Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration) Share this | Hansard source

There is some good stuff in these amendments. Obviously some of the issues about personal identifiers are issues that Labor would not have a problem with. For procedural ease, we have allowed them to be all dealt with together, but there are a couple of things in here that are completely unacceptable and that is why Labor will be seeking to divide on these amendments when they are taken together.

I find it extraordinary that one of the arguments from the parliamentary secretary is that the real reason, the big reason, that they have for wanting to move it originally to three and now to four years is primarily to ensure that the people involved have the opportunity to appreciate the Australian way of life. Why not five years? Why shouldn’t people have five years to appreciate our way of life? What were the arguments that the parliamentary secretary quoted when he introduced the bill? He said, ‘This is the real reason,’ and he quoted the member for Parkes—from a speech that was about reaching a conclusion of three years. The parliamentary secretary actually incorporated into his speech arguments that were brought to the Australian parliament as to why it should be three years. He quoted them with authority and said, ‘These are the reasons you need to listen to.’ They are the reasons we are listening to. They are reasons that we take into account and they are the reasons why we announced we would support the bill. They are the reasons why we announced that this bill was not controversial and, hence, why we are debating it in here.

But it started to become controversial the moment this government, and I do not even know the extent to which I can say this government, at the moment this parliamentary secretary—and I respect that he is elevated beyond the parliamentary secretary level; he has more power than the previous junior minister had, and that was made clear during estimates—

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