The Coalition says in government, it would allocate tens-of-millions of dollars to try to stop asylum seeker boats leaving for Australia, while they were still in Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Indonesia.
The plan would include a boat buy-back scheme in Indonesia and cash rewards for locals who provide information about people smugglers that led to an arrest or disruption of their trade.
Under the Coalition's plan, the Australian government would purchase boats from poor fishermen, if intelligence identified they were about to be used by people smugglers to move asylum seekers.
After purchase, the boats would be destroyed.
Under what the Coalition is calling the "Village Watch Program", Indonesians would also be eligible for cash rewards for information leading to an arrest or major disruption to the people smuggling trade.
Opposition leader Tony Abbott says the plan adds to the measures already announced by the Coalition.
"In order to stop the boats we need action at all points in the people smuggling chain. We need action in source countries. We need action at airports in Malaysia and Indonesia. We need action on the ground in Indonesia, on the coast of Indonesia. We need action on the high seas. And we need better action here in Australia. So this is adding to the arsenal of options that we need if we are genuinely going to stop the boats."
Immigration spokesman Scott Morrison says the Coalition would deploy more Australian Federal Police resources to Sri Lanka, as a source country for many asylum seekers, and to Indonesia, as the departure point for most asylum seeker boats.
He says Australia would also work more closely with authorities Malaysia, used by many asylum seekers as a transit country.
Mr Morrison says a Coalition government would also appoint a special envoy to liaise with countries in the region on anti people-smuggling measures.
"This isn't a diplomatic role. This is an operational 'get it done' role where this envoy would be working with the Indonesian national police, with the military, with the similar agencies. To work through the operational challenges and how the sort of commitment we've made in this policy can be put to best effect on the ground in these countries."
Immigration Minister Tony Burke describes the Coalition's proposed boat buy-back scheme as bizarre.
Mr Burke says it would stimulate the boat-building industry in Indonesia.
"Of all the mad ideas I've heard in immigration I think boat buy-back wins. The whole concept that you can deal with three quarters of a million boats most of which are being used for poor villagers to make a livelihood and Australian officials are going to wander in to buy the boats from them? And whatever pace we were to buy them it wouldn't match the pace at which new boats were being replaced to manufactured to replace them. It is simply crazy policy."
Mr Abbott says he's briefed Indonesian, Malaysia and and Sri Lankan diplomats in Canberra about the Coalition plan.
