'We can't help them all': Liberal motion on white South African farmers defeated

Liberal party members who attempted to have white South African farmers singled out for special treatment when applying for asylum in Australia have been defeated after an emotional interjection from a former immigration minister.

In a policy motion put forward to the federal council, where members attempt to influence Coalition policy, they attempted to amend a motion changing “South African minorities targeted by hate crimes” to “European farmers”, to ensure white farmers were given particular attention.

But after a flurry of debate, Philip Ruddock addressed the crowd, saying singling out whites for special humanitarian visa attention went against what Australia stood for.

Sign up to receive the top stories in Australia every day at noon

“The problem is that we have something in the order of 65 million people around the world displaced, 22 and a half million of them refugees,” he said. “Now, I hate to say it, as much as I might like – we can’t help them all. The question is who do you help? And that is always the question.

“And I am not saying you shouldn’t help South African farmers if they are being discriminated against, any more than I would argue that there are others that should not be helped.

“My view is, at the moment, our arrangements enable all minorities targeted, to be able to seek asylum in Australia, by way of an appropriate application and they have to be considered objectively by Australian officials.”

The motion was carried, but as originally put forward, with South African minorities standing in place of Europeans. The policy motions only show the direction members would like the government to take on particular issues, but remain non-binding for the government to pick up.

However, the issue of the South African farmers proved the first flashpoint in a conference where party divides, between moderates and conservatives, are expected to feature.

Peter Dutton had laid the groundwork for the South African farmer issue in March, after which Tony Abbott told Sydney radio 2GB that “something like 400 white farmers have been murdered, brutally murdered, over the last 12 months”.

Despite several fact checkers debunking the claim, the idea the white South African farmers should be granted special attention, including fast-tracked visas, had persisted, particularly in Western Australia, where a large number of South Africans have settled.

It was the West Australian branch that put the idea forward to the national council, calling on the government to “enable the South African minorities targeted by hate crimes to seek asylum in Australia”.

Julie Bishop has already ruled that out as unnecessary, after Australia’s high commissioner was called in to Pretoria to explain the Coalition’s position following Dutton’s comments in March that the group deserves “special treatment”.

“Australia does monitor the rate of violent crime in South Africa and there has been no dramatic increase in recent years,” she said in March. “We do have a humanitarian visa program if any person feels they are persecuted, then they can apply to Australia for a humanitarian visa, and that would be considered on its merits and I believe that is what Peter Dutton is referring to.”

Each branch of the Liberal party, after consultation with its own state branches and members, can submit policy motions to the federal council for consideration. Western Australia also wants to put the GST back on the agenda, and has asked the government to include tax revenue from gambling operations when calculating GST allocations.

WA has no pokie machines, which would set its revenue lower, compared with the big gambling states on the east coast. The federal women’s committee has called for voter identification laws to be established across the country, forcing “the presentation of an identification document that includes the voter’s photograph or voter’s name and residential address when voting in a federal election”, as well as to “properly fund and promote vocational education and training as an equal first choice career pathway for students”.

The Young Liberals have called on the government to follow Donald Trump’s lead and move the Australian embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and to “suspend aid to the Palestinian Authority until it terminates it’s ‘martyrs’ fund’”. They also want the government to “abstain from military intervention in Syria with an intention to oust its secular regime”.

The ACT branch, in an attempt to rid the public service of all quota hirings, wants a public service recruitment process that would strip candidates’ applications of any and all identifying data to ensure gender, race and age are removed – “commonly known as blind recruitment”.

Victoria is calling for the government to ban any drugs approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration from being used for doctor-assisted euthanasia. The government is also being asked to implement the findings of a recent review and establish a minimum 90-day fuel supply for the country. The federal council will begin considering the policy motions late on Friday afternoon, and the main debates will kick off on Saturday, when Malcolm Turnbull will address the party faithful.