Angus Taylor considers Trump-style immigration policy as he finalises frontbench overhaul

A hardline policy banning arrivals from “declared terrorist” hot spots in more than dozen Muslim countries and a beefed up border taskforce is being considered by new Liberal leader Angus Taylor as he puts the finishing touches on his revamped frontbench team.

Just days after Sussan Ley was deposed as Opposition Leader, details of a radical immigration crackdown she was preparing to unveil have been leaked, including measures to screen the mobile phones of visitors flying into Australia.

The draft proposal first reported by Sky News, would deny visas to people from overseas regions controlled by Islamist terrorist groups, including areas within the nations of Afghanistan, Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine, Somalia, Yemen and The Philippines.

Under the proposed “Operation Gatekeeper”, a new $80 million immigration taskforce would be led by a senior intelligence officer and include representatives from ASIO, AFP and the Australian Border Force.

Mr Taylor, who defeated Ms Ley convincingly in a party room leadership ballot on Friday, is now preparing to unveil his own immigration policy which is expected to include many ideas drawn up by his predecessor that replicated similar approaches in the United States.

On Monday Ms Ley’s shadow immigration minister Paul Scarr distanced himself from the proposal to ban migration from certain declared regions.

“I never proposed any such policy. I never agreed to any such policy. I have a range of serious concerns with respect to any such policy,” Senator Scarr said in a statement.

Nationals leader David Littleproud says he was aware of “input” into the leaked Ms Ley immigration policy but denied it was close to being released. “There’s no final decision on it. There’d been input into that policy, but it hadn’t formally been ticked off, from my understanding, and so those details weren’t finalised,” Mr Littleproud said. “We don’t want to import people in this country that don’t support our way of life and believe in it, and so what we’ve got to do is understand the real threats, the real threats that exist.”Mr Littleproud added that he was pleased Angus Taylor had “hit the ground running” after toppling Ms Ley.

However Nationals’ deputy leader Kevin Hogan also said he hadn’t seen the immigration policy, insisting Ms Ley didn’t run it past the Shadow Cabinet before she was ousted last week by the Liberal party room. Mr Hogan’s apparent unawareness of the plan comes despite claims that the proposal had been finalised and ready to announce on December 15, but was delayed at the last moment due to the Bondi Beach terror attack.

The Refugee Council of Australia condemned the proposed policy, saying it echoed a push by the Lyons government in 1938 to deny safe haven to Jewish refugees wanting to flee Nazi-controlled territory in Europe.

“While no fair-minded Australian would ever support issuing visas to people involved in terrorism, applying an indiscriminate ban to everyone living in a region where terrorists are active is an appalling idea straight out of Donald Trump’s playbook,” the council said in a statement.

Before the Opposition’s new immigration policy is released, Mr Taylor is busy putting the final touches on his revamped Shadow Ministry which is due to be unveiled on Tuesday and is widely expected to reward conservative MPs who were sidelined under Ms Ley.

There is growing speculation that former frontbenchers Andrew Hastie and Jacinta Nampijinpa Price will return to the opposition’s lineup while key allies of Ms Ley including Alex Hawke will be dumped.

Inside the Liberal party there is also growing anticipation former ACT Senator Zed Seselja, a key conservative figure in the Morrison government, will be recruited to Mr Taylor’s office in a “consigliere” role.

The former minister for international development and the Pacific, who briefly considered running for the Liberal party as a New South Wales Senate candidate, did not respond to requests for comment on Monday.

Other key figures expected to be promoted in the new look frontbench are Tim Wilson, Phil Thompson, Sarah Henderson, Simon Kennedy, Claire Chandler and Zoe McKenzie.

Many Liberal MPs, including key Ley supporter Maria Kovacic, said they expected Mr Taylor would appoint Victorian Tim Wilson to the key role of shadow treasurer.

“Tim Wilson is a very effective individual, both in terms of his policy work and his engagement with the public s… somebody that you know, gets down and works very, very hard,” Senator Kovacic said.

In his first public speech as opposition leader, Mr Taylor declared the Coalition could fight both One Nation on the right and the Teal community independents on the left.

“We start by recognising the challenge, which is that we do need to change,” he told the Centre for Independent Studies on Monday.

“But the way to get back is to get back to our core values, free markets, economic liberalism … along with making sure we protect our way of life, we protect our core institutions, which have been so central parties and most important as a country over a long period of time.”