.Labor has seized on Tony Abbott's admission he should have backed the Gillard government's people swap deal with Malaysia while in opposition, saying it would have avoided the current scandals in offshore detention camps

Opposition frontbencher Stephen Conroy said if the 2011 proposal to send 800 asylum seekers to Malaysia in exchange for 4000 genuine refugees had eventuated, there would have been

no need for the Manus Island and Nauru detention centres.

"This would have avoided all of these problems," he told Sky News on Sunday, referring to allegations of abuse and self harm in incident reports leaked to the Guardian Australia last week.

"There were 600-odd deaths (at sea) after the Malaysia solution was rejected and all of the problems that have now emerged at Nauru and Manus would not have happened."

The Malaysia deal was quashed by the High Court and.



Federal Labor warns the problems with offshore detention centres could have been avoided had Tony Abbott allowed the Malaysia solution to go ahead in 2011.© AAP Image/Andrew Taylor Federal Labor warns the problems with offshore detention centres could have been avoided had Tony Abbott allowed the Malaysia solution to go ahead in 2011.  Senator Conroy said he was "absolutely gobsmacked" to read about Mr Abbott's change of heart.

The former prime minister on Friday conceded that while he doubted the Malaysia plan would have worked, allowing it could have avoided some of the "hyper-partisanship" that now poisons public life.

Labor is backing calls for a parliamentary inquiry to examine claims of abuse in the Nauru immigration detention centre.
Mr Abbott as opposition leader refused to back the Labor government's bill to override the decision
Labor senator Sam Dastyari said the federal government has a "secrecy fetish".

"Who are we as a nation, who are we as a people, if we're going to turn around and turn a blind eye to this type of human rights violations?" he told ABC TV.

Greens leader Richard Di Natale reiterated his calls for a royal commission into what's happening on Nauru.

He said the billions of dollars spent on Manus Island and Nauru detention centres would be better spent setting up processing centres in asylum seeker source and transit countries to stop people making boat journeys.

"While these centres continue to be open we're going to the sort of abuses occurring on kids," he told Sky News.


Its just one balls up after another isn't it rtardz 

Well well well

This is just unbelievable.  In fact, if it weren't in the link below, I would have put it down as an anti Abbott sledge.  Regrettably it's true.  When I think of the years of some of the Righties on here blaming Labor for deaths at sea, women and children dying on leaky boats, and now, what has always been suspected is now shown as true.   Abbott basically had a hand in the deaths of these people purely because he would not support Gillard's push to have Australian law changed to try and stop these people coming.  A purely political, selfish  stance that has led to hundreds dying

I feel ashamed to be an Australian when I read things like this

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/outspoken-tony-abbott-flies-the-flag...

The lowest common denominator as are his supporters that use deaths at sea as a wedge , maggots

Its time wrote on Aug 14^th, 2016 at 4:19pm:



Well that seems it was a no-goer. What should the government done when the High Court rejected the notion?

lee wrote on Aug 14^th, 2016 at 5:15pm:


Abbott was not in Government.  Labor was.  After the High Court decision, all Abbott had to do was support remedial legislation.  The Labor Government did not bother, as Abbott had made his position of strident opposition clear.  Remember, Labor was in minority Government then.

lee wrote on Aug 14^th, 2016 at 5:58pm:



you realise that is exactly what governments do each and every time they pass a bill, right?