Refugees

Ms DIGANCE (Elder) (15:34): I rise to speak today on an issue that I believe should be of concern to all Australians, an issue of basic human rights, a situation for which we all carry responsibility and cannot hide from. On 26 September, to the clink of champagne flutes, federal minister Scott Morrison, on behalf of the Australian government, signed a deal with the Cambodian government to arrange for refugees held on Nauru to be voluntarily resettled in Cambodia. Reports say that, at the time of this signing, protests on Nauru, which were into their fourth day rallying against the resettlement plan, culminated at about that very time with some asylum seekers apparently trying to take their own lives—truly acts of desperation.

I express deep concern at and disagreement with this deal and what has come and will come to pass. This is a matter that all Australians should be outraged with. It is a decision displaying little or no compassion and shuns our responsibility as a civilised society. This is a matter of human rights. It is a matter of the rights of those who have fled their homelands under duress. These refugees, otherwise known as people, like me and like you, have sought Australia's protection. How they arrived here is a separate issue, but the fact is they are here and deserve our care and protection.

I remind us all that a refugee by definition is a person who has been forced to leave their country in order to escape war, persecution or natural disaster. In this era of global unrest where we see record numbers of people forcibly displaced and around 87 per cent of refugees now being hosted by developing countries, it is critical that Australia does not shift its responsibilities to refugees elsewhere. Every country must play its part, and that includes us.

I happened to be in Phnom Penh soon after this agreement was signed and began very quickly to sense an embarrassment at being an Australian. Not once, not twice, but so many times I was asked by Cambodians why the Australian government had done this. Why would we not keep these people when they had already suffered enough? Why send them to Cambodia where life was hard? There had been protests outside the Australian embassy as Cambodians expressed their concerns at the plight of their lives which they believed now needed to compete with the pending refugees coming from Australia.

Cambodia, having been subjected to a heinous regime over 3½ years in the mid to late seventies, saw one quarter of the population killed, starved and die, and still carries these scars. It is not uncommon to speak to an adult who was directly affected by the Khmer Rouge. Eighty-five per cent of Cambodians earn less than $3 per day. Health services are still developing and are sparse in areas beyond the capital. Apparently 20 per cent of the population live below the poverty line and the country remains the poorest in Asia. It is also a country where 37 per cent of children under the age of five suffer from malnutrition.

I found the Cambodians I met to be welcoming, but many had very little themselves. The streets were frantic with cars, trucks and a sea of motorbikes honking, darting, weaving and dodging one another from sun up to well after sun down. Motorbikes carried families, mattresses, plates of glass for windows, and livestock. It seemed that bikes outnumbered cars about 50 to one. This is a nation recovering and its people are doing what they can to work through this.

I for one do not support this agreement that our federal government has struck and would remind them that in the past Australia has remained a supporter of human rights—

Mr Knoll interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I don't believe anyone is interjecting on my left.

Ms DIGANCE: —throughout international treaty negotiations and has ratified almost all major international human rights instruments, so this agreement makes me uneasy. To finish, I remind everyone that on Saturday 25 October we all have the opportunity to stand together, shoulder to shoulder, to walk and gather in unity in support of those who have come from across the sea, to say, 'You are welcome here,' and, 'Welcome to Australia,' to show compassion, respect and dignity for each other and every one of us.

Members interjecting:

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order!