Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs. Evidence in senate estimates has revealed that of the 149 individuals the government has released from immigration detention, the minister has determined that 36 not be required to wear ankle bracelets. Minister, can you confirm that it is your position that none of these individuals poses a threat to the Australian community?

Andrew Giles (Scullin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the shadow minister for his question. As the shadow minister is aware, late last year the High Court overturned decades of precedent in its decision which required the release of a number of people who we sought to remain in immigration detention. In response to that, with the cooperation of members opposite, we put in place a range of laws and also put in place a range of processes to keep the community safe, which has been and will continue to be our No. 1 objective and our No. 1 priority. Of course, a big part of that was setting up Operation AEGIS to bring together the government's law enforcement agencies around the country. We also now have four layers of protection, including stringent visa conditions, electronic monitoring and curfew arrangements as well as preventative detention arrangements.

In order to manage that, we put in place a Community Protection Board so that the decisions around community safety can be made by those best placed to decide on the merits in any issue of how to keep the community safe. I'm very pleased that the Community Protection Board is up and running and has been providing appropriate advice on managing this cohort.