Prime Minister Julia Gillard has announced the government will target ports of origin as it aims to stop people smuggling and stem the flow of asylum seekers to Australia.
Ms Gillard today called for a national debate on the asylum seeker issue, saying the community had been polarised by inflammatory language from the opposition.
Julia Gillard ... seeking a "frank" national debate on the issue.
She said the government's policy goal was clear.
"It is to wreck the people smuggling trade by removing the incentive for boats to leave their ports of origin in the first place," Ms Gillard said.
The Prime Minister said Labor's policy would seek to remove the "profitability of the trade and the danger of the voyage".
The announcement came after Opposition Leader Tony Abbott earlier in the day confirmed the Coalition had ratcheted up its border protection policy.
Ms Gillard said human rights lawyer Julian Burnside, QC, was right on the point when he said it would take 20 years to fill the MCG with illegal arrivals.
But the prominent barrister was wrong to label people with concerns about unauthorised arrivals "rednecks", she said.
"Of course there are racists in every country but expressing a desire for a clear and firm policy when you are faced with a difficult problem does not make you a racist," Ms Gillard said.
The debate on asylum seeker policy had been polarised by extreme emotionally charged claims and counter-claims by a fundamental disrespect the Prime Minister said she would reject.
"Even worse is the deliberate use of inflammatory politics presented as policy," Ms Gillard said, pointing to claims by the opposition they would turn boats back.
Mr Abbott’s "turn the boats back" slogan was shallow and "nonsense", Ms Gillard said.
His claim that the Howard government actively turned boats back was wrong, she said.
Just seven boats were turned back by the Howard government and the last was turned back in November 2003, Ms Gillard said.
"To avoid being turned around, boats are sabotaged, raising safety of life at sea concerns for Australian customs and border protection and defence personnel as well as the asylum seekers on board," she said.
"The second practical reality is that there is nowhere to turn the boats back to. Indonesia has made it clear that it will not accept such returned boats."
Ms Gillard said the division on the issue was creating an impasse.
"If you are hard headed, you’re dismissed as hard hearted, if you are open hearted you’re marginalised as supporting open borders," she said.
"I say to those engaged in this type of rhetoric: 'Stop selling our national character short. We are better than this. We are much better than this."
She said the focal strategy of turning boats back would become an operation of rescuing children from the water. So the policy would not work.
She said the boats must be stopped before they reached our shore line, from their point of origin.
Like all global challenges this one could only be tackled by working together. She said Australia was working with its regional neighbours and the UNHCR to deal with the problem.
Ms Gillard said talks were already under way with East Timorese President Jose Ramos-Horta to establish a processing centre for asylum seekers.
Ms Gillard has commissioned a report on "sustainable Australia", acknowledging that each region has different population needs.
She said the population debate should not be constrained by political correctness.
"It would be to ensure that arriving by boat does not give anybody an advantage in the likelihood that they would end up settling in Australia or other countries in the region," she said.
Ms Gillard said she had also spoken to New Zealand Prime Minister John Key about the possibility of a regional processing centre for asylum seekers.
"John said to me that he would be open to considering this initiative constructively," she said.
"East Timor and New Zealand are vital countries in this initiative, as they are already signatories to the refugee convention.
"And New Zealand, like Australia, is a key resettlement country."
Ms Gillard said she canvassed the idea with United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres as well.
Ms Gillard said so far this year more than 60 per cent of all asylum seekers arriving by boat had come from Afghanistan.
She said there was a time when a large number of Afghans were granted refugee status but since April more than 500 had been refused.
"During the past month the primary refusal rate has exceeded 70 per cent," she said.
"If upheld at review these increasing rates of refusal will result in many more people being returned to their homelands."
Ms Gillard said she wasn't immediately ending the halt in processing of Afghan asylum seekers but would keep that under review in coming weeks and months.
She said the government would work closely with the government of Afghanistan on a range of migration issues including implementing arrangements for the return of Afghans not found to be refugees.
"This process is essential for the integrity of our migration program and it's important for sending a clear message of deterrence to people smugglers and their clients that they cannot buy their way into Australia," she said.
She said she believed Australians were prepared to welcome genuine refugees but expected them to learn the rules under which the nation lives and abide by them.
"This means that when newcomers settle in our community they accept their responsibility as members of that community - to learn English, to get a job and send their kids to school like everyone else," Ms Gillard said.
"Most refugees fulfil these obligations and are grateful to be able to make a new home in this country.
"But the rules are the rules, we will ensure refugees shoulder the same obligations as Australians generally."
Opposition unveils 'no documents, no entry' policy
Asylum seekers who deliberately discard their passports before arriving in Australia will be turned away under a Coalition government.
The opposition today announced two new prongs to its border protection policy.
Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said a Coalition government would not tolerate asylum seekers who throw out their documentation.
"If someone wants to do that and seek to take advantage of Australia's generosity, then we won't be giving them the green light," he told ABC Radio today.
"What we will be doing is making them come back and provide even greater reasons as to why their case should be accepted."
The Coalition would also seek to bring more "objectivity" to the refugee approval process by taking the decision away from immigration officers on Christmas Island, and giving it to the minister, Mr Morrison said.
"It's not just no decisions that can be challenged, but also yes decisions if the minister believes that there is a need to do that," he said.
Asylum seeker rhetoric 'alarmist': lawyer
Mr Burnside told Sky News the Coalition's "alarmist" rhetoric, such as the term "border protection", was designed to make Australians fear asylum seekers.
Ms Gillard could win the election by taking a "principled stand" on the issue, Mr Burnside said.
"There are some electorates where there are people who think it would be a good idea to send the boats back at gunpoint," he said.
"I would regard that as a redneck attitude.
"If there are a few people who would rather see asylum seekers blown out of the water, well, I'm not sure that their views ought to govern the government's policy."
Liberal senator George Brandis said Mr Burnside's view was "condescending" to people with legitimate concerns.
"Not only does it not assist the debate ... to stigmatise those people as rednecks, it in fact inflames it by saying that those people are not entitled to their point of view," he told Sky News.
Small Business Minister Craig Emerson agreed the "redneck" label was unhelpful, but also objected to Senator Brandis's language.
"It is not unlawful to seek asylum by boat in Australia," he said.
"He is part of this process of loading up the show with emotion, taking about illegal boat people, unlawful arrivals, I don't think that helps."
AAP
