This was never about children in offshore detention

The Medivac bill passed on a naive belief that Australians who want compassionate treatment of asylum seekers had somehow given up their support for strong borders, writes Peta Credlin.

Losing the seat of Wentworth to Kerryn Phelps last year was a heavy blow for the Morrison Government but her arrival in the parliament has now unmasked Labor’s true position on border protection.

This was never about children in offshore detention — that was a ruse. It was always about dismantling the Coalition’s border protection regime.

For six years, Bill Shorten had repeatedly maintained that there wasn’t a “cigarette paper” between him and the Coalition when it came to border protection.

But now that decisions on offshore detention are the work of any two activist doctors rather than our intelligence and security agencies, coupled with Labor’s promise to repeal temporary protection visas, other than saying they will turn boats around (and no-one believes that will ever happen), border protection has now dramatically returned as a key election issue.

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Back in December, when Labor voted for the Phelps Medivac bill in the Senate, Bill Shorten’s strategists were asleep at the wheel. In their rush to highlight the Morrison government’s minority status post-Wentworth, they allowed the vote to get up without thinking it through.

Independents Adam Bandt, Andrew Wilkie, Kerryn Phelps, Julia Banks and Rebekha Sharkie celebrate passing the Medivac Bill. Picture: Tracey Nearmy/Getty

On key matter of national security, they voted for change without a security briefing from officials and absent government legal advice on the implications. Too focused on scoring parliamentary points, they gambled their lead in the polls on the naive belief that Australians who want to see compassionate treatment of asylum seekers had somehow given up their support for strong borders.

They couldn’t be more wrong.

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Australia is one of only 27 nations that resettles refugees under the UNHCR, and we can do it because we run a system that’s fair, that is controlled and weeds out those who are not genuine refugees to ensure places go to those most in need. But as a people, we take a dim view of anyone who wants to exploit our generosity or rort the system.

This is what Labor has never understood. In trying to shame Australians who support strong borders, it has failed to comprehend that compassion, and support for orderly migration, can sit side-by-side.