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April 11th, 2013 
Bob Katter MP, Leader of Katters’ Australia Party. Picture: Russell Shakespeare
Source: News Limited
BOB Katter wants missile-equipped boats to patrol waters for asylum seekers, but says the arms would be to help deal with other potential threats.
Mr Katter says Australia doesn’t have enough military and customs resources to patrol the massive coastline, and more boats are needed, but the arms would be to help deal with other potential threats.
His comments come two days after a rickety fishing boat crammed with Sri Lankan asylum seekers surprisingly turned up at WA’s Geraldton port after spending weeks travelling more than 5000km.
“The case this week reflects the fact that 90 per cent of our sightings going back 15 years ago came from fishing vessels,” Mr Katter said.
“We have only one-tenth of the number of (fishing) boats that we had out there before, so there’s no spotters out there anymore.
“Now as for the government efforts, they have on average six patrol boats patrolling 16,000 kilometres of northern coastline.
“We need 100 patrol boats, a bit bigger than the conventional patrol boats … built to take six cruise missiles and have interception capacity.”
The missiles would purely be for defensive purposes, he said.
“Normally, they would operate just as a patrol boat.”
The plan would cost a lot, but Katter’s Australian Party suggests putting aside 10 per cent of customs duty to fund it.
“These people will now have a barrier that they can’t break through and once they know that, they won’t come,” Mr Katter said.
The party has some other plans on immigration but will not reveal them until they become firm policy.
The New Zealand flag flies from the boat carrying Sri Lankan asylum seekers. Picture: Graeme Gibbons
Mr Katter also said opposition leader Tony Abbott could only claim the previous Liberal government was successful in reducing the number of asylum seeker boats towards the end of its term because it turned them back to Indonesia, and called on him come up with a better policy.
“There is as much chance of Indonesia taking a boat back now as I’ve got of becoming an astronaut and going to Mars.”
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Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare said today border protection authorities have confirmed a group of asylum-seekers who arrived on the Australian mainland this week were trying to get to New Zealand.
Speaking this morning Mr Clare also said if any of the 66 passengers on board the vessel that arrived in Geraldton in WA on Tuesday were found not to have a genuine asylum claim they would be immediately flown back to Sri Lanka.
It came as the Coalition confirmed it would pursue a plan to spend around $1.5 billion securing unmanned drones to patrol Australiaâs borders if elected in September.
Mr Clare this morning said authorities had made progress in their investigations as to how the asylum-seeker boat arrived on the mainland.
“I spoke to Border Protection again this morning. Theyâve started now to interview people on the boat and the initial advice to us indicates that they were trying to get to New Zealand, not Australia,” Mr Clare told the Seven Networkâs Sunrise program.
“So that helps to explain the route the people took from Sri Lanka to Geraldton.”
Asylum-seekers on Tuesday were seen holding signs that read: “We want to go to New Zealand. Please help us.”
Mr Clare said the “message was clear” if people were not genuine refugees they would be returned to Sri Lanka.
“One of the most successful things we have done in the past few months is flown people back to Sri Lanka,” he said.
“The prospect of drowning hasnât put people off but the risk of being flown home in a couple of days has stopped people coming to Australia.”
Mr Clare was backed by Immigration Minister Brendan OâConnor who this morning said while he “sympathised” with people who made a long and desperate journey to Australia, returns would occur if necessary.
“We are not looking to make an example of them ⊠but our policies must deter people from getting on these unseaworthy vessels,” he told ABC radio.
Sri Lankaâs High Commissioner Admiral Thisara Samarasinghe yesterday called on the government to immediately return the arrivals back to Colombo as the Sri Lankan navyâs operations commander N Attygalle reportedly warned of an influx of asylum-seekers trying to reach Australia.
Tuesdayâs vessel was the first to reach the Australian mainland in five years and was one of the 76 boats carrying 4616 asylum-seekers to make it into Australian waters this year.
Opposition defence spokesman David Johnston this morning said if elected the Coalition would seek to have unmanned drones patrolling Australiaâs waters by 2017-2018.
He said there would be “two in the air at any one time” and Australia would seek to have a fleet of seven in total at a cost of around $1.5 billion.
Information from the drones would be used to “direct surface assets precisely and accurately to intercept” asylum boats.
“It gives us a huge capability,” Senator Johnston told ABC radio.
But Australian Greens Leader Christine Milne has dismissed a coalition’s drone plan as one of a number of “weird and wonderful” ideas being floated before the federal election in September.
“I think we’re going to see all kinds of weird and wonderful propositions come out in terms of trying to beat up a debate leading into the election,” she told reporters in Canberra.
“We’re going to see a lot of propositions either put out there or debated for base political reasons, not because they’re ever likely to happen.”
– with AAP
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