SENATE
2e7N9wg
2e7N9wg
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Thursday, 13 October 2016 <strong>SENATE</strong> 9<br />
We accept absolutely the crucial nature of the work that the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and<br />
Security does. We believe absolutely that it is an appropriate body that has been established, and we support<br />
absolutely the measures contained in this bill—with the caveat around the membership of the committee that has<br />
been proposed by the Labor Party. We particularly support the part of this bill that provides for the Parliamentary<br />
Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security to conduct own-motion inquiries. That was spoken against by<br />
Senator Macdonald in the speech that he just made, and when this bill was previously debated, in the former<br />
parliament, it was spoken strongly against. But we do not accept the arguments that have been put up against this.<br />
We believe it is reasonable for this committee to conduct own-motion inquiries within the constraints that the act<br />
has established and we believe it would improve the scrutiny of our intelligence agencies for this parliament to be<br />
able, through this committee, to conduct own-motion inquiries. Of course, it is this parliament that has actually<br />
established our security agencies; they are creatures of this parliament. And this parliament has every right within<br />
the constraints that exist within the act to, through this committee, have own-motion inquiries conducted and<br />
reported back as appropriate.<br />
As I said at the beginning of my contribution this morning, it is a complex area. It is a complex global<br />
environment—one that moves very rapidly and changes very quickly. This committee plays a crucial role in<br />
scrutinising the intelligence agencies that have been established by this parliament to make Australia as safe as it<br />
can possibly be, and we share that goal of making Australia as safe as it can reasonably be made. But we do<br />
believe that there has not been a strategic approach to this. We believe that the erosion of some fundamental civil<br />
and human liberties in this country has been done in a politically ad hoc manner rather than as a result of a<br />
carefully conceived strategy. We believe that owes much to the zombie lockstep in which both the coalition and<br />
Labor proceed in this space and we believe that having a senator who is not a member of either the government or<br />
the opposition on this committee would allow for a greater diversity of thought on this committee and a greater<br />
diversity of input to the processes of this committee.<br />
In broad terms, we support this legislation because we think it will go some way towards improving the<br />
operations of the committee. However, as I said, we feel strongly enough that there should be a senator who is not<br />
from government or opposition on this committee and we will be seeking to amend this bill to provide for that,<br />
should that amendment be successful.<br />
In conclusion, this is a challenging time for freedoms around the world. It is not only a challenging time<br />
because threats are arising; it is a challenging time because freedoms are being eroded in response to the threats<br />
that are arising. Both of those matters need to be considered strategically. They ought to be the subject of a white<br />
paper—a living, breathing white paper that can be adapted in response to the rapidly evolving global environment.<br />
Also, we need to ensure that this committee is made up of members who have the capacity to bring some<br />
thoughts and some positions to this committee that, potentially at least—depending on who the appointed senator<br />
from the crossbench would be, should our amendment be successful—bring a more strategic approach that is<br />
outside the political lock step, which we so often see in the context of discussions and conversations in this<br />
parliament and in the public debate in Australia around responding to the national security threats to Australia that<br />
exist today.<br />
Senator DODSON (Western Australia) (10:47): The matter of security, as we have heard, is one that we in<br />
this nation take very seriously. We obviously try to balance the liberties and freedoms that citizens would like to<br />
enjoy in our country. We take a fairly open-hearted approach to most things and most people from different<br />
cultures and different persuasions, and we generally try to abide by the laconic notion of a fair go for everyone.<br />
When that notion butts up against the heinous nature of indiscriminate assaults and murders of innocent citizens,<br />
in the most extreme consequences, by those who would want to destroy democracy and want to destroy the<br />
privileges, rights and freedoms that people enjoy, I think we find it very hard to get that balance right sometimes. I<br />
am not suggesting we have not got it right in Australia, but I do know we butt up against the tension point<br />
between our sense of freedom as a nation of people who tend not to understand, or tend not to have experienced,<br />
the atrocities we see in the Middle East and other places pretty much nightly on our televisions. We have<br />
experienced it in Bali with our citizens and in other places, and we are horrified when such things happen.<br />
In fact, today there was a report of a couple of Syrian citizens in Germany capturing a wanted felon, a terrorist,<br />
and then reporting that person to the authorities. The appreciation of the citizens of Germany for that helps them<br />
have a different view of people who are fleeing from violence in other nation states and coming to their own<br />
countries. In fact, they have suggested that such individuals should be honoured with a medal for their services to<br />
the nation.<br />
Here we are talking about something that is rather modest in its intent. The amending bill began with people<br />
like Senator Faulkner in his time here and way back, as Senator Macdonald said, with the recommendations in the<br />
report that came from by Mr Flood and others when we were in the beginning of the horrors of many of these<br />
CHAMBER