Labor has accused Peter Dutton of being a “sook” and throwing a “tantrum” in parliament after he failed to force Anthony Albanese into giving a personal explanation over visa security checks for people fleeing Gaza.
Dutton moved to suspend standing orders on Monday, claiming the prime minister “misled” parliament by selectively quoting Australia’s spy boss, Mike Burgess, to imply Asio scrutinises all applications from those fleeing the conflict.
In a fiery parliamentary debate, Dutton pointed to the Coalition making refugees fleeing Syria wait up to 12 months to come to Australia, whereas he said some Palestinians have come in 24 hours.
The rolling maul began with Dutton’s decision last week to politicise Burgess’ view that rhetorical support for Hamas should not be an automatic bar to Palestinians receiving visas.
Dutton claimed nobody should be allowed to enter Australia from the Gaza conflict “at the moment”, a stance that has been widely condemned, including by Labor who argues he is deliberately stirring division.
But the opposition leader continued to stoke the controversy on Monday, taking issue with Albanese omitting some words when quoting Burgess in parliament on Thursday.
Burgess had said: “If they’ve been issued a visa they’ve gone through the process. Part of the process is, where criteria are hit, they’re referred to my organisation and Asio does its thing.”
Dutton argued that Albanese’s omission of “where criteria hit” incorrectly suggested all applicants were subject to security checks, which Dutton told parliament was “beyond tricky, it’s duplicitous”.
He claimed it was “clear to every Australian” that Albanese had “misled the parliament” and accused the prime minister of having lost his “integrity and credibility”.
The motion called on Albanese to attend parliament and explain how many of the almost 3,000 visa issued were “granted without an Asio assessment”.
The home affairs minister, Tony Burke, responded in parliament that Dutton was “irresponsible and a sook”.
“We’ve got used to the fact that they’ll throw a tantrum if they can’t be in charge … But I never thought they’d play that game on national security,” Burke said.
“He’s got form on trying to divide the Australian community.
“At the moment, we’ve got a debate where he wanted to go after Palestinians. But before that, it was Africans, it was Lebanese, it was Muslims.
“Granted, he hasn’t tried to declare war on every migrant community. He did stand up for white South African farmers. We remember that.”
Burke’s comments referred to controversies in Dutton’s former roles as immigration and home affairs minister, in which he claimed in 2018 that Victorians were “scared to go out to restaurants” because of “African gang violence” and in 2016 that Australian Muslims of Lebanese background were disproportionately involved in terrorism cases.
In 2018 Dutton suggested white farmers were being persecuted and should receive fast-tracked humanitarian visas from a “civilised country”.
In question time Albanese told the House of Representatives it was “extraordinary” that Dutton had demanded to know “the criteria for Asio to carry out security assessments”.
“No matter where a person comes from or what visa they hold, our security agencies are involved in the process,” he said.
Dutton is reportedly seeking legal advice in relation to comments by independent MP Zali Steggall characterising his latest position on pausing arrivals from the Gaza conflict as “racist”.
Earlier on Monday Albanese was asked if Dutton is racist and replied that he thought “Peter Dutton is deeply divisive and that creates a risk”.
“It’s always about politics with Peter Dutton,” the prime minister told ABC Radio.
“Peter Dutton knows full well that the same security agencies, indeed the same personnel, in many cases are looking after national security issues. If he doesn’t have confidence in them, he should say so.”
The Albanese government has argued that security procedures have not changed since the Coalition was in office, when people in Syria, Afghanistan and Ukraine came without face-to-face interviews across the board.
“The complete opposite is the case,” Dutton told the house. “We brought people through the refugee and humanitarian program.”
“It didn’t take 24 hours to get a visa, as it does if you’re a tourist. It took in some cases 12 months, because we had to collect biometrics.
“The prime minister will somehow have you believe that that’s what happened here – it’s not.”
Earlier, Albanese noted that “no one is leaving Gaza at the moment” because Israel is now approving people going through the Rafah crossing.
“That’s the context of Peter Dutton then saying he wants just a pause for the moment,” he told ABC Radio.
On Sunday the industry minister, Ed Husic, told Sky News that visitor visas were faster to process than refugee visas. “Given what’s happening right now and the dangers presented, the view was to get people out as quickly as you can.”
