Coalition pledges Nauru tent city

• published: 30 Jul 2013
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THE Coalition is planning to establish a tent city on Nauru to hold thousands of asylum-seekers under a commitment lasting at least five years, escalating the policy fight on border protection as Labor prepares to transfer detainees to Papua New Guinea as soon as tonight. An Abbott government would build the new camp to take at least 2000 people while finding locations for thousands more in a major policy move that would give asylum-seekers "no guarantee" of settlement in Australia. The Coalition proposal counters Kevin Rudd's plan to redirect new arrivals to Manus Island in PNG, arguing it would be faster and cheaper to use the "immediate capacity" available for tents and marquees on Nauru. Tony Abbott this morning said Nauru was "quite a pleasant island", and the tent accommodation would be temporary. "Nauru is by no means an unpleasant place to live," he told Seven's Sunrise program. "And over time, you would have better facilities. We would be using tents initially because that's what you have to do if you're going to ramp up accommodation very quickly. And we may need a very significant accommodation capacity on Nauru." Mr Abbott said the Coalition would "hit the ground running" with "proper offshore processing". However, he said the plan was not radically different from the Coalition's long-standing policy. "We are just consistently, clearly working on the policies that we have been quite clear about for more than a decade," he said. PNG Prime Minister Peter O'Neill yesterday raised new questions over where refugees would be ultimately taken under the Labor policy, telling The Australian that anyone sent to his country could wait up to eight years to be resettled there. Adding to the challenge of finding locations for regional detention centres, the Fiji government lashed out at Australia for using its Pacific neighbours to fix a domestic problem and declaring the centres would "destabilise" island societies. Fiji Foreign Minister Ratu Inoke Kubuabola warned against centres he said were being discussed for the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu on the grounds they would alter the social fabric of any country that accepted a deal. The speed and capacity of the offshore projects are central questions in the policy fight as the rate of arrivals over the past week exceeded the current housing in the Manus Island detention centre. About 1350 asylum-seekers have arrived since the Prime Minister unveiled his hardline stance on July 19 but there have not been any arrivals for the past three days. In a bid to show the Labor policy taking effect, Immigration Minister Tony Burke plans to send the first people caught by the new regime to Manus Island as soon as tonight. The Australian understands an initial transfer of about 40 single men will be flown off Christmas Island under heavy security from the Australian Federal Police. Coalition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison toured potential sites in Nauru yesterday to emphasise his argument that the island had the capacity to take 5000 asylum-seekers over time in tents and permanent facilities. The plan includes a village on Nauru to hold those who gain refugee status, keeping them on the island while they hope for settlement elsewhere. The Coalition would expect the Nauru government to keep processing asylum-seekers - as it does under the current government policy. Neither Labor nor the Coalition would expect the host nations to house all those who arrived by boat, given that 29.5 per cent of the 1637 people taken to Nauru and Manus under the Howard government's Pacific Solution ended up returning voluntarily to their home countries. Another 43 per cent of those taken to Nauru and Manus from 2001 to 2008 were eventually settled in Australia, according to government figures. Mr Morrison said yesterday that some asylum-seekers might be resettled in Australia but there was "no guarantee" this would happen and that refugees could be transferred to Canada, New Zealand or elsewhere.