Teresa Gambaro (Brisbane, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Justice and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister on Counter-Terrorism. Will the minister advise the House of what steps the government is taking to improve regional coordination and build capacity to challenge violent extremism?

Michael Keenan (Stirling, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Brisbane for that question. She is well aware, as are others in the House, that the threat of terrorism to Australia and to our region has significantly increased. This is not a threat we face alone; it is shared by our traditional security partners and also shared by those closest to us in the region. More than 100 Australians are fighting in the conflicts in Iraq and Syria, and they form part of the 20,000 foreign fighters who have been drawn into this conflict. Reports from the Munich security conference have said that France has approximately 1,200 nationals fighting, the United Kingdom and Germany approximately 600 and Russia well over 1,000. Here in our region the Indonesians have at least 200 people engaged and the Malaysians up to 60.

The threat to Australia from these international conflicts cannot be overstated, and the government has been on the front foot making sure that our security agencies and our intelligence community are equipped with the powers and the resources they need to address it. We have passed legislation to declare particular areas off limits, and those who go to a declared area can face up to 10 years of imprisonment. We have listed terrorist organisations. Returning fighters linked to terrorist organisations can face up to 25 years of imprisonment. We have a new offence of advocating terrorism: you cannot now counsel, promote, encourage or urge a terrorist act. We have also given our law enforcement agencies stronger tools and control orders. We have lowered the arrest thresholds and we have given greater flexibility to our courts to deal in evidence that has been collected in foreign countries.

We know that every day these death cults tweet over 100,000 pieces propaganda. They are grooming Australians online—literally reaching through the computers to our young people, in the midst of their families—to radicalise and recruit them to extremist ideologies. We want to work with our partners on what we can do to address this. The Attorney-General and I will be co-hosting a conference in Sydney next week, Australia's Regional Summit to Counter Violent Extremism. We have invited ministerial representation from around the region and from our traditional security partners to attend. The summit will also be bringing together key stakeholders who can work with us from industry and the non-government sector to address this challenge through practical resources and strategies. They will also host sessions on how to stop using the internet to disseminate propaganda. This meeting will be a very important step for us to deal with this collective threat to our regional security. We cannot afford to wait whilst the death cult radicalises our young people. We need to address this before they can do us harm, and that is what the regional summit will help us do.