KIERAN GILBERT
Welcome back to AM Agenda. With me this morning, from Sydney, the Labor frontbencher David Bradbury. And from Melbourne, Liberal frontbencher Bruce Billson. Gentlemen, good morning. David I want to ask you first of all about the assurances on human rights in Malaysia. Some of your colleagues like Melissa Parke and Anna Burke, they've spoken publicly about their concerns about their deal with Malaysia. Will this guarantee, the immunity from harsh punishment like caning and so on, will that be enough to placate them?
DAVID BRADBURY
I think so and I think that Chris Bowen has been doing an outstanding job in working through what has been a very difficult issue and I think that the proposal that has now been the subject of the agreement, the final details of which we expect to be announced relatively shortly, really does achieve a really important and sophisticated response to a very complex problem. I think though, as Chris Bowen made the point, what is significant about this arrangement is the fact that it does strike at the very heart of this notion of the product that the people smugglers have been selling. I think that that is what is important about this proposal. I heard the comments that Scott Morrison made and frankly I think that Scott Morrison is a purveyor of half truths and misinformation and sometimes even inflammatory innuendo on this issue. But one of the questions that should have been put to Scott Morrison is that if a durable solution is as simple as picking up the phone to Nauru and putting TPVs back in place, why was it that last year he was out there proposing a so called 'Iranian Solution'? A proposal that said we should take people that arrive by boat, send them back to Iran and have them processed there. If he thought that picking up the boat phone to Nauru and putting TPVs in place, and I just remind you Kieran that when TPVs were put in place 8,000 asylum seekers arrived in the two years after that and in fact 95% of people who were subject to a TPV ended up being settled in Australia.
GILBERT
But the deal with, just to make it clear with the Iran proposal that Scott Morrison made, as part of a regional idea in Central Asia at the source countries to be overseen by the UNHCR, it would not have been an Australian driven initiative, it would have been a UN initiative. It was an idea that he floated but it was certainly not a primary option. The primary option that he's been arguing is Nauru and it remains that the facility there could be opened tomorrow.
BRADBURY
Absolutely Kieran, but the point remains that what we've just heard from Scott Morrison is that it's as simple as picking up the phone to Nauru and slapping TPVs on to people. What we know is that it will require a more sophisticated response than that. In fact by his own admission, by floating the proposal and you might seek to say that's about going back to the source, Malaysia is very much a source or certainly a transit country through which people seeking asylum in Australia have come. So I think that there is a bit of hair-splitting going on in relation to those two proposals but the fundamental point is that when we have Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison visit Nauru, and every time we hear Tony Abbott talking about picking up the phone to Nauru, Scott Morrison and Tony Abbott know, as does Bruce, that that facade will not be enough to tackle this problem.
GILBERT
Okay let's go to Bruce now then Dave, Bruce respond to a few of David's points there if you want to but also on Nauru, the argument that Chris Bowen made in that interview there says that most people sent to Nauru anyway, this was a one off off-shore processing centre, most of them who were processed there ended up in Australia so it's not really a disincentive that they want to break the business model of the people smugglers.
BRUCE BILLSON
Well Labor is so all over the place that they can't even cite evidence which supports their argument. What Minister Bowen is saying is that under the Nauru/Temporary Protection Visa model which the Howard Government implemented, those people that were found to be genuine refugees were settled in Australia. That's the whole point of the refugee process. What he doesn't talk about though is that during that period the average number of boats coming to Australia was three. Now since this great 'we'll take the product away from the people smugglers' announcement that Labor has made, there have been six boats arrive with three hundred people on board. So if they're taking the business model away from the people smugglers, under the Temporary Protection Visa/Nauru model which was successful with the Howard Government which included the orderly settlement of people that were found to be refugees, the point David was trying to make was about the weakness of the system when it was actually the strength of the system, three boats a year verses six in one month since the announcement of this plan. As each day goes by you see the Government falling over themselves to try and find answers to the problems that they've obviously not clearly thought about. Now, there are discussions of two categories of asylum seekers in Malaysia, when we were assured when that initiative was announced, everyone would be treated the same. There is now going to be a separate centre where people are going to be tagged, and then released in to the community. Where's the follow up care? Care about food, about access to health services, about education and all the things that Julian Burnside and others said you could be confident about in Nauru with Australia very much protecting the welfare of the people that were there that you can't be confident about in Malaysia. So all I hear are arguments from Labor which are just shooting themselves in the foot and not answering the real question which is why won't the Prime Minister pick up the phone to the President of Nauru and get on with it, with a solution that is proven to work and proven to see genuine refugees settled in Australia where their claims are verified.
GILBERT
Bruce I want to look at another big issue today and that is the live cattle trade. What is the Coalition's position on this? Do you support the suspension of live exports to Indonesia or not? The Nationals certainly have been scathing but I've spoken to some Liberals who back it.
BILLSON
Well the issue about what action should be taken has to be looked at in terms of where the problems are in Indonesia. It's remarkable that a month before extraordinary and incredibly abhorrent images appeared on the Four Corners program confronted the Australian public, we learnt that Minister Ludwig was already aware of the problems. Now what he has done was initially something we supported, stop the delivery of Australian cattle to abattoirs found not to be carrying out their activities in a humane way...
GILBERT
What about short terms bans across the board? Do you support that?
BILLSON
I'm not talking about the temporary short term ban while the Government gets its act together, we're talking about a ban or prohibition which would last a very short period of time whilst the Government gets its systems in place to verify those meat processing operations that are meeting all the expectations that the Australian public and industry has of them. As opposed to saying, well everybody is out including those who are doing the right thing, what kind of a message does that send to people who have made the investment, have certainty and quality assurance systems in place so that the animals are treated humanely are now getting swept up with the rogue abattoirs where decisive action was needed to be taken and we wonder when Joe Ludwig woke up to what everyone else seemed to know was going on. Which includes images that were carried in that broadcast that I understand the Minister was aware of a month before it went to air. Yet, he was caught flat-footed and now there seems to be no durable policy that the Government seems to be able to put forward.
GILBERT
David will the Government pay compensation to the graziers affected?
BRADBURY
I'm not going to speculate on the question of compensation but what we've just heard from Bruce there is something of a revelation. I think he should pick up the phone and call Warren Truss and advise Warren Truss that that is indeed Coalition policy if what Bruce has said is in fact the case. What we've heard from Mr Truss and others within the Coalition is that there is not a problem here. They have actually asserted that frankly there is not a problem here.
BILLSON
That's not right David.
BRADBURY
They believe it's not a problem that requires any action. What we have said is that this is a very difficult issue and I think that the full range of considerations that have to be taken into account are out there and are part of the public debate at the moment. The images that we saw on the Four Corners program were disturbing and every Australian that has seen them would find them disturbing. Having said that, we have some challenges we have to work through in terms of the fact that there are many Australians whose livelihoods are connected to this industry. We need to make sure that our response is a measured one that sends a very strong message about the sorts of standards we expect to be maintained throughout those destination countries, but equally...
GILBERT
Should the Government pay the compensation or should Meat & Livestock Australia pay it? The industry body.
BRADBURY
I'm not going to speculate on those matters because they will be the subject of other discussions by people that are closer to the action than me. I simply make this point and that is that the overwhelming view of constituents, not just in my electorate but I'm sure in many electorates across the country has been that Australians believe that we cannot allow the sorts of activities we've seen aired on that Four Corners program, to the extent that cleaning up the way in which these standards are adhered to and maintained in other countries, to the extent that that is needed in order to maintain an ongoing livestock trade, requires urgent attention and I think the Minister's response demonstrates that.
GILBERT
Okay let's get Bruce's thoughts, Bruce are you worried that your position on this is going to alienate some of your constituents who are, obviously there was a very strong reaction to those images?
BILLSON
Yeah and David is wrong. Warren Truss and the rest of the Coalition have been very clear. You've got to deal with the rogue operators that have been handling our Australian cattle humanely. If you saw that Four Corners report and you saw the cattlemen from the Northern Territory visibly moved by the images he'd seen, there is nobody who wants to see cattle treated inhumanely, nobody. Warren Truss has been consistent about that; the Coalition has been consistent about that. Where the Government is falling down is that they're damaging those who are doing the right thing because they've failed to put in place the appropriate systems to ensure the quality can be maintained, that humane treatment, proper training, the use of stunning technology and the modern equipment that meets all of the modern expectations that's reliably implemented and those abattoirs doing the right thing should be able to participate in the live cattle export trade. Those who aren't, they shouldn't be part of it and I think you get universal agreement.
BRADBURY
So do you support what we're doing or not Bruce? I'm no clearer now as to whether you're going to support us or not.
GILBERT
Unfortunately I can't allow elaboration and you guys will have to chat after the show, we've run out of time. Thanks a lot fellas, we appreciate it Bruce and David.