Asylum seekers and deportation of criminals key issues for the Prime Ministers of PNG and NZ
Jacinda Ardern was forced to catch a commercial flight home from Melbourne tonight after a malfunction on her defence force jet. It came after a day of high-level talks, including the issue of Kiwi deportations from Australia, which Ms Ardern said wasn’t “fair dinkum”.
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New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was forced to catch a commercial flight home tonight after her private plane was grounded in Melbourne this afternoon.
A New Zealand defence force spokesperson confirmed the engineering fault was related to the 757’s air data computer, which failed during pre-flight checks.
It came after a day of discussion on Australia’s deportation of criminals with almost no connection to New Zealand, which the Kiwi PM said isn’t “fair dinkum”, adding she won’t let the issue go.
New Zealanders who moved to Australia as toddlers and grew up to commit crimes have been regularly dumped back over the ditch, sparking anger from cross-Tasman neighbours.
Ms Ardern on Friday raised the issue yet again in a meeting with Prime Minister Scott Morrison in Melbourne, where they also discussed regional co-operation and business links.
“New Zealanders look at this policy and think ‘that’s not fair dinkum’,” she told reporters of the Australian deportation process.
Mr Morrison made it clear the policy will not change, but Ms Ardern said she will keep raising it.
“New Zealand absolutely accepts that Australia is within its right to deport those who have engaged in criminal activity in Australia,” she said. “However, there are examples, what I would call on the more extreme end, where individuals have little to no connection at all to
New Zealand, who have for all intents and purposes grown up in Australia, and those are the cases we continue to raise at every level.” Leaving the meeting, Mr Morrison did not answer a question on the deportation issue.
“Progress for a lot of issues today. It was wonderful ... it’s always a great relationship,” he told reporters.
A government spokesman told AAP there were no plans to change the policy.
Australia has so far refused to back down on the policy of deporting people to New Zealand, even if they moved to Australia as toddlers and grew up Australian.
Ms Ardern has said the policy is having a “corrosive” impact on the relationship between the two countries.
It comes after Ms Ardern was forced to admit a “gifting faux pas” after having nothing to offer in return to Australia’s soft toy pink bunny.
The mother to one-year-old Neve was thrilled to accept the floppy-eared toy on Friday in Melbourne where she met her Australian counterpart Scott Morrison and wife Jenny.
Mrs Morrison handed over a bag containing the gift but the NZ visitor offered nothing in return and was later quizzed by reporters.
“I have to admit that we usually get a heads up on whether or not gifts are going to be exchanged,” Ms Ardern said.
“I was all ready to roll and then was told ‘no gift exchange’. And so they’ve gifted us something for Neve.” A clearly grateful Ms Ardern laughed as she added “I think they intended to sneak that one in there”, before offering a sarcastic thanks to the reporter who raised the issue.
Earlier today, Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton said New Zealand was the only country where a citizen could get a visa to stay in Australia on arrival.
“But we have been very clear, if you come as a New Zealand citizen, a Brit, wherever you come from, your country of origin is where you go back to if you have committed a crime,” Mr Dutton told Nine’s Today Show.
“Where people are sexually offending against children for example, we have had a big push to try and deport those paedophiles.” Labor leader Anthony Albanese has no plans to change the policy either. “We think that the balance is essentially right but it’s legitimate if there are issues for Jacinda Ardern to raise those with Scott Morrison. We don’t want to see this to be a partisan debate,” he told Today.
Ardern’s visit comes as Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister James Marape is also meeting Mr Morrison this weekend — and he has a list of serious demands.
Mr Marape is demanding a deadline for ending the offshore processing of asylum seekers on Manus Island.
Mr Marape will urge the Morrison government to fix a timeline when he arrives in Australia for an official six-day visit this weekend.
“We would like it to be ended as soon as possible,” Mr Marape told ABC radio on Friday.
It has been six years since the Rudd government reintroduced offshore detention for asylum seekers who arrived by boat.
“I’ve met Immigration Minister Peter Dutton already; I’ve asked him to expedite the processing of asylum seekers,” Mr Marape said.
“We need to establish a timeline going forward.”
Around 450 asylum seekers remain in PNG and another 350 are being held on Nauru.
“There are genuine refugees and there are also non-genuine refugees. What happens to the rest of them we have in (our) country?” Mr Marape said.
“These are human beings we’re dealing with. We can’t leave them all hanging in space with no serious consideration into their future.”
Ms Ardern told a 2000-strong crowd in Melbourne on Thursday night she wanted to make a difference long after she finished as prime minister.
“Child poverty and climate change those are the two areas where I’d love to ensure what we do lasts,” Ms Ardern said at Melbourne Town Hall.
She was asked what it would take to get meaningful global action on climate change.
“I think a visit to the Pacific Islands might do it. I think we actually just do need to humanise this,” she said.
“If you visit Kiribati or Tuvalu, it is real. This is not a hypothetical. The changes they’re seeing in their natural environment is happening now.”
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