Mr McCLELLAND (Barton) (6.09 p.m.)—The opposition support the passing of the Anti-Terrorism Bill (No. 2) 2005, with appropriate amendments. Our desire for appropriate amendments is strengthened by the report of the Senate Legal and Constitutional Legislation Committee, to which the former speaker, the member for Wentworth, just referred. That report was tabled an hour or so ago. It made some 52 recommendations, including—as was indicated in the former contribution—the removal of schedule 7, which related to the sedition offences, and called for a review of that area of the law to be conducted by the Australian Law Reform Commission.

That recommendation in particular—indeed, the 52 recommendations, on my necessarily brief perusal of them—would appear to be commonsense and balanced. The recommendations go to a number of issues, including greater particularity of the basis of orders under the legislation, which obviously refers to the issue of procedural fairness, and in some cases tightening of the principles upon which orders will be given or made under the legislation. The recommendations also include the safeguarding of videotaping of any questioning period, greater access to legal advisers, and a requirement for the Attorney-General to report on Commonwealth preventative detention orders on a six-monthly basis. The committee also recommended that the legislation have a five-year sunset clause. All of these recommendations would appear to us to be sensible, particularly the ones going to greater oversight by the Ombudsman and to the development of protocols through the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security and the Ombudsman for the conditions under which people may be detained under the regime.

In the short time available to it, the committee—once again in the area of national security—has clearly done a commendable job, as indeed has been the contribution of a number of Australians who give their evidence, often highly expert evidence, before these inquiries without cost to the Commonwealth. A number of Australians feel very strongly about this legislation. It is appropriate that there be a thorough analysis and scrutiny of legislation of this kind.

It is necessary to balance the need for stronger powers in the fight against terrorism. When we speak of the ‘war against terrorism’ we have to be realistic about whether or not that is an appropriate phrase. It is not ‘war’ in the classic sense of aircraft carriers, fighter planes, tanks and so forth. It is necessarily—when we are talking about our region in particular—a detailed, forensic policing. It is essentially a criminal law enforcement exercise and, of necessity, you have to look at giving your law enforcement officers appropriate powers in dealing with that. It is not only appropriate but absolutely essential that the appropriate balance is struck.

It is frequently said that, if we do not have that appropriate balance, we are giving a victory to terrorists in terms of our undermining the safeguards and systems that we so cherish and that have been developed over 800 years. It is often said that terrorists can certainly kill and maim but only by our response to terrorism can we undermine those institutions of government, democracy and freedom that we all treasure so dearly. So it is vitally important that our response is balanced.

In that context, introducing laws of this nature—as the previous speaker said, in what I thought was a very sound and worthwhile contribution—overturns principles of justice under our common law and criminal code system where there is a presumption of innocence—that is, you do not have your personal freedom limited or restricted; you have a right to be left alone unless, by your actions, you infringe the law of the land. This legislation will apply at an earlier point than a point where it is determined that someone has committed a crime.

It is significant, and it is appropriate and necessary that safeguards are in place for that to occur. The opposition regrettably accept the necessity for laws of this nature in order to have appropriate safeguards, but in a balanced and sensible way we call on the government to look at the recommendations of the Senate committee, to which I have referred. Experience has shown that a local terrorist event may have subterranean roots that cross international borders, which means that to get to the bottom of that terrorist event it will be necessary to liaise with, and obtain the cooperation of, not only state and federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies but also the equivalent agencies overseas. That, of course, takes time.

It is also important to realise that, as with the London bombings, the immediate bombing may be only part of the story; there may be other actions planned by the terrorists which make it essential to find out who were the perpetrators of the bombing, with a view to preventing further attacks. In that context it would be foolhardy to ignore the advice of law enforcement authorities, including British law enforcement authorities, which have spoken of the need for these powers, particularly the detention orders and the control orders. Clearly, when you are dealing with a suicide bomber there is a need to undertake very time consuming forensic examination of not only the explosive device but also, obviously and distastefully, human tissue, with a view to identifying the bomber and thereby having a base upon which to track down any accomplices. I think the Attorney-General has said previously that it may be necessary to review thousands of hours of video footage, as was the case with the London bombings. All these tests—the forensic testing, the viewing of video footage and other inquiries—obviously take time, but time is of the essence in getting to the bottom of who the perpetrators were to prevent further events occurring. In that context control orders for people who are involved in terrorist activities, or there is a reasonable basis on which to suspect them, is justified but, again, only with appropriate safeguards.

When dealing with terrorists who in many cases are so fanatical that they are prepared to sacrifice their own lives for their perceived cause, it is important to realise that they are not amenable to the constraints of the normal criminal justice system. The constraints that would normally apply to a criminal who is released on bail pending a final hearing may not be, and probably would not be, a disincentive to someone intent on taking their own life. Hence, from the point of view of community safety, it may be necessary to restrain that person. Just as it is important that those advocating the need for these laws do not overstate their case and do not have what the Senate Legal and Constitutional Committee have referred to on occasions as legislative overreach, it is equally important that those who oppose laws of this nature, and I can understand their concern, do not bury their heads in the sands of those who are providing the advice. Not that we should legislate in this area on the basis of opinion polls but I think some 70 per cent of Australians saw a need for tougher laws when it came to security, particularly laws that may be necessary to prevent a ticking-bomb situation from occurring. Someone who advises that 70 per cent of Australians, in the light of the expert advice, that laws are not necessary is deluding himself. It is very easy at the pointy end of an aircraft, where we have the privilege of flying at taxpayer expense, to liaise with the intelligentsia and the intellectual elite, but it is a much different story if you are catching a peak-hour train to work every morning or your child is on a train to school every morning which could very easily be the target of a terrorist event. So there needs to be balance and perspective in the equation.

Labor’s approach to antiterrorist legislation over the years since September 11 can be summarised in a line: it is to ensure appropriate judicial oversight of otherwise unrestrained executive action. That has been our goal and that is why we have amended legislation to bring in that judicial oversight of otherwise unrestrained executive action. We have all seen what can happen when there is opportunity for unrestrained action. We saw that in respect of a recent report on the conduct of the Department of Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs. The current Attorney-General was the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs when a lot of those events occurred. I am not necessarily damning the current Attorney-General, but we do not want these sorts of coercive powers of detention to deprive people of liberties exercised by one person, the Attorney-General—or anyone else for that matter—without appropriate oversight and appropriate safeguards and procedural fairness. Again, we call on the Attorney-General to have regard to the very sound recommendations of the Senate Legal and Constitutional Committee.

We note that the legislation has gone through a number of drafts and we are probably up to about version 64, so it is a much better set of laws than that originally created following the first Council of Australian Governments meeting on this issue. Nonetheless, there is room for improvement and we call on the government to address that. But we say that no-one should be deluded that laws in themselves, written in ink on white paper, are going to protect us from terrorism.

I note that part of the package grants greater powers in regard to tracking those who finance terrorism. In that context, this parliament has already passed laws that give the government the power to track the assets of terrorist organisations. My research indicates that in the order of $2,700 has been frozen. Those were funds relating to, I think, a Sikh youth organisation which had been shown to have had terrorist connections. There was another organisation that had its assets frozen. I think it was called the Shining Path organisation, which proved to be a record store in Melbourne, and those assets were quickly unfrozen. My point is this: those quite severe powers of freezing assets are there, but they have not been acted on by the government. You can have all the powers in the world, but if they are not acted upon with determination and proper resourcing of our agencies then they are all but meaningless.

In that context a point I wanted to make in this debate was that clearly, under this legislation, the Australian Federal Police in particular will be given extensive powers and an extensive role in the fight against terrorism. Indeed, in June this year, in addressing the Australian Federal Police at their training village in Canberra, the Prime Minister said:

In fact, since September 11, over 600 Australian Federal Police employees have been diverted to counter-terrorism and related functions of a national security aspect. This includes approximately 400 to the International Deployment Group, about 66 to the counter-terrorism teams, approximately 15 to offshore counter-terrorism teams and at least 25 to the counter-terrorism intelligence portfolio and other intelligence functions. But it has put an enormous pressure on the overall activities of the Australian Federal Police force. We still expect them to undertake control activities; indeed we still expect them to undertake the policing function of the Australian Capital Territory. But these additional responsibilities have not been associated with any significant increase in the number of police officers. Indeed the staffing level of the Australian Federal Police force is roughly equivalent to what it was 20 years ago.

It is unacceptable that the government still has not appreciated the significance of the Australian Federal Police in the fight against terrorism. We have seen the tremendous work that they have undertaken in the Solomon Islands restoring law and order to that country to prevent a situation where the country otherwise most certainly would have become a failed state and a potential haven for terrorism. But the government has not undertaken anything akin to the planning that we have seen in the defence forces—for instance, the defence white paper on the development of the defence capability plan—for the Australian Federal Police. There has been a complete absence of analysis of the counter-terrorism value of resources spent on the Australian Federal Police. We believe that is an issue that needs to be addressed.

There are also a number of other areas where the government must introduce practical measures in the fight against terrorism, and they are set out in the second reading amendment moved by the Leader of the Opposition. For my own part, there is a particular concern that I have as a result of some experiences as shadow minister in the security portfolios, and that is with regard to rail security. We have seen measures, albeit we have criticised a lack of adequate measures with regard to airport security. I think our concerns have been borne out in a recent report by Sir John Wheeler. We have seen some measures relating to port security, although not enough, we believe, particularly as the government is still encouraging foreign seafarers around our shores rather than having Australian eyes and ears around our coastline.

But with respect to rail security there has been, at all levels of government, a disgraceful lack of attention. It is, quite frankly, at all levels of government, not good enough. By way of example, if the government had spent the money it has spent on the industrial relations advertising campaign, we would have seen the equivalent—at a cost of $90,000 per dog team and handler—of around 600 additional teams being used on our railway systems. These are practical measures on which the government has to show national leadership. It is not sufficient to say that it is tough on terrorism if it does not address these practical measures. The opposition is calling on the Australian people to focus on these measures in terms of requiring the Australian government to act on them, and not to be misled into thinking that legislation in itself is going to be a safeguard. It requires resourcing; it requires a deliberation and a determination to address these practical measures.