Labor’s asylum-seeker headache lands in WA as arrivals sent to Nauru

The first boatload of asylum-seekers to reach Australia under the Albanese government has sparked criticism that Labor is soft on borders.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and Immigration Minister Dan Tehan. Picture: Martin Ollman / NCA NewsWire

Peter Dutton has warned Anthony Albanese has given people-smugglers a green light to resume operations, after confirmation that 12 asylum-seekers caught by the Australian Border Force in Western Australia were unauthorised maritime arrivals.

As the 12 were flown to Nauru on Friday to await processing, the Opposition Leader said the government’s dismantling of Operation Sovereign Borders could see “people drown at sea and kids end up back in detention”.

Mr Dutton also ramped up ­attacks on the government’s ­security screening of 860 Palestinians granted visas, urging the Prime Minister to “get across the detail and … start conducting proper checks and searches ­before people land in our country”.

The asylum-seeker group, which was flown to Darwin after being found in an isolated and rugged stretch of the Kimberley coastline on Wednesday, was the first of 10 ventures since last year’s election to breach Operation Sovereign Borders.

Government officials suspect the group may have paid Indonesian fishermen to drop it off on the Anjo Peninsula – the closest point on the Australian mainland to Java. This is partly because authorities have not found a boat.

The group that reached far northern WA is the second lot to be sent to Nauru since September, when 11 asylum-seekers were intercepted at sea and transferred to the Pacific Island. Before that, Australia had not sent any asylum-seekers to Nauru for nine years.

Asylum-boats have continued to try to reach Australia since Kevin Rudd declared in 2013 that no new arrivals would be settled in Australia but the frequency of attempts has varied greatly. Since May last year, there have been 11 known people-smuggler ventures to Australia including one boat that was intercepted the day before Labor was elected and four boats intercepted that June.

Mr Dutton, a former immigration and home affairs minister who oversaw Operation Sovereign Borders, accused Mr Albanese of a “catastrophic failure” on border security.

“The Albanese government dismantles Operation Sovereign Borders and the boats restart. Under this Prime Minister, he stops the economy but he starts the boats. The people-smugglers have worked out there’s a Prime Minister who’s weak and doesn’t have the ability to stand up to people-smuggling and the human tragedy if it starts again,” he told radio 2GB.

After the government abolished temporary protection visas and watered down other immigration enforcement powers, which Mr Dutton says creates a “pull-factor” for people-smugglers, the Liberal leader warned “there’s a greater likelihood that these people now stay”. “(The people-smugglers will) say … jump on the boat because look at what’s happened with the High Court; you can get an outcome in Australia which means you might be in immigration detention for a few months, or even a couple of years, but eventually you’ll get back out into the community and you’ll be given a permanent visa,” Mr Dutton said.

After the government rushed through emergency powers legislation last week in response to a High Court ruling on indefinite detention, Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil on Friday said “national security is the first priority of our government”.

She accused Mr Dutton of being a “reckless politician who will do and say anything to score political points – even if it puts the national security of Australians at risk”.

“Whether it’s the conflict in the Middle East, tensions at home, Operation Sovereign Borders or even the highly sensitive security operations involved in individuals returning from conflict, there’s nothing Peter Dutton won’t use for his own political ends,” Ms O’Neil said.

“Our government is careful and deliberate about how we discuss national security issues and especially operational matters.”