Bill Shorten says he has “no interest” in changing Labor’s stance on asylum boat turnbacks but acknowledges there will be a debate on the floor of the party’s national conference in the middle of the year.



On Tuesday the Labor leader told reporters the party had concerns about the treatment of asylum seekers in offshore detention, and that people were being held effectively in indefinite detention as a consequence of the Turnbull government’s punitive deterrence regime.

“I make one thing very clear: we don’t support the way the government has treated people in detention,” he said. “We don’t believe that mandatory [indefinite] detention has to be the necessary result of stopping the boats.”

But in a public message to delegates, Shorten said he had no interest in revisiting the boat turnbacks issue at the conference. “We recognise that the boat turnback policy has been effective, and I have no interest in changing that policy.”

The last federal Labor conference in 2015 saw an emotional debate on the floor about asylum boat turnbacks. A motion to end turnbacks, supported by a number of current frontbenchers, was defeated.

Shorten made undertakings at the last federal conference to double the number of asylum seekers Australia accepts, and to increase resourcing for the UNHCR, to try to contain a boilover.

Members of the left faction are positioning to revive the debate.

Labor’s newest federal MP, Ged Kearney, has signalled she will play a role at the conference, arguing for a more “humane” policy on asylum seekers and offshore processing.

Kearney told Guardian Australia last week her constituents in the northern suburbs of Melbourne “will want to see me argue and work within the party for some change [on asylum policy], and that is what I have promised them, and that is what I will do”.

“I’ve been clear to people that I may or may not be successful with that, but we are going to work through priorities, and some of those can be achieved,” Kearney said. “I think getting people off Manus and Nauru needs to be a priority, and hopefully if Labor is elected that is something we can actually deliver on.

“With respect to the rest of the policy … it will be an issue for national conference. I’m yet to really find my way in my new role as a Labor candidate at the national conference. I’m working through that at the moment. But I certainly want to support people who are like-minded.”