Michael Keenan (Stirling, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice) Share this | Hansard source

The proposed expenditure for the Attorney-General's portfolio reflects the fact that this has been a very challenging year for the agencies within the portfolio, not least, of course, because we have been dealing with a security situation globally that has significantly deteriorated, and as a result we have had a very significant deterioration in Australia's global security as well. We have been reminded of this, very sadly, just recently, with the handing down of the Lindt coronial findings in response to the Martin Place siege, which occurred several years ago, and the atrocious Manchester bombings at the Ariana Grande concert that, quite barbarically, targeted teenage girls in particular going for a fun night out. We have had an arrest of a 22-year-old woman in South Australia on terror charges, the appalling slaughter of Coptic Christians in central Egypt, three police officers killed in Jakarta and, just overnight, the shocking news that a 12-year-old Australian girl was killed in a suicide bombing in Baghdad—quite amazingly, when she was going to get ice cream after the sun went down to break her Ramadan fast. It was actually the ice cream parlour that was targeted by these barbarians. I would like to pass on my sincere condolences to the Al Harbiya family during what must be an extraordinarily difficult time for them.

It is these incidents that make the government extraordinarily resolute in what we are required to do to make sure that Australia is, as much as possible, immune from this threat. We consider national security to be our highest priority, and that is what we have been focused on within this portfolio over the past year. Since coming to government, we have given our law enforcement agencies and our intelligence community very significantly enhanced powers as well as significantly enhanced resources, with $1½ billion, which supports our efforts in combating terrorism and strengthens their ability to provide law and order for our country. In just this budget, we have invested $321.4 million extra with the Australian Federal Police. This is the largest single investment in the AFP's domestic capability in a decade. We have tripled the investment that goes into countering violent extremism—it is now $45 million since we have arrived in office—and we have recently invested $13½ billion to strengthen national counterterrorism arrangements with the states and territories through training, exercises and purchasing of specialist equipment. Importantly, we have passed eight tranches of unprecedented counterterrorism and national security legislation through the parliament. I acknowledge that that has been done in a cooperative way with the opposition—and it is fitting, of course, that in this parliament we have a bipartisan approach to issues of the utmost importance such as national security.

A key element of the reforms introduced by the government is the new offence of 'advocating terrorism'. It is very clear that the threat of a five-year jail sentence has meant that some of the groups that have been advocating quite abhorrent behaviour in Australia have been silenced. The AFP has advised me that as a direct result of this legislation a number of people who have previously been quite active and vocal in this space have ceased their activities.

We have also modernised the ability of our agencies to collect intelligence. We have strengthened the control order regime, which can regulate people's behaviour. This can be particularly important for breaking up groups of people who might be getting together to engage in behaviour that would be against our national security. We have reduced the arrest threshold for terrorism offences. This is incredibly important because it allows the police to move in earlier when they have information that people might be planning to do the wrong thing. We have introduced new offences that make it a crime to enter a declared area, such as Al-Raqqa or Mosul. If we can prove you were in those declared areas and you have committed a prima facie offence we can prosecute you for that, unless you have a reason for being there. Most recently, in conjunction with the states, we have done a regime of post-sentence preventative detention, which means that if somebody has been convicted of terrorism offences and has served their sentence but has not been rehabilitated and still poses a threat to the Australian community, we will continue to detain them. We cannot offer blanket protection from terrorism, but all of these measures have made Australia significantly safer. (Time expired)

See this speech in context