Richard Marles (Corio, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Hansard source

In my speech on the second reading I spoke in support of the legislation before the House, including the package of amendments which emanated from the recommendations made by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security. So I do not intend to say any more relation to that, but I do wish to speak briefly in relation to those additional matters that were circulated by the government as a result of the advice that was received by the government last week.

As the minister has referred to, the government received advice in respect of the constitutionality of the amendments emanating as a result of the recommendations from the PJCIS. As a result of that advice, the government met with both me and the shadow Attorney-General to seek an additional amendment to those amendments in order to further bolster the constitutionality of this legislative package.

There were constitutional issues raised during the hearings of the PJCIS, and I spoke about that in my speech on the second reading. The opposition at that time made it clear, as I do now, that it is of course for the government, in bringing legislation before this parliament, to be certain of the constitutionality of that legislation, and we were provided with a letter from the Attorney-General to the Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which was made public, assuring us of the government's confidence in the constitutionality of the legislation.

In raising with us the issue that there may be further amendments to those that emanated from the parliamentary joint committee, it was also made clear that the motivations for those was in respect of constitutionality, and we again sought assurances from the government that this would assist in the ultimate constitutionality of the legislation before the parliament. The Attorney-General wrote to both me and the shadow Attorney-General on 25 November making it clear that these additional amendments seek to further enhance constitutionality of this legislative package.

Once again, I make the point from the view of the opposition that it is of course for the government to be confident of the constitutionality of this legislative package. We appreciate the letter that was provided on 25 November giving an indication of the government's confidence in these new amendments and what they do in terms of the constitutionality of the package, and it is on the basis of that that we continue to proceed forward in support of this legislative package. But it is of course for the government to be confident of the constitutionality. It does, as a result, change the substance of the recommendations that were agreed to by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, in particular, in respect of recommendation 15, which goes to the question of a judicial review which ultimately is available to those persons who have their citizenship cancelled by virtue of their own conduct. Whereas previously there was a mandatory requirement in recommendation 15 for the minister to consider whether there were any extenuating circumstances such as would warrant the rescinding of a loss of citizenship resulting from the operation of a person's conduct, that is now a matter of discretion for the minister.

Again, we sought clarification from the government in respect of the ultimate ability for judicial review to be available to persons in this circumstance. As the minister made clear in his speech, and as we understand has been put into the supplementary explanatory memorandum, and as was provided in a letter to the opposition again by the government on 27 November, the right of judicial review for all persons who find that their citizenship has been revoked as a result of their own conduct is still available, albeit that it is narrowed by virtue of this amendment. The continued presence of a judicial review is important for the opposition in continuing to support this process, which we do. We also note in that sense that the critical focusing of this legislation which emanated as a result of the recommendations of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security—that is, the limitation of a loss of citizenship by operation of conduct to those people acting overseas—remains intact and is unaltered by virtue of these new amendments.

As result of all of that, the opposition is comfortable to move forward and support this package of legislation. It is important legislation. We do, as a parliament, need to have as our primary responsibility keeping our nation safe. The minister is right when he says that there is an unprecedented level of concern in relation to our nation's security. In doing that, we have to get the balance right of people's rights versus addressing the needs of our nation's security, and the opposition believes that this legislative package ultimately does that.

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