Rudd defends PNG deal as more boats arrive

Kevin Rudd depends PNG deal.  Photo. AAP

PRIME Minister Kevin Rudd has refused to say when his hardline plan to banish boat asylum seekers to Papua New Guinea will work, as another refugee vessel is intercepted en route to Australia.

Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare on Sunday confirmed a boat with 83 passengers was spotted on Thursday northeast of Christmas Island.

That takes to 17 the number of boats that have been intercepted since Mr Rudd's declaration on July 19 that new arrivals will never be settled in Australia and will instead be sent to PNG for processing and possible resettlement.

The new approach is aimed at discouraging people from taking dangerous sea voyages to Australia.

Repeatedly pressed on whether he expected the PNG deal would slow the boats before the federal election, Mr Rudd has refused to bite.

"It is the implementation of that policy direction over time, resolutely, which will yield results," he told Network Ten's Bolt Report.

"In the interim, people smugglers will test your resolve."

The prime minister said he had always expected people smugglers to test the government's resolve on its new PNG arrangement.

"(But) we are not for turning. Our policy is very clear," he said.

"Our policy is very clear ... you will not be settled in Australia."

A Galaxy poll published by News Corp Australia found people rated Mr Rudd better than Opposition Leader Tony Abbott at handling the asylum seeker issue, 40 to 38 per cent.

The poll was taken between July 23 and 25, within a week of Mr Rudd's PNG announcement.

Labor frontbencher Kim Carr said Australians had very strong views on asylum seekers.

"They've got a right to have those attitudes," Senator Carr told Network Ten.

"We are, however, concentrating on stopping people from drowning."

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said the real test for the PNG arrangement would be whether asylum seekers would be resettled in that country.

"I know people want to believe that this thing is the answer," he told ABC television.

"But the truth here is there is a long way to go both in the implementation and legal issues."

Mr Abbott said it had taken Mr Rudd five years and almost 50,000 people arriving by boat to support offshore processing.

"This government is all announcement and no delivery," he told reporters in Sydney.

"It's all talk and no action."

Meanwhile, the immigration department says it's ramping up efforts to expand Australia's processing centre on Manus Island.

The department on Sunday released photos of a cargo plane touching down in Port Moresby to deliver supplies for the facility.

AAP