Darren Cheeseman (Corangamite, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Customs Amendment (Enhanced Border Controls and Other Measures) Bill 2008. This bill demonstrates this government’s absolute commitment to border security and maintaining a tight customs control regime. The bill shows our government is not afraid of taking tough and decisive measures to control what comes into this country. It shows we are a government concerned about this issue. Unlike the previous government, we are not a government that talks about border security only when it suits our political agenda.

Australia, by and large, has been very successful in protecting our lands from the real threats coming in. We have been effective in controlling the spread of many diseases. We have been effective in controlling mass importation of illegal weapons. That is just to mention a couple of examples. But we also saw, when the system failed us, how catastrophic the consequences can be. The impact on the horseracing operators and owners when horse flu arrived in Australia showed exactly the impact. A whole industry was devastated for months. Jobs were lost. Animals were destroyed. Businesses went bust. The social life of many communities was hurt. So the consequences can be very severe, and this is therefore an extremely important matter for this parliament.

This bill is also very important to the Geelong region and to western Victoria. We have our population to protect. We have farming and various agricultural industries to protect. We have the health of our crops to protect. We have the integrity of our products to protect. We have our marine industries to protect from poachers. We have our youth to protect from drug importation. In Geelong and western Victoria, the region I come from, we also have the port of Geelong and not far down the road the port of Portland. It is critical that we have in place regimes that protect the reputations of these facilities. All sorts of goods and products come in and out of these ports. The regulatory regime that is in place must be there to protect not just our land and products but also, of course, the reputation of these ports. The economic activity generated by these ports in my region is very significant.

Let us just look at a little bit of the detail of this bill. In this detail you can see our determination to keep things tight. You can see our absolute determination to keep improving the system that we have. This bill inserts new provisions, including offences, dealing with missing goods and goods delivered for home consumption without authority. It inserts new circumstances in which the commander of a Commonwealth aircraft can request the pilot of another aircraft to land. It extends the power to seize goods without a warrant to include goods on board a ship that are unaccounted for. It extends the regime for the storage or taking into custody of prohibited weapons to all prohibited imports. It inserts a regime supporting the current power of arrest, consistent with the Crimes Act 1914. It extends the obligation to assist Customs officers to board a ship to the owner or operator of a port or port facility. It clarifies the types of devices that can be used to enable the boarding of a ship that has been the subject of a hot pursuit, as adequately described by the previous speaker. It extends the circumstances in which Customs officers may enter and remain upon certain areas. It extends the matters that can be authorised in a search warrant or a seizure warrant and the powers that can be exercised by Customs officers and persons assisting with executing such a warrant.

The word ‘tweaking’ is sometimes applied to bills and amendments to bills in this place. This is a little more than that. These are strong new measures to make our customs even more robust. These are strong measures that recognise the world is changing and continues to change and our customs methods and customs regime has to be up to the task. There are some strong new deterrent measures and some very important powers of seizure and compliance within this bill.

I want to briefly say a couple of things about the port of Geelong, which is a critical bit of infrastructure. It is vital for industry development in our region. It is important for my electorate of Corangamite to relate this legislation to this facility. Authorities within my region are currently looking at plans for a major infrastructure upgrade to the port of Geelong. I think this is a very important project. It is one of our region’s top infrastructure priorities. This project includes extending the two different rail line gauges right up to the port, adding capacity and efficiency to the port. And there are other changes that could potentially greatly increase the capacity of this port. It is possible that one day in the not-too-distant future the port of Geelong will be even more important to our region and our economy, particularly given that the port of Melbourne is very close to capacity. With such strong and robust customs regimes in place nationally, the possibility of allowing provincial ports to become major terminals I think is enhanced. In short, I think this legislation is very good for our region. It will serve to keep intact the port’s reputation and to keep intact the reputation of all our ports. And our ports are important. They are a crucial link in the integrity of our trade chain.

To come back again to the detail of the legislation before us, there are some bits and pieces to this legislation that are about tweaking the system, unlike some of the earlier provisions that I mentioned. These changes are not quite as important as some of the previous ones mentioned, but they are again signs of a desire to keep improving our customs regulations in every area. These changes include providing for an exception to the offence of failing to make a cargo report, harmonising the boarding powers with the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, amending the impending arrival reporting requirements in relation to pleasure craft, making a technical amendment to the matters that must be included in a search or seizure warrant, inserting a new offence for obstructing or interfering with Customs equipment and extending the power to moor a Customs vessel to a man-made structure.

In summary, what we have is a vigilant government looking hard at every aspect of our customs regime. We are a federal government committed to strong and decisive measures that will be effective in maintaining the integrity of our customs system. Ours is a government that wants to do the right thing by industry and the people employed within the industry. This is not a government that is concerned with shameful changes to one area of border security that are designed to exploit racial hatred for cheap electoral advantage. This is a government genuinely concerned about proper legislation and regulatory change in the critical areas of customs and border security. I thank the House and I commend this bill to the House.

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