Scott Morrison gets personal on border security

Scott Morrison has set up a national security showdown with Labor ahead of the election, due in May.

Scott Morrison: ‘Keeping Australians safe and secure … affects your every day.’ Picture: Getty Images

Scott Morrison has set up a national security showdown with Labor in a speech outlining his election manifesto and a plan to target Bill Shorten on border protection, community safety and economic management.

In an address to the National Press Club in Canberra, Mr Morrison personalised the importance of national security and made it a frontline election issue, declaring it was “not just about discussing the great geopolitical tensions of our time”.

“Keeping Australians safe and secure … affects your every day. It extends to our communities, our families, women, children and individual Australians,” he said.

“That’s how I see my national security and safety responsibilities to the Australian people.”

The Prime Minister linked the ­Coalition’s plan to return defence spending to 2 per cent of GDP and its $200 billion investment in Australia’s defence capability to other community safety measures aimed at thwarting drug trafficking, crime and domestic violence.

The Opposition Leader told Labor MPs last night that Mr Morrison’s address set the tone for the Coalition’s re-election campaign. “There was no mention of Medicare, hospitals, schools, TAFE, early education, climate change or the NBN,” Mr Shorten said. “In the end, there was only one message for the nation: be afraid; be afraid of the present; be afraid of of the future; be afraid of each other”.

Mr Morrison rejected suggestions the election, due in May, would be a referendum on leadership instability within the government and identified security and economic management as the key issues people would cast their votes on.

He said the election was “about the Australia you want to live in for the next decade. Do you want to live in a stronger Australia, under my government? Or do you want to live in a weaker Australia, under Bill Shorten and Labor?”

“People can rightly say that we’ve had three prime ministers — that is true. What they cannot say is that we’ve mismanaged the ­finances. They cannot say that we’ve mismanaged the budget or the economy,” he said.

“They cannot say that we’ve mishandled the borders or failed to invest in the defence forces or sec­ure our position in the Pacific and the broader Indo-Pacific region …

“The great myth of the 2013 election was that Labor was thrown out only because they had too many prime ministers. They were thrown out because they were a joke in government.”

Mr Morrison criticised Labor for being soft on national security.

“Our record includes 12 tranches of national security legislation passed,” he said. “But on almost every occasion, Labor has been dragged to support this vital legislation.”

Unveiling the government’s plan to “keep Australians safe”, Mr Morrison also released a brochure attacking Labor’s record and accusing it of delaying hundreds of defence projects, slashing defence spending and reducing sea cargo inspections when in government.

On borders, Mr Morrison ruled out any compromise with Labor on medical refugee transfers, saying existing policies had allowed the government to increase the humanitarian intake and provide 7046 women and children refuge in Australia since 2013.

“That’s what strong border protection delivers when it comes to human beings,” he said. “Our plan is simple. We won’t change it, not one jot. Labor will.”

Economic management, seen as a traditional area of strength for the Coalition, was also used as a vehicle to sharpen the contest with Labor ahead of the election.

Mr Morrison described Labor’s response to the banking royal commission and its demand for extra sitting weeks as “reckless”, and said implementing commissioner Kenneth Hayne’s recommendations would require 40 pieces of legislation.

“You cannot … scramble it together in a couple of weeks, throw it into a feverish sitting of parliament just before the election and then be surprised at the result,” he said. “Bill Shorten doesn’t understand the complexity of these measures, the consultation that has to be undertaken — the exposure drafts that need to be made available (and) the unintended consequences to be identified.”