2024-05-07
In a historic failure, the Albanese government has been unable to get a single stakeholder to support their shambolic Migration Amendment (Removals and Other Measures) Bill 2024.
The committee report on the Bill released today demonstrates just how isolated Labor is in this attack on Australia’s diaspora communities.
The Greens dissenting report summarises the unanimous calls from the stakeholders and the broader public to scrap this anti-refugee and travel ban push.
With over 120 public submissions to the Senate inquiry into the Bill, only one supported it, and that was from the Department of Home Affairs itself.
Throughout the inquiry, this Bill was shown to be racist, in breach of international law, a threat to social cohesion, cruel, ineffective and unworkable. Despite this the Labor majority Senate Standing Committees on Legal and Constitutional Affairs’s report supports the Bill. That is a recommendation with no friends.
The Bill is not only cruel but also unnecessary, with the proposed powers unlikely to achieve anything more than whipping up fear and racism. There is also a deep lack of substance to this Bill, with the government providing conflicting information on who will be affected and blatantly refusing to tell the public key facts about its impact.
The debate now moves to the Senate where the government has no certain path for this Bill to proceed, with the Greens and progressive crossbenchers opposed, and the Coalition far from a certain partner.
Senator Shoebridge's dissenting report can be found here on page 97 [link]
Greens Immigration Spokesperson Senator David Shoebridge said: “Every single witness and submission to this inquiry, apart from those paid by the Commonwealth, demanded this Bill be rejected.
“I cannot recall another occasion when the government of the day has been so monumentally out of touch with the public. This is an unprecedented level of rejection.
”Given how many fundamental issues have been demonstrated with this Bill it is extraordinary that the Albanese government tried to ram it through Parliament's last session in less than two days. We now know that had Parliament agreed to that reckless proposal from the Albanese government it certainly would have made a terrible mistake.
“Instead of taking the opposition on board the Albanese Government has instead doubled down and are refusing to tell either this committee or the public who they want to target with this Bill or the countries they intend to blacklist.
“Not since the White Australia policy has a proposal by the Federal Government been so fundamentally against the spirit of multiculturalism in Australia or been such a direct threat to diaspora communities in the country.
“The Albanese Government has chosen to try to outflank Dutton to the right on immigration. This is a contest they can never win.
“This Bill can’t be fixed by amendment, it is so fundamentally flawed it must not be allowed to become law.
“The Greens have heard the message loud and clear during this inquiry and we will vote accordingly to reject the Bill in full,” Senator Shoebridge said.