food, there is every facility and there is air conditioning—and a lot of better than many Australians have in their own home. I will seek later to table this newspaper cutting, which has a photograph of the east Lorengau centre that simply puts the lie to the Greens political party. You can see how they've all gone quiet, because someone has—

Senator McKim interjecting—

Senator IAN MACDONALD: You can say what you like when no-one else is there, Senator McKim, but I happened to be there. I happened to have some discussions with the member for Manus.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Gallacher ): I remind all senators that interjections are disorderly and that senators should address their comments through the chair.

Senator IAN MACDONALD: We're told these people are in a jail. It's the sort of inflammatory language the Greens use. They sent along their GetUp! people to invade my office last Friday when I was in PNG at the time—they were too stupid to come when I was there—and they got themselves arrested because they intimidated my staff. But we expect those sorts of things from the Greens and GetUp!. If Senator McKim and Senator Singh want to know what's really happening, why go to UNHCR officials? Some of them are good; some of them you couldn't describe that way. Why not go to the honest, hardworking Australian public servants who know what is happening there?

I have the misfortune of chairing the estimates committee where immigration is brought up, and every time Senator McKim keeps asking the same questions and being told by Australian public servants what the situation is. The situation is these people—who are not refugees, most of whom have been found not to be refugees; those who are refugees have been invited to apply to go to America or can settle within Papua New Guinea—are currently getting $174 a week in pay from the Australian taxpayer in addition to medical care and accommodation, which includes all of their food.

As Senator McKim has been told time and time again, the people on Manus are free to move around the island and in the general community there. The Courier Mail showed a wonderful photo of some of these so-called refugees being confined there, looking like they're on a holiday on a tropical island. They're allowed to do that. They live there freely. They can come and go as they please. Again, this is evidence in the Senate estimates committee. The service is much nicer at east Lorengau—I'm quoting an Australian official—than in the regional processing centre, which is where they were. All the accommodation being offered is hard walled. Each of the units in east Lorengau that people will be living in have a shared kitchen, a living facility, a number of bedrooms and a bathroom. They have a washing machine facility adjacent to the unit areas, as well as prayer rooms and other service areas where they can congregate and meet, and there are training facilities as well. Does this sound like a jail? Does this sound like the police and army in PNG are herding these people around and tipping over their only source of water? They only have to walk—they don't have to walk, they will be transported by the PNG officials—a couple of minutes away to three wonderful sites that are available and have all the food, all the medication, all the doctors, all the resources that are needed.

Yet Senator McKim would have Australians believe—and he fools some people. Some of these GetUp! numpties that run around protesting might be fooled by Senator McKim, but why don't they find out the real facts and not take the word of Senator McKim, who has a clear personal interest in this? I often wonder just how much the people smugglers donate to the Greens political party at election time, because every one of these illegal maritime arrivals was paying the people smugglers $15,000 per person. They're hardly poor people. That's in addition to the airfare to Indonesia. Senator McKim goes up there and gives these people false hope. He tells them that, if they protest enough, they might eventually get into Australia, but they will not get into Australia. They should know that. They have wonderful accommodation facilities, with food, water, clothing, electricity and air conditioning, just around the corner. But don't take my word for it; go and read the decision of the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea, which made findings of fact that there was no case for those people to stay there; there was nothing holding them there; there were other perfectly good facilities, with food, water, shelter and clothing, just around the corner.

It would help if some of the people there weren't alleged to have committed sexual offences on under-aged children there. That has upset some of the locals; I know that. But the majority of those there are not in that category and they are free to come and go. In fact, as someone said in the newspaper in PNG while unfortunately I just happened to be there last week, Senator McKim, these people have actually been moving from this site to these other sites for the last three years, walking back and forth quite safely with no threat to their lives or persons. All of the facilities are there and available.

I cannot believe how Greens political party members can tell blatant lies about the situation there when it is there for anyone to see.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Leyonhjelm ): Senator McKim, a point of order?

Senator McKim: Yes, a point of order: that is clearly an unparliamentary allegation that Senator Macdonald has raised.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Thank you, Senator McKim. It wasn't directed at any individual senator. That is not a point of order.

Senator IAN MACDONALD: It's true! The Greens political party did go around making up these lies to try to convince the gullible people who they then sent to invade my office in Townsville and intimidate my staff. Can I tell you, Senator McKim: if you're going to send them, next time at least get them to go while I'm there. They won't worry me—that is, if they get out of jail in time.

I don't want to demean this debate. I just ask anyone interested in the facts—

Senator McKim interjecting—

Senator IAN MACDONALD: interested in the facts, rather than the lies, to have a look at what Australian public servants say; to have a look at what the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea says—the actual facts of what's available. Everything you've heard from Senator McKim in this debate and elsewhere is factually wrong.

Senator RHIANNON (New South Wales) (17:02): Peter Dutton should be charged and tried with crimes against humanity. The evidence is clear from UN bodies, the AMA and Amnesty, and we've heard the contributions of Senators Nick McKim and Richard Di Natale—like Senator Di Natale's description of what is happening to the health of the 400 men forced into the most appalling situation, which is deeply shocking on its own, and Senator McKim's description of the deprivation with regard to the removal of water containers.

How could it come to this? We know why it's come to this. The Liberals and the Nationals see this as a way to retain power. They have been cultivating fear of refugees in this country for so long. This is the ugly side of politics in the 21st century. That it has come to this is incredible. I've lived in this country all my life, but to see our government, whatever its persuasion, doing this is deeply shocking. Peter Dutton, the minister, is holding on to his seat by 1,505 votes. That is what is motivating him so deeply to cultivate this fear amongst people, hoping that's how he can cling on to power. How forceful he is in wanting to retain that tactic was shown in the way he handled the offer from the new Prime Minister of New Zealand, Prime Minister Ardern, which said very clearly that 150 of these people could go to New Zealand. Before the Australian Prime Minister had had the opportunity to discuss that offer with the New Zealand Prime Minister, he was already out there condemning and rejecting it, because he wants to hold on to this scare tactic that they're running.

Why? Because we also know what the purpose of Manus is. The Prime Minister knows it, the former minister, Mr Morrison, knows it and Minister Dutton knows it—that is, they are using Manus Island as a deterrent by making the whole place so repulsive, so brutal. The degree of suffering, abuse and torture that the 600 men who have been there for many months have experienced is beyond belief. And that's the intent of this island—to make it so repulsive that the message will percolate out: 'Don't try and come to Australia; it's a ruthless regime, and this is what will happen to you.' So that's the situation with the coalition.

Now, as to Labor: Labor do need to look at what they're doing. There is a pathway for them to change their position. The United Nations Human Rights Council has called for Manus to be closed immediately. The United Nations refugee council has talked about the unspeakable persecution going on there. And, despite what Senator Macdonald says, the PNG government has said, very clearly, that this is Australia's responsibility, as have all those people there—the AMA; Catholic Social Services; Amnesty. Labor, if they could find their backbone, would have the backing of so many. They can have a pathway to standing up and doing the right thing by Australian law and by international law.

I do congratulate the protesters who disrupted the Melbourne Cup, and those who got onto the Opera House and took over the immigration department. Direct action is now being taken up by more people. People are angry in Australia; they're deeply disturbed. I very much congratulate Senator Nick McKim for going to that island and getting evidence from those people and bringing it back here. The clear message now is: evacuate. Evacuate now. Bring these 400 people to safety. That's 400 people; other countries have millions of refugees. It's time we did the right thing, and it should start with these 400 men.

Senator GALLACHER (South Australia) (17:06): I acknowledge the passion and fire that's in the debate currently before the chamber. A number of positions have been purported to be that of the Labor Party. I think it's really instructive to note general business notice of motion No. 552, moved by Senator Carr and carried by 31 to 28 votes in this chamber today. That clearly and succinctly sets out the position of the Australian Labor Party. It reads:

That the Senate—

(a) acknowledges the failure of the Abbott-Turnbull Government to manage offshore processing arrangements and secure other third country resettlement arrangements for eligible refugees;

(b) notes the United States of America refugee resettlement agreement will resettle up to 1 250 eligible refugees from Manus Island and Nauru but that some eligible refugees will miss out on the opportunity to resettle in America;

(c) acknowledges former Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced an agreement with Prime Minister John Key on 9 February 2013 at the annual Australia-New Zealand Leaders' meeting that:

   (i) New Zealand would resettle 150 refugees annually from Australia, including refugees from Manus Island and Nauru, and

   (ii) the first refugees would be resettled in 2014;

(d) notes that, if former Prime Minister Tony Abbott had not withdrawn from the agreement, as many as 600 refugees would have been resettled in New Zealand by now;

(e) acknowledges the inquiry and report of the Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee, Serious allegations of abuse, self-harm and neglect of asylum seekers in relation to the Nauru Regional Processing Centre, and any like allegations in relation to the Manus, and in particular, recommendation 7: "The committee recommends that the Australian Government give serious consideration to all resettlement offers it receives, including the Government of New Zealand's offer to resettle refugees from Papua New Guinea and the Republic of Nauru. Further, if particular resettlement offers are considered unsuitable, the Government should clearly outline the reasons";

(f) notes New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has renewed the offer to Australia to resettle 150 refugees from Manus Island and Nauru;

(g) notes Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has failed to explain why he will not accept New Zealand's offer to resettle eligible refugees from Manus and Nauru; and—

finally in this motion, the very good work of Senator Carr and others—

(h) calls on the Turnbull Government to immediately accept New Zealand's offer to resettle refugees from Manus Island and Nauru and begin negotiating appropriate conditions, similar to the United States refugee resettlement agreement, to ensure people smugglers do not exploit vulnerable people.

This has been an issue ever since I came into this place on, I think, 1 July 2011. I can remember Senator Cash being extremely vocal on this issue. It occurred to me at that time. Right at that point I thought: 'This is Australia. Why are we fighting over this issue? Our reputation as a taker of humanitarian refugees is without question.' Without question, we have taken more humanitarian refugees per capita than almost any other nation in the world. We've done it well, we've done it successfully and I think we did it in a bipartisan way. But the tragedy of this situation now is that we can't find our way through what looks like a pretty awful situation.

I don't like to turn on the TV and see people in distress anywhere, and we certainly don't like to see people who ostensibly are under the support, care and protection of the Australian government without electricity, water, medical facilities and the like. But I'm not sure that the political parties in this place at the moment—and I exempt the Labor Party from this, but I include the Greens party and the coalition—are really working in any way collegiately and cooperatively to a proper resolution.

It appears as if our Prime Minister has unerringly bad judgement and, whenever there is a chance to make a decision, he will unfailingly make the wrong decision. There is evidence of that right throughout his prime ministership. If ever there was a case for a Prime Minister to grab an issue by the whatever you'd like to refer to and show some genuine leadership, this is it. There have been a succession of ministers in this space. I do not talk at first hand, but I've heard in our caucus previous ministers in this space who have been distressed. The immigration portfolio has been a life-changing experience. It has really changed the way they've thought about and looked at the whole of our activity in this space. So it is not an easy portfolio and we had many problems, but what has happened has become immensely political now.

I get, like every senator in this place, the genuine concern. Australian constituents are making appointments, coming into my office and asking me to support positions which are contrary to my party policy and probably contrary to the fairly pragmatic position that I hold, but I understand the passion which they feel. They want these people to be in a better space, and it's a genuinely widely felt and deeply felt issue right throughout the Australian community. If ever there was one issue which we should be working together on, this is the type of issue where we should have no difference. Labor, Liberal, Green, Australian Conservatives—no-one should be allowed to get away with playing tawdry political games in this space.

Australia has an enviable reputation as a haven for people in humanitarian refugee intakes. I went to the town of Mount Gambier a couple of years ago, just after I became a senator. We had taken Karen refugees from the Burmese border. We had taken a chance, so to speak. We relocated them into regional South Australia, and in a very short space of time their children had taken over the schools. They were excellent in every area. The parents had got into viticulture and were all excelling at contributing to the economy. At their Australian citizenship ceremony, they sang the anthem in English, and all of them were working. We do this very well.

There is this really hard economic line about people who are refugees. Let's face it: we know that the stats say that quite a large proportion of these people on Manus Island are refugees. If we're not going to let them in here, we should be resettling them somewhere else. We shouldn't be simply saying, 'The door's closed here; you can rot in New Guinea,' because I don't think I would like to live in New Guinea. I don't think I would like the opportunity to participate in the New Guinea economy, and I qualify all this by saying I have never been in New Guinea, but, from what I have seen of some of the problems that any country that's developing has, it's not a place where I would like to go and resettle. So you can understand that these people are not actually inspired to settle in New Guinea.

But I really do think that we ought to do this debate a bit of justice and rise above the petty pointscoring and politics. I respect Senator Rhiannon's contribution, but I don't really think that roughing people up at a fundraiser or becoming strident in your verbal and physical actions is going to bring a result that helps people. I think the division that has been shown in this last hour is the problem. Harder heads need to get together, sit down and work out a compromise solution which sees these people move to New Zealand or move to the United States or move to any other resettlement option.

I don't disagree in some respects that the Hon. Peter Dutton would be the hardest of people in this space. Given that it's an extremely hard task, he has not shown any compassion, any mercy or anything other than, 'My way or the highway,' and, 'I am right on this.' Anyway, what it really looks like, and what I really have some discomfort with, is that he seems to think it's good politics. Well, if it is good politics and it gets him some votes, it's a disgraceful way to get votes by treading on people's humanity, by not affording them the generosity that was afforded to me, my family, Senator Dastyari's family and many hundreds of thousands, in fact millions, of Australians who came to this country, made a good life and were welcomed. If you want to play politics, this is the wrong issue.

Senator GRIFF (South Australia) (17:16): For two weeks now, over 600 asylum seekers and refugees have been holed up in the Manus Regional Processing Centre and have rightly refused to move to the new transit accommodation at Lorengau, which they fear very much is not secure. While these men endure squalid conditions, it is business as usual for this government. Drinking water, food, medical treatment, electricity and sewerage services have been cut off. The government has now made this PNG's problem, when it really very much should be ours.

This is an international embarrassment. Worse, how can Australia diplomatically counsel other countries about their human rights obligations when we are clearly—very clearly—failing ours? Need we be reminded that in June the government settled a $70 million class action brought about by more than 1,900 men who were detained in hostile and damaging conditions? It seems that, once asylum seekers arrive by boat, this government forgets that they are human beings with needs and emotions, no different from any of us here. Many have suffered terrible events in their home country and continue to suffer in detention.

The new transit accommodation has been hastily erected, and, according to the UNHCR, the West Lorengau transit facility was still incomplete by the time the men were due to move in on 31 October. This still appears to be the case.

Given the fact that the local community doesn't want them there and these detainees are really Australia's responsibility, the government should consider New Zealand's genuine offer to resettle 150 asylum seekers. That is 150 men and women who finally get a chance to live a full and peaceful life. As for the government's argument that it will encourage asylum seekers to use New Zealand as a back door to Australia, well, that argument is very flimsy. Besides the fact that it insults New Zealand by implying that people our neighbour accepts would immediately seek to leave rather than stay there, I fail to see how this argument can be sustained. Firstly, New Zealand is only proposing to take 150 people. It's not an open-ended offer. Secondly, a similar argument can be made against the US deal, which the government was so happy to jump on.

Too many asylum seekers spend too many years wallowing in immigration detention. The irony and the horror are that we are simply doing more damage to already traumatised people, and we offer them no hope. I add my voice to that of the UNHCR and many others urging the government to accept New Zealand's offer and, over and above that, to remember its humanity and expedite resettlement of all our offshore detainees.

Senator RICE (Victoria) (17:19): The humanitarian disaster that is unfolding on Manus Island makes me ashamed to be an Australian. The Australia that I know and love is a welcoming place. It's a place where we value people from all over the world. In particular, it's a place where we have welcomed refugees with open arms for decades and decades. The Australians that I know have good hearts. The Australians that I know do not condone torture—and that's what we are doing to these innocent people. The UNHCR says indefinite detention is torture—let alone leaving men to die, which is what is going on in the Manus Island detention centre now. This is Australia's Guantanamo Bay. This is our Gitmo.

The people of Australia are saying it's not happening in our name. The caring, thoughtful, welcoming people of Australia, who live in our diverse multicultural community, know that these people who we have locked up indefinitely, these people who have lost all hope, are our brothers, they are other people's brothers, they are people's husbands, they are people's children, they are people who love and live and just want a chance to be living a good life. They are people who have fled persecution from many different parts of the world—from Iran, from Iraq, from Burma. They are the Rohingyan refugees whom we in this place over the last month have been so concerned about and wanting to make sure that they could have a good life. That's who these people are. But because in their desperation to flee persecution they got on a boat to come to Australia we have turned our backs on them and said no. We've said: 'We don't see you as humans. We're just going to treat you as collateral damage. You are just the scapegoats. You are just going to be the example for the rest of the world to stop the boats.' And these men are dying to be that example.

That is not the Australia that I want to be part of. These men deserve a life. We know that we haven't even stopped the boats by having them at Manus island. We are just turning the boats away and not talking about it. We know what needs to happen to stop the boats—and that is for the world, including Australia, to accept that there are millions of refugees in the world who need to be resettled and that we need to be having serious attempts to create peace in their countries. These people are going to need to have places to be resettled in. We need to be lifting our intake of refugees in Australia, not turning people away.

We've got a chance to reshape what's going on now and actually say, 'Enough is enough. These people deserve to come to Australia. They can be Australians. They will fit in as Australians like refugees before them have done.' We have 400 people fleeing persecution. We have people there who can't be resettled in PNG because of its anti-homosexuality legislation. They would continue to be persecuted if they were to live in PNG. We should be welcoming these people as our fellow Australians and showing Australia to be the humanitarian, caring, welcoming country that we once were. (Time expired)

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Leyonhjelm ): Order! The time for the discussion has expired.