Arch Bevis (Brisbane, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Aviation and Transport Security) Share this | Hansard source

The Fisheries Legislation Amendment (Foreign Fishing Offences) Bill 2006 imposes penalties on illegal fishing boats and on those responsible for the illegal fishing boats being in Australian waters when they are apprehended. This is a positive move and it is supported by the Labor Party. Unfortunately, there is a catch-22, which is that you have to catch the vessels. This government’s record in that fundamental task has been appalling. This bill will be of no consequence at all unless the government lifts its game and improves its performance in apprehending the thousands of illegal boats that come into our waters in Northern Australia each year. Few people who do not live in Northern Australia, or who are not involved in the fishing industry in Northern Australia or national security matters, comprehend how big this problem has become and, indeed, how it has grown. A year ago, 8,000 illegal vessels were sighted. Last year, that had grown to 13,000. That is an increase of 5,000 additional illegal boat sightings in one year.

In the past, government members and ministers have sought to diminish the significance of that frightening number of 13,000 illegal boats in a year by saying, ‘But they’re just the boats that are sighted,’ and pretending that it somehow overstates the number of illegal vessels because there is the potential for double counting. It is true: there is a potential for double counting, but what is equally undeniable is that, in fact, we do not sight all of the illegal vessels that come into our waters. The most probable assessment is that that figure of 13,000 boats a year ago understates the actual number of illegal vessels coming into our waters. The fact that it has grown in one year from 8,000 to 13,000 is an enormous indictment of the Howard government’s approach and its absolutely disgraceful neglect of the need for improved border security in our north. Against that figure of 13,000 illegal boats, the government last year managed to apprehend 200. The odds are in favour of the illegal fishing vessels.

I have received briefings and seen films of these boats from the authorities apprehending these vessels, from media outlets and from fishing vessels. We now have the ridiculous situation where Australian fishing boats going out from Darwin will regularly take video cameras with them to take footage of the illegal vessels to give to authorities as proof of the problem—not that any further proof was required, I might add. From that information one concludes that most of these boats have about six or seven crew. Some have more and some have less, but most have about six or seven crew, who are typically Indonesian. We are talking, therefore, about 80,000 or 90,000 people unlawfully coming into Australia’s territorial waters.

Most of that activity involves illegal fishing, and this bill deals specifically with it, but I want to draw the attention of this parliament and the people of Australia to a related and, I think, far more serious threat. When you have 13,000 illegal boats and nearly 100,000 people illegally entering our waters, you invite a whole raft of other problems. Yes, our natural resources are plundered by the fishing, but in addition there is no process of quarantine involved here. We have already recorded cases of avian flu not far from the areas where those illegal boats depart. The boats that come to undertake illegal fishing are known to bring with them their own stock. They have had chickens on board; one even went up a river in Australia to get fresh water and had a monkey on board. The danger of the spread of virus or disease, whether it is avian flu or something contagious to other flora or fauna or to humans, is obvious. The threat is significant

Equally worrying is the increasing information that some of the boats illegally traversing those waters have been involved in the illegal drug trade. Also worrying—to not as great an extent but nonetheless worrying—is the evidence that some boats plying the waters to our north have also been involved in arms running. This is a major concern for national security. Yet the Howard government, which prides itself on being tough on defence and security matters and which at every opportunity cloaks itself in the flag and basks in the reflected glory of the great deeds of the men and women in the Australian services—the government loves a photo opportunity with the men and women of the Australian defence forces—has patently neglected and shown a complete lack of interest in ensuring that our northern borders are anything but porous.

A small group of people in Customs, Defence, Coastwatch and other related agencies are doing a very good job in Northern Australia with very few resources to deal with this. The fashion that has become characteristic of this government is to rely on political spin rather than substance. The government tried to paint a different picture of this problem during the recent budget. Yes, there are funds allocated in the budget, but let’s not get carried away with that. Let me rely on no greater authority than the Treasurer himself. In typical Costello fashion, the Treasurer announced in his budget speech:

We expect to double the number of fishing vessels apprehended in Australia’s northern waters each year.

That sounds impressive to those who know nothing about what is going on in Northern Australia—we are going to double the number of boats we catch. At the moment we catch 200 out of more than 13,000. We are going to double that if the government reaches its target—and that is only if. The government plans to catch 400 boats next year and let the other 12,600 go free.

There is an interesting question about whether the government is confident that it can actually catch 400 and let 12,600 go scot-free. Either way the odds are still pretty heavily in favour of the illegal boats—whether they are there for fishing, for drug running or to replenish supplies on our coastline. To boast as the Treasurer did and as this government has that they will double the number they catch and that that is a great achievement is an insult to the men and women of Northern Australia and, in particular, the people whose livelihoods depend on securing our borders there.

After the budget, the Australian Fisheries Management Authority estimated that, with the additional funds made available, they would now be able to catch on average two illegal boats a day. The problem is that, on average, there are known to be 35 boats a day in those waters. So, even after the budget, the government’s own fisheries authority estimates they will now catch two—and 33 will go scot-free. That is one of the greatest disgraces of national security and border protection this government faces. It is amazing that members of this government have had the temerity—though not in this debate; no-one from the government side other than the member for O’Connor wanted to speak on the bill—to try to defend their performance in these matters.

A couple of days after the budget, the new Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, either through ignorance or bravado, persisted with the same line. In answer to a question on 11 May in this parliament he said the government’s approach to illegal fishing in the north was ‘full-on’. If the government’s full-on effort is to catch two boats a day and let 33 go scot-free, heaven help us if they decide to take their foot off the pedal. If that is the full-on performance that this government can manage, then people in Northern Australia truly do have a lot to be concerned about.

In fact, they do have a lot to be concerned about because the government’s approach to this important issue has been one of complete indifference. The government has been keen to issue press releases. We have had three ministers in the portfolio in recent years and, in that time, the government kept claiming victory, that it had turned the tide and was winning the battle. There is a folio of press releases from government ministers claiming to have got on top of this problem and every year the problem has got worse. Last year it just ballooned out of control. Last year, when it grew from 8,000 to 13,000, I think even the Howard government understood that it could not get by with the flim-flam and the political spin.

Only recently did the government decide that it should actually catch these people. Until recently, when a vessel was apprehended, the government’s approach was not to take the people into custody, it was not to take the boat and it was not to sink it. Rather, it was to take the fishing gear off, to take the catch off, to tell the sailors they were naughty people and to send them on their way. Next week the sailors were back with new nets catching fish again. They knew the odds were in their favour second time round. They knew that, on the odds, roughly only one in 10 boats were going to get caught, and they had already been caught once. I suppose, to their way of thinking, that meant that the odds were looking pretty good for them second time with one in 10 boats being caught. So they were happy to come back.

As I said, until very recently the government’s approach was simply to apprehend these boats, take the fishing nets, take the fishing catch and send the boat and illegal crew on their way. What an absurd situation. Is it any wonder that the word spread throughout the fishing community to our north that we were a soft touch? Is it any wonder that those involved in drug-running decided that the easy way to get drugs into Northern Australia was just to put them on a boat and sail all the way over to the Australian coastline, down to the river and hop off? We have had cases where illegal fishing boats, with people camped beside them, have been photographed upstream in rivers. Not only did these people go through our territorial waters, not only did they get to the Australian coastline, but they actually went upstream and had a bit of a picnic. What an absurd situation.

Last week in parliament the Minister for Defence decided that he would buy into this and announced that the government was going to now send minehunters to Northern Australia to chase the illegal fishing boats. There is a whole big issue in the Defence portfolio about this, which time will not allow me to go into. These are highly specialised vessels. They are designed with special materials. They are constructed in a special way so that the boat does not vibrate—for obvious reasons—as most boats do. When you go hunting mines you do not want to make too much noise and bump into things that are unexpected. These boats have a low magnetic signature, because you do not want to set off magnetic mines, and they have a different propulsion system. They have special manoeuvrability so that they can turn on a dime, to coin a phrase. And, by the way, they do not go very fast. The minehunters are not designed to go chasing fishing boats. The minehunters are designed to tread their way very carefully through treacherous waters and to remove mines from them. The government have announced they are going to take these highly specialised, very expensive minehunters from Sydney and Newcastle and send them all the way up to the Northern Territory, to do what, I am not quite sure—other than to assist with another photo opportunity and press release.

I have no doubt that when those first minehunters arrive in Northern Australia we are going to see the Minister for Defence and/or the minister for the Northern Territory and a couple of the backbenchers from the Liberal and National parties up there in Darwin taking a photo opportunity with them, trying to con everybody, trying to put the political spin out there, that they are now increasing the resources and doing something to catch the illegal boats.

The minehunters have a top speed of about 14 knots, and that is not going to be sustained for long. I do not know whether the Department of Defence will be too keen on having their minehunters used in that role, I might add. I am not sure what they are like as tugboats either, because when you apprehend these illegal fishing vessels one of the jobs that you have to do is bring them back. I do not know whether the minehunter is fast enough to catch them. It is probably fast enough to tow them back, although I am not sure it is designed for that. No doubt the Minister for Defence will explain all of that when he fronts the cameras with his grin in Darwin, some time in the future, to try and milk this as a media opportunity. What will it do to solve the problem? Very little. How many of the 13,000 illegal boats will they catch? Not many.

That is not a solution to the problem. But it is a classic example of the way in which the Howard government deal with problems like this. First they ignore it and then they say they are on top of it. When facts make it obvious to all that the government have not told the truth up to that point, they then try to confuse the issue and out comes the wallpaper to cover the cracks. The Minister for Defence says, ‘We’ll send minehunters to catch these illegal fishing boats.’

The bill before us is not going to be used that often, unless the government starts catching a few boats. The government is not going to catch them by continuing to do what it has done in the past. That is patently obvious. The problem has got worse, not better. It is also not going to catch them by pretending that sending a couple of minehunters up north is going to fix the problem, it will not—although I suspect it will create some problems for the through-life maintenance and support of the minehunters that were never intended to be used in this role. That is if indeed they are sent up there for anything other than a photo opportunity. I would not put it past this government to send them there just for the photo opportunity.

There is only one clear-cut solution to this problem, and that is we need more resources on the water, we need to improve our surveillance, but above all we need to have an interdiction capability. We need to be able to intercept and apprehend those vessels. That is not going to be done by anything that the government has announced to date.

In addition, we need to ensure the command and control structures between the various agencies are improved. It is precisely for those reasons that the Labor Party has argued for four or five years now that we need to have in Australia a department of homeland security to coordinate the various agencies. At the moment there are two or three different ministers and two or three different departments all with their fingers in this pie of border protection in the north. You do not have to be a masters student in business management to comprehend the simple fact that, when you have three or four ministers, their departments and about seven or eight agencies under those ministers all involved in this, there is overlap and there are cracks. That is what has been happening throughout this government’s period in office in dealing with this issue. It is why it is so easy for mistakes to be made and things to be overlooked. It is why it is so easy for nine out of 10 boats to come and go as they please. It is why people in the region know that, if you want to get illegal goods here, if you want to fish illegally in our waters, if you want to run weapons through the waters to our north, you can do it with impunity—you are unlikely to get caught.

Labor has long argued that we need a department of homeland security with one minister, one department and one clear chain of command. That is an essential policy change that the Howard government needs to adopt if we are ever going to get on top of this problem and, I might say, wider issues. But there is a second thing that is also important: we need an Australian coastguard. I have been to speak to people in Northern Australia about this and I have heard their comments. They know that we need an Australian coastguard. They have no doubt about that. But it is not just a change of badge and it is not just a paint job on boats; it is the additional resources that that Australian coastguard needs. If the Liberal and National parties had adopted Labor’s view about a coastguard years ago when we advocated it we would now have extra patrol boats on the water actually apprehending these illegal vessels—not taking their fishing nets and slapping them on the wrist and sending them away but actually apprehending the vessels. The boats would be there if the government had done what Labor said four years ago.

Even at the last election Labor made clear its ongoing commitment to the creation of a coastguard. At the last election we committed to the acquisition of eight new vessels, three new helicopters and another 250 personnel. That is what is going to make a difference. That is what is going to determine whether this law is ever used. It is all good and well for the parliament to pass laws about punishing those involved in illegal activities. If you do not actually have on the ground the practical measures to catch them, this law will not be doing much at all. The practical measures are a homeland security department and a coastguard. Labor is committed to both.

It is about time the government recognised the necessity of that, swallowed its pride and conceded that in 2002 it got it wrong and in 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2006 it has got it wrong. It needs to now accept the need for a coordinated homeland security department and actually put some real resources into funding an Australian coastguard and not the mickey mouse changes that the Treasurer announced, catching 400 boats a year instead of 200 and still letting 12,600 go. That is not a solution. The people in Northern Australia understand that. It is about time the Howard government did too.

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