Government concedes Malaysia deal off

13 Oct 2011, 8:35 pm   -   Source: AAP
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Julia Gillard has conceded the government can't implement its controversial Malaysian people swap deal.

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Prime Minister Julia Gillard has conceded her government cannot implement its controversial Malaysian people swap deal and says it will now revert to onshore processing of asylum seekers who arrive by boat.

Ms Gillard said on Thursday Labor remained committed to the Malaysian deal (to send 800 asylum seekers to Malaysia for processing and accept 4000 genuine refugees from that country) but it was clear it couldn't get the necessary legislation through the parliament.

The government abandoned its plan to bring the legislation to a lower house vote earlier in the day after key crossbench MP Tony Crook said he could not support it.

Even though the government was also unlikely to get the changes past the Greens in the Senate, Ms Gillard said the true blame lay with Opposition Leader Tony Abbott.

"It will continue to be the government's policy that the Malaysian arrangement should be implemented with an associated processing centre in PNG," Ms Gillard told reporters.

"Clearly until Mr Abbott faces up to the national interests we will not be able to implement it."

Ms Gillard said the bill - aimed at reinstating the government's power to send asylum seekers to third countries - would remain before the parliament indefinitely in case Mr Abbott should ever "wake up" and decide to support it.

For now, the government will continue processing asylum-seeking boat people onshore.

Ms Gillard conceded that was likely to result in an increase in the number of boats arriving.

"As a result of the conduct of Mr Abbott ... we are at a real risk of seeing more boats," she said.

"If we do see more boats - whilst we do have unused detention capacity now - that will put pressure on the detention network."

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen said the government would make greater use of bridging visas for asylum seekers who arrived by boat, to take some pressure off detention centres.

The government would also continue putting some asylum seekers into community-based detention. It had no plans to open new detention centres, Mr Bowen said.

Ms Gillard said the government would also give "active consideration" to boosting activities to detect and disrupt people-smuggling in Indonesia and elsewhere in the region.

She said the government would also honour its commitment to take 4000 refugees from Malaysia.

The government will make further announcements on asylum seekers in the coming weeks.

On the coalition's preference for offshore processing in Nauru, Ms Gillard again rejected it as an option.

"It does not have a deterrence effect - that's clearly the advice," she said.

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said the government had "raised the white flag" of surrender on border protection.

"This is a prime minister that wants to blame everyone but herself," he told reporters.

"The prime minister should of course resign over this, the immigration minister should of course resign over this."

He renewed the coalition's call for the government to call an early election.

The Australian Greens welcomed the return to onshore processing but want changes to make it more efficient and humane.

"What we are saying is that the government should translate their decision, interim as it may be, to process people onshore into a long term decision," party leader Bob Brown said.

"That would be a better outcome."

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