Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Deputy Speaker, but do we really need to go through this again? I went through this with the other deputy speaker, about how it's pronounced 'Gold-styne', named after a suffragette. Every time we mention the name of the electorate, we honour her, so I respectfully counsel the deputy speaker that that's how we pronounce the name of the electorate Goldstein correctly. In any case, that's the second time I've now had to do that in this speech, so hopefully we don't have a third deputy speaker!

The principal reason I support this report is it constructively goes through all the different issues that we find with the tension between national security and freedom of the press. I outlined before the division how strongly I support both principles, and they are important. There are some people who believe in almost unlimited or unfettered restrictions or limited restrictions on the press to be able do their job. Idealistically, that suits me. In practice, when you work through the issues around national security and the risk to lives, particularly with sensitive information being released, that's not a viable option unless you're prepared to discard those lives for freedom. I always sit on the freedom versus security ledger, but I also recognise the need for national security not only for the interests of government to be able to deliberate and do its work but also because we don't want officers in the field who may be doing particular types of work to be exposed to harm. That's what we've sought to introduce in this report. We can go through it and the different recommendations, line by line, but what's clear to me is that putting in an effective mechanism to make sure that the classification of documents is properly scrutinised and done in accordance with the spirit of law as well as the practice of what we should expect as a Five Eyes partner is critical. I think that making sure we revisit a lot of those previous reviews, which made recommendations that haven't necessarily been fully enacted by successive governments, is also critically important.

One of the things that arose specifically out of the Smethurst case was whether registrars could issue warrants. As a member of the inquiry, this was one of my bugbears, and it was a simple thing to fix, to build a sense of public confidence. That in itself is mostly what we are talking about. I think that our national security agencies do an outstanding job. I think they do it deliberatively and cautiously. In terms of their roles, there is a constant review of the functions and powers, as well as an auditing of the activities, of both the IGIS and the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor. Of course, the IGIS effectively has the power of a standing royal commission. I think they take those roles very seriously and I think they do an excellent job. I'll leave it to the members of this chamber to decide whether they think the free press always do their job with the same degree of responsibility. I have mixed views at times, but that is the price of freedom. That is why I am a great believer in free speech in particular.

So, getting that balance right is important. I think that having proper courts and superior court judges issuing warrants is a foundational test for making sure that there is public confidence. When they're issued by a registrar to journalists it erodes public confidence that there are proper considerations in place, that there are proper restraints and that there are proper consideration of the public interest in its many forms, including security and of course freedom, in this discussion. There is also the involvement of a public interest advocate, looking at the justification for a warrant but also making weighty decisions about what the public interest is in making sure that the public gets the information they need to hold us—meaning all of us—and the agencies and arms of government, as well as, of course, politicians, to account.

That's where I feel we got the balance overwhelmingly right. The member for Berowra made some additional comments—and I've no doubt that he'll give a very erudite outline of the basis of his comments. I associated myself with them. They're not dissenting from the report. They're not arguing against the report. They're talking about a general trend around what warrants ultimately are and particularly around the fact that they are an obligation and a responsibility of the executive versus the courts and that we should reflect that and acknowledge that as part of the discussion around these issues.

Of course, the Parliamentary Joint Committee of Intelligence and Security do quite a substantial and weighty amount of work, not just in the areas of freedom of speech, freedom of the press and national security; we have inquiries looking at any number of other areas of legislation, like the legislative clearing house, as well as the more recently announced inquiry related to tertiary institutions and the role of foreign interference, which, I think, at this time, is critical for building another type of confidence.

The PJCIS works very well, and I want to acknowledge all of the members, even those from the opposition that I sometimes have strategic disagreements with! Sometimes I have strategic disagreements with members from my own side as well—it's true—inside and outside the committee. I thank them very much for their constructive work under the chairmanship of the member for Canning, who does an excellent job stewarding the committee and steering us all in the right direction. The truth is that it is a committee where there is so much work that needs to be done, particularly on the detail. I want to thank everybody who had input into this inquiry—your voices were heard and listened to—and also to the secretariat, who bring all of those voices together into a digestible form to enable us committee members to successfully prosecute our job. I commend the report to the Federation Chamber.

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