George Brandis (Queensland, Liberal Party, Attorney-General) Share this | Hansard source

The other participants were my co-chair, the UK Home Secretary, Theresa May, together with the US Secretary of Homeland Security, Jeh Johnson, the New Zealand Attorney-General, Chris Finlayson, and the Canadian Minister for Public Safety, Steven Blaney. We discussed a range of national security issues including cyber threats to critical infrastructure and information sharing among jurisdictions. But the meeting was dominated by the most important item, the increasing global terrorist threat and in particular the challenges posed by citizens seeking to participate in the Syria and Iraq conflicts on behalf of terrorist organisations and the threats posed by returning foreign fighters with increased terrorist capability and home-grown extremists planning domestic attacks.

The national security ministers of the five jurisdictions agreed to increase collaboration on counterradicalisation, including by sharing approaches on prevention and intervention efforts aimed at exchanging best practice on the identification and management of radicalised and radicalising individuals and developing proactive strategies to address terrorist use of the internet and social media platforms. The efficacy of our approach requires strong laws and partnership with companies providing online services and the communities most vulnerable to terrorist propaganda. One important decision was to establish the Council of National Security Ministers on a permanent basis with a view to it being held annually. Next year's meeting will be co-hosted by New Zealand and Canada and is planned to be held in Quebec.