Chris Hayes (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I would like to speak in favour of the amendments and obviously to indicate that Labor will be supporting the passage of the Proceeds of Crime Amendment (Proceeds and Other Matters) Bill. We're all concerned when we find that there are loopholes that prevent its ability to achieve its end result, particularly when it comes to matters of law enforcement.

The proceeds of crime regime allows the authorities to trace, restrain and confiscate proceeds of crime against the Commonwealth law. The whole notion of this is to prevent organisations from financially benefiting from their crimes. Apart from crime causing misery and suffering within communities and the harm that it does, proceeds of crime allow criminal enterprises to reinvest those funds into other activities, which continues the suffering within communities.

Mr Deputy Speaker Georganas, as you know, prior to coming here I spent many, many years representing police in most Australian jurisdictions. As a matter of fact, I grew up in a police family. I can readily remember Dad coming back, probably on a Sunday morning, after he and a lot of his colleagues had been out—probably the forerunner to things such as the gang squads—and some of my uncles, as I always referred to them—I subsequently found out we weren't related, and they were all a lot bigger than me—were missing bits of bark and stuff. So they had probably had a very hard night. They were certainly enthused by catching criminals. They were enthusiastic when they caught them in an operation and they had the evidence for a successful prosecution and prepared their briefs. With bikies—I suppose their forerunners were bodgies and widgies, in those days; we probably wouldn't refer to them today as bikies—force was met with force. That's the way things were.

The thing I want to point out is that, in that era of policing, the driving thing was to catch crooks and lock crooks up, whereas I think the modern-day aspect of policing is to prevent and disrupt crime. There's a victim in every crime that takes place. Being able to prevent or disrupt criminal enterprise has a huge social benefit for all of us. That's why we need new tools to fight contemporary crime.

I know proceeds of crime is a relatively straightforward concept—you don't let people benefit from a criminal enterprise. The whole notion of this is to take away the business model that underpins criminal enterprise. I think the proceeds of crimes legislation is very good. It's been around for some time. I think it was introduced by the Hawke government some 30-odd years ago. I have been able to discover from my work on the parliamentary law enforcement committee and my involvement with current police colleagues, both within the country and internationally, that it is a matter of following the money. Proceeds of crime is one aspect of it. I suppose unexplained wealth is another. I'm particularly concerned to see that we tighten our provisions to ensure that, on how we approach moneys that flow from crime, we set a national agenda that is consistent among the state and territory jurisdictions as well as the Commonwealth.

In an effort to debase criminal enterprise we do need to take away the attraction of criminal enterprise, which is to make a profit. Their profit is derived from crime. As I said a little earlier, for every crime that's committed there is a victim. Therefore, there's got to be some greater emphasis put on that.

I know that there are many things. There is the sharing of intelligence that goes on among police. That's a very good thing because crime doesn't know borders—it doesn't respect the geographic borders, the electoral borders and things of that nature. They will look for areas of opportunity. They will commission their crime where there is weakness and where there are loopholes. I come back to the matter before us. A loophole exists in the current legislation in respect of the proceeds of crime.

I did see a very good example of where the weakness is. It is actually explained in the explanatory memorandum. I think it's a very good example: a car is bought from the proceeds of crime, from a fraud offence, and the car is later sold and the money is subsequently put towards a mortgage repayment on real property. I think most of us on both sides would say that they're obviously the proceeds of a crime and it doesn't matter when it occurred, they are still the proceeds of the crime. The Western Australian Supreme Court and the Queensland Court of Appeal took a different view in respect of the cases of the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police v Huang and the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police v Hart and others. The courts took the view that the person's interest in property is fixed at the time of the initial acquisition. In other words, quite frankly, the courts have taken the view that, once that money has been transmitted, you can't follow the money—it stops at that initial purchase. That's a bit of a green light for some of the criminals out there who might want to buy a block of units in Sydney, Melbourne or somewhere like that: they might get pinged for the offence but not for the financial aspect, the proceeds of the crime.

I've mentioned some of the work we did on the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Law Enforcement, and in this debate I'd like to refer to the exercise that took place between April and May 2009. The Australian government sent a delegation to a range of countries to look at contemporary methods of law enforcement and what police thought they needed to do in targeting criminal enterprise. In every jurisdiction that was visited—and bear in mind the jurisdictions were Canada, the United States, Italy, Austria, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands—the law enforcement strategies that were discussed all went to attacking the business model that underpinned serious and organised crime. The Italian national police's Mr Grassi summarised it well for our committee when he said that, from their perspective, members of criminal syndicates are far more prepared to spend time in prison than to have their assets lost as a result of any proceeding. I suppose we all know that in jail we have issues about communication and crime syndicates continuing to operate, but it's a real issue when people are prepared to spend time in jail for what they've invested in crime but not to relinquish their actual assets.

That's certainly the view of policing generally at the moment. I would like to quote from a submission that was made by Mark Burgess APM, Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Police Federation. I think he succinctly captures the law enforcement perspective when it comes to this bill. He said:

Criminal assets confiscation methods offer law enforcement agencies the opportunity to send a clear message to criminals: if you make money from criminal activity, we will take that money off you.

This is basically the contemporary thinking of policing—not waiting for a crime but actually going out and attacking the business model that underpins crime.

We need to have regard to the fact that there will be certain intrusions into civil liberties, and no doubt that's one of the issues that the courts have to deal with, but if we are going to protect our society we need to have that balance. I would favour the liberties of the people we represent to live harmoniously, to live in peace and to live without the fear that they may be impacted by crime. I have less regard for the civil liberty of criminals who perpetrate crime. I think we need to have a suite of legislation that gives our police and our law enforcement agencies the tools they need to attack the 'big end of town' when it comes to criminal enterprises. It's all very well to have poor coppers running around and locking up people distributing drugs on the street. Those people, to the cynics among us, are probably a dime a dozen. The Mr Bigs of crime are where we need to address our energies, and the only way to do that is to focus on the money. Again I quote Mark Burgess, from the Police Federation:

With the 'Mr Bigs' of the crime world able to distance themselves from the actual commission of crimes, or with criminals unconcerned with serving short term jail sentences, asset confiscation is an integral piece of the crime-fighting puzzle.

That certainly echoes the views I have.

We must get serious about this. We must ensure that our agencies have the tools they need to do the task that we require of them, which is to protect our communities—all this when serious and organised crime is estimated to be costing the country $36 billion a year. That's a lot of money. I have a view not so much about the proceeds of crime but unexplained wealth. The more money we can take off criminal enterprise to redirect into strategies that keep our community safe—I think that would be a pretty noble thing for us to do as law makers. As I say, I know in doing that there will be arguments about trampling aspects of civil liberties, but, again, I come down in favour of protecting the community.

As I said at the outset, I support the legislation. No doubt as courts do their work and inadvertently unravel the intent of what we as legislators intended in this legislation, there will be other remedies required. I would indicate that if we move away from the intention of what this is—to take money away from the criminals—I will certainly be up for supporting any other amendments.

Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to follow on from the member for Fowler and his support for this bill, the Proceeds of Crime Amendment (Proceeds and Other Matters) Bill 2017. I acknowledge his support for our police force and the officers who wear the uniform every day and go out there and keep our community safe. The support that the member for Fowler gives to that is very well recognised on both sides of this parliament. I would like to personally say thank you to him during this contribution.

The entire purpose of the proceeds of crime legislation is that we want those who are thinking about getting involved in criminal activity for a profit to rethink—you cannot obtain wealth and you cannot obtain the things that are great in a free-market society by engaging in illegal activity. We want those criminals to use their entrepreneurial skills to add real wealth to the economy and engage in legitimate business activities. If they do so, for whatever wealth that they accumulate we say, 'Good on them.' But if they think they can accumulate wealth through illegal activities—that is what this legislation is aimed to prevent and stop.

This bill has a range of special measures that we need to address. These amendments are a necessary response to developments of recent cases, where there have been found to be some weaknesses or loopholes in the legislation that need tightening. The amendments:

I'm glad this bill has support across the parliament. There are a few particular areas of criminal activity that I also think this parliament needs to look at more closely to ensure that we have the right legislative response to them. The first one is in respect of illegal tobacco. There is only a market for illegal tobacco because of government legislation putting very heavy taxes on that tobacco. For example, I was passing through Dubai airport last year on a delegation and in the duty-free section there were Benson & Hedges cigarettes on sale. Firstly, I'm not a smoker. I'm probably the most rabid antismoker you could find in this parliament. I can pick up the smell of cigarettes from 100 yards away and I find it offensive. It affects my nasal passages. When it comes to antismoking, I think I'm the most antismoking person you could find. But I was keen to see what the price of those cigarettes that I could buy duty free actually was. I worked out that a packet of Benson & Hedges—in a three-carton package—was the equivalent of $1.67 Australian. That's the retail price in a duty-free shop. Admittedly it was on special, but it was $1.67.

We are putting legislation through which is bipartisan legislation—it's supported by both major parties in this parliament—to increase the rate of taxation on cigarettes as an attempt to drive down the rate of smoking, because of the harm smoking does. But, in doing so, we are going to raise the retail price of that packet of Benson & Hedges to $40. So, when the retail price through taxation is $40, yet you can buy that same product overseas at a retail level—let alone a wholesale level—for $1.67, we have created a great incentive for criminals to become involved in the illegal tobacco racket.

We're seeing more and more seizures. I'm sure that every member of this parliament would be able to go to countless tobacconists in their electorates and, if they really wanted to, buy an illegal packet of tobacco. In Western Sydney, in particular, they seem to be popping up all over the place—selling unlawful product and almost thumbing their noses at the law.

So, if we are going to crack down on tobacco use in this country, if we are going to try to reduce the rate of smoking in this country by a price mechanism—effectively, a prohibition via price—we have to acknowledge that that will cause all the criminal activities that we have seen throughout history when prohibitions on products occur. So we need to think very carefully about this issue of illegal tobacco, how we're going to tackle it and the law enforcement activities that we're going to need in this area. One of the most important areas is the proceeds of crime. Anyone who thinks that they can obtain wealth through the importation or the sale of illegal tobacco must know that this parliament will put laws in place that will confiscate those ill-gotten gains.

The second area regarding our laws here in Australia that we need to look at and crack down on further is car theft. We have seen a slight decline in car theft across Australia in recent years—as technology improves, it can make it harder for criminals to steal cars. Unfortunately, as we always see, we have to keep one step ahead of the criminals. We have seen places in Melbourne where a modus operandi of car thieves is to break into people's houses when the people are at home, take the car keys—which people often leave at somewhere near the front entrance or in the front foyer of the house—and go and steal the car. People have actually been erecting bollards to prevent this. There is a company in Melbourne that is doing a roaring trade erecting bollards—the type of bollards that we see here at Parliament House. When people get home to their house they can put their bollards up, sending a message that if anyone breaks into their house for car keys, they won't be able to get the car out.

The other concern about the issue of car theft is that we've seen a great imbalance in the figures between the states. New South Wales has had a very significant decline in the rate of car thefts, which has been very good, but Victoria has had a very large increase in car thefts. It's almost as though a large section of the car theft industry has packed up and moved out of Sydney and gone down to set up business in Victoria. That is something this parliament needs to look at more closely. And the reason why, even though car theft is a state issue, is that there have been reports that a lot of the stolen cars are actually being exported out of Australia. There was a famous story about a month or so ago where someone had their late-model BMW stolen in Melbourne and it turned up in Dubai. There are reports that up to 40 per cent of cars stolen are exported out of the country. You could imagine that difficulty in Europe, where you have open borders making it very easy to ship cars across countries. But in Australia, the only way to get a car out of the country is to put it in a container and have it exported. So I think we need to look closely at what export regulations we have in place and at the weakness of those laws that enable car thieves to put stolen cars in containers and ship them out of country. In doing so, we need to be careful that we don't overly interfere or put too much red tape in the way of businesses or companies that are doing legitimate exports of cars and car parts.

We could reduce that rate of car theft if we could close our borders. Often so much of our law enforcement activity is done looking at goods being imported into the country. It appears that we have a blind spot with stolen goods being exported out of the country. So it's very important that this parliament looks at what we can do in this space to tighten up those export regulations for the export of stolen cars to help our state law enforcement agencies to crack down and to reduce the number of car thefts, because, if we can reduce the number of car thefts in this country, we can reduce insurance premiums. If we're doing that, we're effectively putting money back in motorists' pockets. If we could get car thefts down substantially, we'd see a substantial reduction in premiums. At this time, every household is under cost-of-living pressures. If we could do something just to reduce the insurance premium on their car, that would go a long way in helping. This is why the law enforcement committee, hopefully, will be looking at the issue of car thefts and the export of stolen cars and looking at what regulations we can make in this federal parliament to close that gap down.

If someone here in Australia thinks that they are going to obtain wealth and property—whether it's fast boats, fast cars or flash houses—through stealing cars, this legislation gives them the message to give up that illegal activity because this will see their assets confiscated. I leave my remarks there. I thank the opposition for their support of this bill. I hope that, in this area of proceeds of crime and law enforcement, this parliament can continue to work in a bipartisan manner to crack down on illegal activity. I thank the House.

Matt Keogh (Burt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The government does support the Proceeds of Crime Amendment (Proceeds and Other Matters) Bill 2017 to amend the Proceeds of Crime Act as it operates at a Commonwealth level. This piece of legislation serves to rob criminals of any benefit that they may receive from the crimes that they commit. And it mirrors, in many respects at least, a legislative intent of a similar form around the country. This particular bill aligns the Commonwealth unexplained wealth regime with other types of orders in the act to ensure that it covers situations in which wealth is derived or realised directly or indirectly from certain offences. One would have to say that we would hope with this amendment that the unexplained wealth provisions that exist at the Commonwealth level might actually now start to be used. The states have been using these provisions in their own legislation for a long period of time, and one would hope that, having such a provision in the act for quite a while now, maybe the Commonwealth will make use of the provision once it's amended.

The legislation also purports to clarify:

… that property becomes 'proceeds' or an 'instrument' of an offence under the Act—

when those—

are used to improve the property or discharge an encumbrance security or liability incurred in relation to the property, and

'lawfully acquired''proceeds''instrument'

Australia's proceeds of crime regime must be kept up to date. It must meet modern economic conditions and it must ensure that it is effective and that loopholes are not created or maintained that allow criminals to maintain wealth from their criminal activities. These loopholes, where they exist, must be addressed. However, it must also be said that the Proceeds of Crime Act as it currently stands does provide for the forfeiture of property or at least the value of such property in an extremely wide set of circumstances already, some of which may actually be quite concerning, or at least surprising, to the public at large. Foremost of those is cuckoo smurfing, the description of which is probably far too detailed for this speech but is something I'm sure the AFP commissioner and those apprised in this area of the law are familiar with and know needs to be addressed.

In dealing with this legislation, the issue I would like to turn briefly to is the changes to the definition of proceeds and instruments. Those words are used in sections 17 to 19 in relation to restraining orders and 47 to 49 in respect of forfeiture. They're also defined in sections 329 and 330, and it's important to look at those two provisions. Section 329 sets out the meaning of proceeds of crime, and section 330 describes how something becomes or ceases to be a proceed of crime. Generally, the specific will overrule the general. Section 330(4) specifically defines how property ceases to be a proceed of crime. The government is amending section 330 by inserting proposed subsection (8), which provides that whatever is in section 330 will not override or not limit section 329, but that may have the effect of actually creating more ambiguity than the provision as amended is trying to resolve because it sets up a situation where property may be a proceed of crime but it's not clear, at least for the purposes of a bona fide third-party purchaser for value, whether that property actually ceases to be a proceed of crime. It's for that reason, and to deal with those sorts of issues, that not only do we have the opportunity under the Proceeds of Crime Act to confiscate or to forfeit proceeds of crime, which is very important, but the commissioner has the opportunity to seek a pecuniary penalty order. In other words, the commissioner has the capacity to take the same value off the criminal as the proceed of crime, where they cease to hold it themselves.

In that regard, the explanatory memorandum for these particular amendments cuts straight to the chase where it says that the amendments proposed to the act are, in part, directed at the decision by his honour Justice Kenneth Martin of the Western Australia Supreme Court in the decision of the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police and Huang in 2016. The effect of the amendments could actually be far wider than trying to deal with this case, but it is important to realise that, in that case, if the commissioner had applied for a pecuniary penalty instead of a forfeiture, he would have got the value he was seeking. So in many respects the amendments that are being sought by the government may not have been required but are in response to the poor tactical decision which seems to have been made by the commissioner in that decision. But we don't stand in the way of what the government is proposing to do here, because if there are actual loopholes in the legislation we of course support the government in closing them. I speak only to make sure that it does stand on the record that, in trying to close loopholes, the government may well just be creating others for the future.

What the government also needs to understand is that legislation alone will do nothing to fix issues relating to crime if our police continue to be under-resourced. This government pretends to be tough on crime while savagely cutting funding for the Australian Federal Police. In the 2017-18 budget, the government cut $184 million, with 151 AFP officers let go this year alone. Of course, we have to tackle crime. But, if the Prime Minister were serious about tackling crime, he wouldn't be cutting the numbers of the police force. We should be judging this government on what they do rather than just what they say, because, even though they talk a big game when it comes to law and order, their actions are seriously lacking, not only on the policing end but in actually doing work to ensure that crime doesn't occur in the first place.

But, when it comes to resourcing our primary law enforcement body, the AFP, it's inadequate, especially when it comes to financial crimes. And these are the crimes where the Proceeds of Crime Act provisions are actually the most cutting and should have the most serious effect on those who are thinking of committing crime, because those are usually the most premeditated crimes. Those are the crimes where the people who commit them are thinking about whether they will be caught and what the penalty will be. So it looms large to make sure that the Australian Federal Police, along with its other complementary agencies in the area such as ASIC, APRA and AUSTRAC, are adequately resourced to actually police Australians to make sure that financial crime does not happen.

Similarly, not only do the resources of the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions, so long overlooked by successive governments I will admit, need to be increased, along with the ever-expanding scope of the work of the Australian Federal Police and our other law enforcement agencies, but a significant investment is actually required to catch it up with all of the prior expansion of law enforcement work that has been happening at a federal level in this country. Whilst they remain inadequately resourced, all we see is more and more law enforcement agencies running around trying to catch crooks, as they should; yet, they can't be, or there is a backlog in prosecuting them properly and making sure that justice is brought to bear against those that commit crimes in this country because the Commonwealth DPP is chronically underresourced. These amendments are supported, but, like much of the government's legislation nowadays which I have to speak on so frequently, it's necessity is somewhat dubious, and I really hope that we do not soon find ourselves back in this place having to fix another legislative amendment bungle by this government.

Ross Hart (Bass, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today, like the member for Burt, to speak on the Proceeds of Crime Amendment (Proceeds and Other Matters) Bill 2017. As we have heard this morning, this bill makes amendments to the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 with the intention of closing loopholes that exist in our proceeds of crime regime. Specifically, these amendments address a gap in legislation which allows criminals to structure their affairs to avoid forfeiture or confiscation of assets that were not lawfully acquired. Under the Commonwealth's proceeds of crime regime, authorities are empowered to trace, restrain and confiscate the proceeds of crime against Commonwealth law. Two relatively recent court decisions have been referred to this morning which have prompted the government into action, consequently proposing the amendments to the act that we have before us today.

The first of these was Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police v Huang, which was a 2016 decision. This matter concerned an application under section 94 of the Proceeds of Crime Act. The particular issue that arose was the fact that the source of funds used by the offender in order to repay a loan meant that they couldn't trace or acquire the particular property. So, if you'd paid down a mortgage, that didn't thereafter taint the property that had been acquired. In response to this particular case, parliament passed amendments to the definition of 'lawfully acquired' within the act, which were intended to ensure that, where illegitimate funds are used to discharge a legitimately obtained security such as a mortgage, property or wealth obtained using the security is not considered lawfully acquired. I say again: a criminal may well have property which has been legitimately acquired, subject to a mortgage. In this case the mortgage was partially repaid. The question was whether the legislation at the time enabled the Commonwealth to deal with the property on the basis that it had been tainted by the money that had been repaid from the mortgage.

The second case is Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police v Hart & Ors—no relation, I assume—which, again, is a 2016 case. That case was analogous to the Huang case, where you had a repayment of mortgage, but in the Hart case the source of funds which were used for repairs or restoration of a particular asset were the issue. In other words, if you had a particular asset such as a house which had been enhanced, repaired or renovated, the question was whether the unlawful activity tainted the property and whether the source of funds used for repairing or restoring the assets could be relevant in determining whether there was forfeiture of the asset.

The amendments serve to align the Commonwealth unexplained wealth regime with other types of orders which are contemplated in the act to ensure that those provisions cover situations in which wealth is derived or realised directly or indirectly from certain offences. It also clarifies that property becomes proceeds or an instrument of an offence under the act when they are used to improve the property or discharge an incumbent security or liability incurred in relation to the property—in other words, a mortgage. Lastly, the act is amended to clarify that property or wealth will only be lawfully acquired in circumstances where the property or wealth is not proceeds or an instrument of an offence.

It is important to understand the context of what we're talking about here today. Serious and organised crime is estimated to cost Australia $36 billion each year. That's a cost to the economy that affects you and me. It affects organisations doing business within the Australian economy. The Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission estimates that this equates to $1,561 out of every individual's pocket. Of course, this is money not paid in tax; this is money lost to the economy. It is essential, therefore, that our proceeds of crime regime is kept up to date. The regime provides justice to the community by stopping criminals from financially benefitting from their crimes. Also, further crime is prevented by cutting off funding for future criminal endeavours and would-be criminals are deterred by reducing the appeal of the illegal activity. However, given the scope and impact of organised crime in our community, it is clear that legislation alone is not enough to tackle this deeply concerning problem. We on this side of the House believe that it's absolutely essential that we properly resource law enforcement. It's not enough simply to provide legislation that is able to be used by law enforcement if we don't adequately resource our law enforcers.

This bill will not and cannot make up for the fact that this government has cut Australia's law enforcement activity. As we heard earlier this morning, the other side, those opposite, claim to be tough on crime. They often come into this place and talk about issues like mandatory minimum sentences, for example. They beat their chests and claim that they are being tough on crime. But when you look at what they are actually doing, how they're resourcing the Australian Federal Police and enforcing law enforcement generally, you see that in the most recent budget they cut $184 million from the Australian Federal Police. Last year, 151 AFP officers were let go and the government threatened the pay and conditions of AFP officers. In my home state we see the ongoing effects of these types of cuts. For example, in Tasmania in 2014 the Abbott Liberal government removed all the Australian Federal Police from Hobart airport. You might ask the question, 'Why would I, in northern Tasmania, be concerned about whether we have an AFP presence in Hobart?', because we don't have a presence of AFP in Launceston, and we haven't had it for a significant period of time. The important issue—an issue which is totally lost on this government—is the fact that this decreased the total number of AFP officers in Tasmania from 30 to five. That was an 84 per cent reduction in AFP personnel in Tasmania. That affects the entire state; it's not something that affects just the capital city.

Tasmania, regrettably, is the only state where the capital city airport has absolutely no AFP presence. This has forced the diversion of Tasmania Police resources from ordinary policing activity to the protection of Hobart airport. This means that there is a diversion of precious resources away from community policing and general crime policing across the state to protect the Hobart airport. It's not doubted that the AFP are experts in fighting serious crime, such as drug trafficking and organised crime, and it's difficult to know how many of these crimes are going undetected in Tasmania because of this government's refusal to fund the AFP properly or to reinstate the presence of AFP in the state.

Last year, I'm proud that the Labor opposition committed to reinstating an AFP presence at Hobart airport to patrol the airport to prevent and detect crime and to keep passengers and workers at the airport safe. The restoration of a permanent AFP presence at Hobart airport will enhance our national security and improve security at the airport by enhancing the law enforcement's ability to detect national security threats, contraband, illegal drugs, federal crimes and other crimes. The restoration of this presence will also enable Tasmania Police to re-divert their officers and resources back to community policing, which should improve community safety in Hobart and across Tasmania.

Under Labor's policy the AFP presence in Tasmania will increase from five personnel to 21 personnel with at least two federal officers on duty at all times the airport is open. This is the type of resourcing that ultimately allows law enforcement agencies to do their job detecting and preventing crime and keeping our community safe. This government is happy to give lip-service on law and order, but so far we're yet to see a proper commitment to resourcing and supporting law enforcement agencies in their incredibly important work.

I'd also like to note that concerns were raised through the committee process regarding several aspects of this bill. The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, for example, recommended that the government undertake a detailed assessment of the Proceeds of Crime Act to determine its compatibility with the right to a fair trial and the right to receive a fair hearing. The committee also noted that the proposed amendments may engage and limit the right to not be subject to arbitrary or unlawful interference with a person's home as the amendments affect orders that can be used to restrain and forfeit real property. Further, there did not appear to be a safeguard in place to allow the court to revoke a forfeiture order where a person has been acquitted of an offence or where their conviction has been subsequently quashed. It's really important, at this stage, to reflect upon the fact that there are some areas, such as law enforcement, where bipartisanship is truly appropriate. We can't afford to place national security, for example, in issue when we're considering the safety of our nation, and that also applies in this area of law enforcement. Of course, we must consider the rights of the individual. We also must consider representations that have been made by peak bodies, such as the Law Council of Australia, as to how, in practise, these amendments might work.

The Senate Standing Committees on Legal and Constitutional Affairs reported on the bill. They took into account a submission from the Law Council of Australia to the committee's inquiry, which raised an important issue of proportionality. They stated that there is a need for proportionality, which was especially critical, given that this legislation anticipates that there will be a low threshold in obtaining restraining orders. The legislation also contains strict exclusion tests, and there's a very limited judicial discretion to prevent forfeiture and the operation of forfeiture provisions. Just unpacking that for a minute, the issue of proportionality is important; it's something that I think this parliament needs to monitor.

The important issue is that, if there is a trivial application of proceeds of crime to the reduction of a mortgage or to renovate or repair a house, one would not want to see injustice occasioned, particularly to a perpetrator's family, where a house, where an asset, has been tainted by a trivial transaction. As presently drafted, and as advised by the Law Council of Australia, that is something that needs to be considered and needs to be monitored. Whilst Labor are satisfied that we should support the legislation through the House, it's perfectly appropriate that we do sound a note of caution with respect to issues like proportionality.

Labor will not oppose the passage of this bill through the House; however, we should also be vigilant about carefully examining this legislation to ensure that it is sufficiently robust to address what have been identified as significant gaps in our proceeds of crime regime. We also need to be mindful that we do not unnecessarily encroach on Australian individuals' rights and liberties. Again, as I indicated earlier, there is a gap, in many cases, between what the government professes it is doing with respect to issues like law and order and how it actually implements legislation. The job of a robust opposition is not simply to oppose. That's why Labor is not opposing this bill. But speeches like mine and the speech that was delivered by the member for Burt are really important signals to the wider community that there are concerns as to issues like proportionality, as to whether injustice might be occasioned in the operation of this legislation.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

Ordered that this bill be reported to the House without amendment.