Tom French (Moore, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

Australia is an island nation, and that gives us an enormous advantage. We are separated by sea from many of the pests and diseases that damage farms, animals, plants and natural environments in other parts of the world. But that advantage only works if we protect it. Every day, aircraft land at Australian airports, ships arrive at our ports and travellers return from holidays, visit family, come here for work or arrive in Australia for the first time. They bring luggage, food, clothing and equipment. Almost all of them are simply getting on with their lives. But sometimes, without even knowing it, a traveller can also bring something in that could cause enormous damage. It could be seeds stuck to a boot, soil on camping equipment, fruit carrying an insect or meat carrying a disease. That is why we have a biosecurity system.

The Biosecurity Amendment (Improving Operational Efficiency) Bill 2026 is about making that system work better. It does not lower our biosecurity standards. It does not remove the responsibility on people entering Australia to tell us what they are carrying. In fact, it gives our biosecurity officers better tools to get the right information earlier and use that information more effectively.

The bill has three main parts. First, it supports the Australia travel declaration, or ATD, and allows biosecurity information to be collected in modern ways. Second, it gives businesses operating under approved biosecurity arrangements a clearer and fairer process when government decisions are being made about those arrangements. Third, it fixes a small technical problem in the existing Biosecurity Act. Those changes might sound fairly dry, but the reason behind them is simple: Australia is receiving more travellers and goods, the risks are changing and our border system has to keep up.

In 2025 alone, biosecurity officers inspected more than 280,000 commercial air and sea consignments and intercepted more than 359,000 incoming travellers. In March this year, alone, officers intercepted more than 33,300 travellers carrying biosecurity risk material. Those are not small numbers. As international travel continues to grow, we cannot simply respond by making every traveller stand in a longer line. We need smarter systems.

That brings me to the first major reform in this bill, the Australia travel declaration. Most Australians who have travelled overseas know the current system. You're sitting on the plane as it approaches Australia. The cabin crew hand out paper incoming passenger cards. You find a pen—more often than not you discover you don't have one—then you try to remember the flight number, where you were staying and whether something buried at the bottom of your suitcase falls within one of the questions on the card. For decades, that system has done an important job. But in 2026 we can do better.

The Australia travel declaration allows travellers to provide biosecurity information digitally. Under the current pilot, eligible travellers can complete the declaration through the Qantas app before arriving in Australia. Once it is completed, they receive a QR code which can be scanned once they arrive. The declaration can be completed up to 72 hours before departure. The pilot started in Brisbane in 2024. It was expanded to Sydney in 2025 and to Melbourne in 2026. By 26 May this year, more than 380,000 travellers had used the system. The government has now announced its intention to expand the system further. The bill creates the legal framework needed to support that work.

Importantly, this is not simply about replacing a piece of paper with a screen. The real benefit is getting useful information earlier. At the moment, much of the information on an incoming passenger card becomes available to officers when a traveller is already arriving at the border. A digital system can allow that information to be provided earlier. That gives biosecurity officers more opportunity to assess the risk, and it means officers can spend more time looking at people and goods that require closer attention instead of treating every traveller in exactly the same way.

The explanatory memorandum makes the purpose clear. The aim is smoother passenger flows, less congestion and faster processing while maintaining our biosecurity standards. That last part is important. Efficiency cannot mean weaker biosecurity. The point is to be more efficient because we have better information, not to wave more people through and hope for the best.

Under the bill, new section 195A will create a clear obligation on incoming travellers—including passengers, crew members and people in charge of aircraft or vessels—to provide prescribed biosecurity information and documents. Adults can also be required to provide information for children or other people for whom they are responsible. The information that can be required is tied to biosecurity. For example, travellers may be asked what goods they are bringing into Australia. They might be asked where they have travelled—whether they've visited farms, been around animals, walked through wilderness areas or visited freshwater areas. In some cases a person's occupation may help officers understand the risk. That does not mean that Australia has suddenly developed an unhealthy interest in what everyone does for a living. It means that someone who works around farms, plants or animals may be more likely to have soil, seeds or other biological material on their equipment and clothing.

The bill also allows information to be used for future assessment and profiling of biosecurity risks. In plain English, that means looking for patterns. If we know where the risks are appearing, where travellers have come from, what goods are causing problems and where breaches are occurring we can put officers and resources where they are most useful. That is basic risk management. The bill also makes clear that information needs to remain accurate. If information changes or is incomplete, travellers are required to correct it. There are penalties for failing to comply. There are also existing serious penalties for knowingly providing false or misleading information, and that is appropriate.

Australia welcomes millions of people through our border. The overwhelming majority of people do the right thing. The system should make their journey as simple as possible. But there must be consequences for people who deliberately ignore biosecurity rules, because the cost of a serious pest or disease outbreak does not stop at an airport terminal. It can reach farms thousands of kilometres away. It can affect food production. It can close export markets. It can destroy businesses. It can damage the environment. It can threaten jobs in regional communities. Australia's agriculture sector depends heavily on our strong pest and disease status. Our producers are able to sell high-quality food and fibre around the world because international customers trust Australian products. Biosecurity helps protect that reputation.

That is why farmers are right to insist that any new technology must strengthen the system, not weaken it. The National Farmers' Federation has described Australia's biosecurity as non-negotiable. The Queensland Farmers Federation has also supported greater digital efficiency in principle, while stressing the importance of strong border protection and cybersecurity. These are reasonable expectations.

Modernisation has to be done properly. Accessibility also has to be part of the rollout. Not every traveller owns the latest phone. Not everybody is confident using an app. Not everybody has reliable internet access. And some travellers may have a disability or another reason that a particular digital process is difficult to use. Canberra Airport has specifically raised the importance of keeping the declaration process accessible for travellers who face barriers with digital technology, and that should be taken seriously as this program expands. Digital government should make services easier. It should not turn possession of the right phone into an entry requirement.

The second major reform in this bill deals with what are called approved arrangements. That phrase needs some explanation. Some businesses regularly deal with goods that carry biosecurity risks. Rather than having government officers personally manage every step of the transaction, an approved arrangement allows an organisation to manage certain biosecurity risks itself under rules agreed with the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. These arrangements can make the system more efficient while still requiring the business to meet strict biosecurity standards.

The issue addressed by these bills is: what happens when an organisation applies for one of these arrangements or asks to change an existing arrangement and the department is considering saying no or imposing conditions? The bill establishes a clearer notice-of-intention process. Again, the name sounds complicated; the idea is not. If the department is considering refusing an application it should generally tell the applicant why before making the final decision. The applicant then gets a chance to respond. Under the proposed process a notice of intention must be in writing. It must explain what the decision-maker is considering doing. It must provide reasons and, except in serious or urgent cases, the applicant can be invited to provide a written response within 30 days. It must also tell applicants about the review rights. For lawyers, we call that procedural fairness; for everyone else, we might call it giving somebody a fair chance to put their side of the story.

If a government regulator is considering refusing an application, an applicant should normally know why. If the regulator has misunderstood something, the applicant should be able to correct it. If there was more information that could change the decision, the decision-maker should be able to consider it. The department already uses notices like these as part of its administrative practices, and this bill puts that practice more clearly into legislation. That means greater certainty for industry and more consistent decision-making. Good regulation is not simply about being tough; it is about being clear. Businesses need to know what the rules are, regulators need to have the power to enforce those rules and, when decisions are made, people should understand the process. That combination supports confidence in the system.

The third part of this bill is much smaller. It fixes wording in section 568 of the Biosecurity Act, relating to the Inspector-General of Biosecurity. The act currently uses the phrase 'relevant information' in that section. The problem is that relevant information already has a special defined meaning elsewhere in the act. That special meaning was not intended to apply here, so the bill removes the word 'relevant' from that provision, making the meaning clear. It is not a dramatic reform; no-one will be making a documentary about it, but clear laws are better laws, and fixing confusing drafting is worthwhile.

This bill also forms part of a much larger investment in Australia's biosecurity system. Since the 2022 election, the Albanese Labor government has committed more than $2 billion in additional biosecurity and resourcing. We've also strengthened our frontline capability. Detector dogs remain one of the most effective tools we have. In 2024 biosecurity detector dogs intercepted more than 42,000 items at our borders and mail centres. More than 10,000 of those interceptions were made by the additional 20 detector dogs funded by this government.

Technology is valuable, but good biosecurity will always depend on people as well. It depends on trained officers making decisions. It depends on scientists identifying risks. It depends on detector dogs finding things that people would rather they not find. It depends on farmers and industry working with government. And it depends on travellers being honest about what they are bringing into Australia. The aim of this bill is to make each part of that system work better together. We should welcome international visitors. Tourism supports businesses and jobs across Australia. Australians should also be able to return home without spending unnecessary time standing in airport queues. But convenience and security are not opposing ideas. Done properly, technology can give us both. Information can be provided earlier. Risk can be assessed sooner. Low-risk travellers can move smoothly through the system. Biosecurity officers can concentrate on areas that require closer attention. Businesses working under approved arrangements can receive clearer and fairer decisions, and our farmers, environment and economy continue to receive the protection they depend upon.

Australia has built one of the strongest biosecurity systems in the world, but a strong record is not an excuse to stand still. Travelling numbers will continue growing. Trade will keep growing. Technology will keep changing. Pests and diseases will keep changing too. Our laws have to be capable of changing with them. That is what this bill does. It replaces unnecessary reliance on paper with a framework for better digital processes. It gives officers access to information earlier. It strengthens the legal obligation to provide accurate biosecurity information. It improves procedural fairness for industry, and it cleans up an unclear provision in the existing act. These are practical reforms. They make the border more efficient without lowering the standard of protection Australians expect. I commend the bill to the House.

Ash Ambihaipahar (Barton, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

As a kid, I would sit with my uncle, late at night, on his car bonnet, watching the planes taking off or landing at Sydney airport. Fast forward to today: if you stand on the northern edge of my electorate on any given morning, you'll see the planes lining up over Botany Bay and, one after another, descending into Sydney airport. It is a visual Barton locals know very well because behind each landing and take-off is a small force of my own constituents. They're baggage handlers, check-in staff, cleaners, caterers, ground crew and biosecurity officers checking bags at the carousel before anyone gets to go home. Sydney Airport sits right on Barton's doorstep. For thousands of families in Hurstville, Rockdale, Kogarah and Bexley, it isn't just a piece of infrastructure; it's the family income. And that's the lens I bring to this piece of legislation, the Biosecurity Amendment (Improving Operational Efficiency) Bill 2026, seeing it not as a theoretical piece of border machinery but as legislation that touches on an industry my community works in, lives near and very much depends on.

I want to start with something almost everyone in this chamber has experienced personally: standing in the arrivals hall after a long haul flight, exhausted, filling out a paper form by hand, trying to remember exactly what farm you visited a couple of countries ago, then shuffling forward in a queue that never seems to actually move. That paper form is the Incoming Passenger Card, and it has been part of the arrival experience for many decades. It works in the sense that it gets the job done, but it's slow. It's manual, and in an age when almost everything else about air travel has gone digital, it increasingly feels like a bit of a relic. Two previous attempts to digitise it, between 2016 and 2022, didn't get across the line, but this bill is the third attempt and, unlike the first two, it's already proving itself in the real world.

Since October 2024, a pilot program called the Australia Travel Declaration has been running on select Qantas international flights, starting in Brisbane and expanding to Sydney in 2025 and to Melbourne this year. Instead of a paper card, travellers fill in their declaration on their phone up to 72 hours before they even board. It generates a QR code sent straight to their email, which a Border Force officer simply scans on arrival. As of May this year, more than 380,000 travellers came through this system this particular way.

In July, the government announced that it would extend the digital declaration to every capital city before the end of the year and has backed it with $56.1 million over four years to build a web form version so that no traveller, regardless of which app they have or don't have, is left behind. For an airport that sits in my community's backyard, that's not a minor technical upgrade. It's the difference between a smooth Tuesday arvo at the terminal and a bottleneck that ripples through every gate, every ground crew's shift and every connecting flight.

Let me put some scale around what our biosecurity system is actually managing. Last year alone, biosecurity officers intercepted more than 359,000 incoming travellers carrying something of concern and inspected over 280,000 air and sea consignments. Detector dogs, including the extra 20 this government has added to the front line, caught more than 42,000 items at our borders and mail centres in 2024. Over 10,000 of those were through the new dogs alone.

Those aren't just statistics for a briefing note. Every one of those interceptions happened because a person was standing at a desk or a dog was working on a bag at an airport where my constituents go to work every single day. When traveller numbers keep climbing—and they are climbing, with Australia welcoming millions of visitors a year and with Brisbane, in particular, preparing to host the Olympics—the volume passing through the system only grows. If we don't modernise how we collect basic biosecurity information, the strain doesn't fall on some faceless bureaucracy; it falls on the workforce at Sydney Airport, on the queues that snake back from immigration and ultimately on whether Barton locals actually get home on time after their shift.

This legislation makes three changes to the Biosecurity Act 2015. First, it creates a clear, standing obligation for travellers arriving in Australia—passengers, crew or anyone in charge of an aircraft or vessel—to provide the biosecurity information regulators need, in whatever form regulations prescribe. That's the legal foundation that lets the Australia travel declaration keep expanding as the paperless replacement for the Incoming Passenger Card, covering the same essential questions—what goods you're carrying, where you've travelled and your occupation—but just collected earlier, digitally and with far fewer touchpoints between a traveller and an official.

Second, it introduces a notice-of-intention process for businesses operating under approved arrangements, the agreements that let companies manage their own biosecurity risk under departmental oversight. Under this bill, if the department is proposing to refuse an application or attach conditions to it, the business gets advance notice and a genuine opportunity to respond before that decision is finalised. This is not a new concept, invented from scratch; it puts into law a practice the department already follows informally. But writing it into legislation matters, because it gives industry participants certainty and a proper avenue to be heard, rather than simply being told after the fact.

Third, the bill fixes a drafting error concerning the powers of the Inspector-General of Biosecurity to request relevant information during a review. This is a small but important piece of legislative housekeeping that ensures independent oversight of our biosecurity system actually functions the way parliament always intended it to.

I note for the House that none of the regulation-making powers in this bill are exempt from parliamentary disallowance. Every regulation made under the new traveller information obligation remains subject to the parliament's scrutiny, which is exactly where that scrutiny belongs. Listening to people who actually use it, what struck me the most in reviewing the evidence before the Senate committee inquiry into this bill is how broad the support is and how thoughtfully conditional some of it is, too. Industry has been asking for this for years. The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry has recommended digitising border processes in successive pre-budget submissions. The Tourism & Transport Forum called it 'practical, achievable and long overdue'. The Australian Airports Association surveyed travellers and found 71 per cent wanted a digital option. Sydney Airport itself told the committee this bill 'provides an important legislative foundation for a more efficient, secure and technology enabled border environment'.

But I think the most important voices in this debate are the ones asking us not to rush the substance of biosecurity protection in the name of speed. The National Farmers' Federation put it plainly at last year's Economic Reform Roundtable: 'Our biosecurity is a non-negotiable, and any change to the paperwork has to prove it strengthens border protection, not just streamlines it.' The Queensland Farmers Federation made a very similar point, stressing that cybersecurity has to be a genuine pillar of any digital system, not an afterthought. Canberra Airport, even as it has welcomed the change, reminded us that the declaration process has to stay accessible for travellers who face barriers using digital technology—older travellers, people without smartphones and people who simply aren't confident online. That is a very true reflection when I think about my grandparents, when they travel.

I think those are the right instincts, and they're instincts that this bill actually tries to build in. The regulations remain disallowable. A web form option is funded specifically so no-one is forced to rely solely on an airline's app. And the underlying information being collected doesn't change. We are not lowering the bar on what biosecurity risks were already screening for; we're changing how efficiently we screen for them.

At the end of the day, I think the bill is about two things at once. It's about protecting Australia's farms, food security and environment at the border. And it's about making sure that people who work that border—many of them who live in my electorate, who are also members of the mighty United Workers Union, I must say—aren't carrying the weight of a system that's very much stuck in 2005 vibes. Every time I drive past the airport, I see the queues at the drop off. I think about the shift workers heading in and the exhausted families heading out, all of them relying on a system that must be quite rigorous but also fair.

I believe this bill doesn't compromise on that rigour. What it does is finally bring a much fairer and a much clearer system to the industry. As the Chair of the Sydney Airport Community Forum, this is something that would be of interest for the participants in this forum, who look at a lot of things outside of the scope, particularly on LTOPs and the sounds of aircrafts, but it is also quite relevant to the functions and the operations of Sydney Airport, which are really pertinent. I think for them this is an important step. It will also make it clearer for Sydney Airport and also for the workers and travellers. I commend the bill to the House.

Sitting suspended from 13:25 to 16:00

Matt Smith (Leichhardt, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

There is a strange trick of legislation sometimes. This is the Biosecurity Amendment (Improving Operational Efficiency) Bill 2026. Its purpose is to get rid of those stupid cards that nobody likes filling out when they arrive back in Australia. The first time I travelled overseas I was 16 years old. I was coming back from a basketball tour and I was tired and injured. Because of where Australia is in the world, all flights seem to go overnight, and I hadn't slept when we arrived in Melbourne. It was the late nineties. Someone handed me a card and on it they needed a whole bunch of details, some of which I couldn't remember. I wasn't entirely sure where my passport was. I was 16, so I certainly didn't have a pen. I couldn't remember if I'd been on a farm. It was a complete shemozzle. We got through it and I was allowed back into the country, which I'm very thankful for. That is something that we Australians face—those of us lucky enough to travel overseas—but it's something that our international visitors face as well, particularly in a region like Leichhardt. We have two international airports. We are a tourist destination. People come from all over the world. It's a bucket list investment, just for a few hours on the beautiful Great Barrier Reef or to smell the clean air in the Daintree or to take a look at the vastness of Cape York.

The last thing people want to do when they get off that plane is fill out that card. You've got the card, you trudge through customs and get through security, then you get your bag and you get to go out into the beautiful sunshine. But we're changing that. We have been working with Qantas over the last few years, developing the prototype and making sure we've got a system that works. Over 425,000 people have already used it. Over the next four years we're phasing those cards out—gone, done, finished. If I'm lucky enough to travel overseas again, I'm looking forward to being able to do it all electronically on my phone, nice and quick, and get back to doing the things I want to do—which, when I'm coming home, usually involve collecting my dogs. But, for our tourists, it'll be getting out amongst everything that Australia has to offer.

This is going to create cost savings. It's going to make sure that people get where they want to go faster. It's going to improve the opportunity for our customs and Border Force officers to do the thing that they are best at doing: keeping our borders secure, keeping our country safe and keeping contraband—tobacco, alcohol, drugs and weapons—out of Australia. They won't have to collect the cards. You won't have to remember where you're staying, which can be a bit tricky, particularly if English is not your first language. We want to make the experience better. We want to make sure the people—the men and women—who are working some really strange hours at times, with flights arriving at two or three in the morning, are doing the job that they put their hand up for. Every customs officer and Border Force officer I've ever met in this job has put their hand up for one reason: they want to keep Australians safe. They understand the responsibility and the commitment that that takes. They understand the precious nature of what we have been given naturally and the precious nature of what we've built as a society. And they are hell-bent on making sure that it continues in the right direction. They don't want things that are dangerous coming into our country, and they don't want to be collecting cards and entering data when it could be done electronically.

This has been in the works for quite a while. It seems like such a small change, but small changes have big impacts, and it also brings us into the 21st century. It is not a great look to hand people a card on their way into Australia, particularly when they're sitting there on their smartphones—probably playing the block game. This will make it better and easier. Pressure will be taken off the system, and our Border Force and customs officers will be able to continue to do what they need to do. For example, in 2025, over 359,000 incoming travellers and more than 280,000 air and sea consignments were inspected. The modernisation will allow those numbers to increase.

We know that organised crime is testing the borders always. We've seen it up my way, in the Torres Strait, and we responded hard with BROADSTAFF. But it's like the velociraptors in Jurassic Park. They're going to keep testing and they're going to keep coming. Each time that happens, we need to be ready for them. We need to make sure that our security systems are there. We need to make sure that our Border Force is well resourced. There was an extra $74 million for Operation BROADSTAFF in the last budget, keeping the most northern border safe. It's a bit of a porous border with the treaty villages there, but it's an important part of Australia. Being smart and practical is the Australian way. It's always been the Australian way. Now our customs is going to catch up to what we know we're capable of. I'm really excited to know that the guys who are on the front line will be making a difference and that they're not going to have to do the paperwork. No-one likes paperwork.

Since this commenced in 2024, as I said, over 450,000 passengers have already utilised this system, mostly on inbound Qantas flights to Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, and they've trialled it as a travel declaration. The anecdotal evidence coming out of this is that it has been met as a resounding success. We're going to expand it out to Perth and Adelaide before the end of 2026. That will take care of most of our capital cities, and then it will be rolled out more broadly across Australia to our regional international airports, of which Cairns is one and Horn Island is another. This is an essential part of what co-design looks like. This isn't a department saying to business or an entire industry, 'This is what we think you need.' This is sitting down, listening and understanding what the requirements are and building a system that meets the needs of that industry. That's what good governance looks like—understanding the needs of who it is that you're working with. In this particular case, the airline industry has been very excited to get this up and running because they know what that means. They know that faster movements through customs is a selling point.

Everyone always starts their story about their trip overseas by saying how bad customs was—'How was your trip to Peru?' 'Oh, it was great, but I was three hours in customs.' It's the negative that always sticks. I don't want people talking negatively about the Far North or about Australia when they come here. I don't want them to say, 'But customs was a bit rough; we were there for a couple of hours.' I want them to say: 'I got off the plane and I went outside and felt that beautiful Australian sunshine hit my skin for the first time. It's got that tingle that is not available in most of the rest of the world.' I want them to say that they smelt that air and that they looked at our blue sky. Our sky, compared to a lot of the other countries I've ever been to, is electric—and, in my part of the world, set against the rainforest or, down south, the gum trees.

That's what I want people to talk about when they get off the plane. That's what I want them to talk about when they go back to their countries of origin. That's what I want them to remember—that initial beauty and the fact that someone said, 'G'day, welcome to Australia; we hope you enjoy your stay here.' We understand what that means for tourism, what that means for our international reputation and what that's going to mean to the hundreds of thousands of people who will descend on Queensland over the next few years, especially when the 2032 Olympics are up and running. We're going to make it nice and smooth. We're going to make it nice and easy. The sun will hit their skin. They'll be in Brisbane, they'll be in Cairns, they'll watch the Olympics and we will say, 'G'day, welcome to Australia.' I commend this bill to the House.

Kevin Hogan (Page, National Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) | Link to this | Hansard source

Given the Biosecurity Amendment (Improving Operational Efficiency) Bill 2026 deals with biosecurity, I want to talk about a biosecurity issue we have in Australia. I met recently in my office with some commercial beekeepers from across the Northern Rivers and heard directly about the growing impact of varroa mite on their business and their ability to maintain the healthy colonies that are so important to them and their businesses. What I heard was exceptionally concerning because the impact of varroa is now no longer confined to the beekeeping industry; it's becoming a threat to Australia's agricultural productivity and, indeed, our food security.

Commercial beekeepers, as everyone would understand, provide essential pollination services for all of Australia's fruit, all of Australia's vegetables and for the nut and seed industries. As colonies are being lost, hive numbers decline and operators come under increasing financial pressure, and it is putting at risk an essential part of Australia's infrastructure. Beekeepers have invested heavily in approved treatments, changed their management practices and adapted their businesses to manage varroa. Yet, despite the current advice that they're getting, many are still losing colonies. They are questioning whether the current system is giving them the tools that they need to manage an established biosecurity threat under Australian conditions.

The most concerning message from beekeepers I've spoken to is that commercial operators are making decisions about whether they can remain in the industry. Every loss of an operator means a loss of hives, expertise, breeding programs, equipment and, more importantly—and I can't stress this enough—commercial pollination capacity, meaning a threat to food availability. This capacity simply cannot be immediately rebuilt if we lose it, if we wait until businesses have failed. We're trying to rebuild an agricultural capability when we can, right now, have it protected.

Varroa has exposed weaknesses in our biosecurity system. We need to understand what happened. We need to understand the weaknesses in our border protection—the surveillance, the detection and the responses—and what measures are being put in place to ensure those weaknesses are addressed. We need a biosecurity system that more than responds once a threat has been established. We need a system that prevents, detects, responds early and is prepared for a threat that we have not yet seen.

Australia spent years preparing for the possibility of varroa entering the country, yet now it's established and has been widespread in New South Wales and across eastern Australia. This should prompt a serious examination of how our biosecurity system has performed. We need to understand how varroa entered Australia, whether our border surveillance and detection systems were sufficient and whether the response was capable of containing the threat before it became established.

Biosecurity needs to work as a complete chain from prevention and early detection to rapid response and ongoing preparedness. If that chain fails, the cost does not disappear; it moves from the border to farmers, businesses and, ultimately, consumers. We are managing varroa under conditions that are very different to other countries. Our warmer climate allows colonies to continue breeding for much of the year. Treatment resistance is emerging, and Australia has limited practical experience managing an established varroa population. The industry believes the problem is moving faster than the regulatory response and the system needs to be capable of adapting to Australian conditions and to the evidence emerging from the field.

The national approach to varroa treatment and own-use certification and the experience of commercial beekeepers also highlight a second weakness in the current system: Australia does not have a consistent national pathway that gives trained commercial beekeepers access to practical, affordable varroa treatments for their own hives. Beekeepers are managing an established pest under Australian conditions, yet treatment options, approvals and regulatory pathways can be complex, costly and slow to adapt to emerging evidence. The industry is not asking for deregulation or unrestricted chemical use. The experience of varroa demonstrates the need for a national biosecurity framework, rather than a fragmented approach across jurisdictions and agencies. That framework should bring together border protection, surveillance, research, diagnostics, emergency response and industry expertise. It should also ensure that, once a threat is established, commercial beekeepers have the regulatory tools needed to manage it effectively. This includes considering a lawful, accredited, regulated own-use pathway for specified organic varroa treatments supported by appropriate training safeguards and Australian field trials.

I'll end by saying that I can't stress the importance of this enough. What we're talking about here is the industry that provides pollination services to the whole of Australia's agricultural sector—fruit, vegetables and a whole lot of other food products. We need to do better than we currently are, or a lot of this could be called into question when these industries are asking for pollination services.

Helen Haines (Indi, Independent) | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Page. While I absolutely critically understand the importance of varroa mite and biosecurity, I would remind you that a link to the bill that we are debating would really be appreciated in your commentary. Thank you. I understand that the member for Pearce would like to present a copy of their speech for incorporation into Hansard in accordance with the resolution agreed to on 6 November 2025.

Tracey Roberts (Pearce, Australian Labor Party) | Link to this | Hansard source

The incorporated speech read as follows—

I would like to speak to the Biosecurity Amendment (Improving Operational Efficiency) Bill 2026. Australia's biosecurity system is one of the quiet achievers of our national framework—rarely seen, but absolutely essential to the protection of our environment, our agricultural strength, our economy and, ultimately, our way of life. For communities like those across the electorate of Pearce in Western Australia, biosecurity is not an abstract concept; it is deeply practical. It is about protecting local growers, supporting small and medium agricultural enterprises, and ensuring that the produce cultivated in our regions continues to meet the high standards expected both domestically and internationally.

Australia's favourable pest and disease status is something we should never take for granted. It is the foundation upon which our agricultural productivity is built, and it is a key reason why Australian products are trusted across global markets. That trust translates directly into jobs, into export opportunities, and into regional economic resilience. But, while our biosecurity system is strong, it is not static. It operates in an environment that is becoming more complex, more dynamic and more challenging with each passing year. We are seeing unprecedented volumes of international travellers and goods moving across our borders. At the same time, global disease profiles are shifting, climate change is altering the distribution of pests and pathogens and the expectations on our border systems to operate quickly and efficiently are increasing. These pressures are not theoretical; they are very real, and they are growing.

In 2025 alone, biosecurity officers inspected more than 280,000 commercial air and sea consignments and intercepted over 359,000 incoming travellers carrying biosecurity risk material. More recently, in just the month of March this year, over 3,000 mail items and more than 33,000 travellers were intercepted with goods that posed a risk to Australia's biosecurity system. Each one of those interceptions represents a potential threat that was stopped at the border. Each one is a reminder of what is at stake.

For Western Australia in particular, where our geographic isolation has historically been a natural advantage, maintaining strong biosecurity controls is critical. Industries across Pearce—from horticulture to livestock—depend on that protection. A single incursion of a serious pest or disease could have devastating consequences for local producers and for the broader economy. That is why the Albanese Labor government has taken decisive steps to strengthen Australia's biosecurity system. Since coming to office, we have committed over $2 billion in additional resourcing to ensure that our biosecurity framework remains robust, responsive and fit for purpose. This investment recognises that protecting Australia's borders requires not only skilled personnel but also modern systems, up-to-date legislation and the ability to respond quickly to emerging risks. However, resourcing alone is not enough. A strong biosecurity system must be supported by legislation that enables efficient operations, supports informed decision-making, and reflects the realities of today's border environment. That is precisely what the Biosecurity Amendment (Improving Operational Efficiency) Bill 2026 seeks to achieve.

This bill is practical, it is targeted and it responds directly to the operational challenges faced at our borders. It focuses on two key areas. The first is modernising the way travellers provide biosecurity information. For too long, aspects of our biosecurity system have relied on outdated, paper based processes. In a world where millions of travellers move through our borders each year, those processes are no longer sufficient. This bill enables the adoption of new digital methods, including the Australia Travel Declaration, which allows travellers to provide information earlier, more accurately, and in a more accessible format. This is not simply about convenience; it is about better risk management. When information is provided in advance, biosecurity officers are better equipped to assess risk before a traveller even arrives. That means faster processing for low-risk travellers and more targeted attention on those who present a higher risk.

The Australia Travel Declaration pilot has already demonstrated clear benefits. It has supported smoother passenger flows, reduced congestion at airports and enabled quicker processing times—all without compromising Australia's high biosecurity standards. Importantly, it also allows biosecurity officers to access and analyse information more effectively. That means less time spent on administrative tasks and more time focused on protecting Australia from genuine threats. For travellers, this means a more streamlined experience at the border. For our biosecurity system, it means greater efficiency and stronger outcomes.

The second key element of this bill is improving transparency and fairness for industry participants. Approved arrangements are an important part of Australia's biosecurity framework, allowing businesses to manage certain biosecurity functions under strict regulatory oversight. However, the current system does not always provide sufficient clarity or opportunity for applicants to respond before decisions are made. This bill addresses that gap by introducing a clear notice-of-intention process for decisions relating to approved arrangements. This is a straightforward but important reform. It ensures that applicants are informed of proposed decisions and given an opportunity to respond before those decisions are finalised. It supports a more consistent and transparent regulatory process, and it reinforces procedural fairness. For businesses operating within the biosecurity system—including those in Western Australia who rely on efficient import and export processes—this provides greater certainty and confidence. It also strengthens the integrity of the system as a whole.

In addition to these substantive changes, the bill also makes a minor technical amendment to the Biosecurity Act to remove the use of a defined term that has created ambiguity. While technical in nature, this change is important. Clear and precise legislation is essential for effective implementation, and even small ambiguities can create challenges in practice. Taken together, these amendments represent a meaningful step forward. They strengthen operational effectiveness at the border, improve the quality and transparency of regulatory decision-making and support better engagement with industry. But perhaps most importantly, they do all of this while maintaining Australia's uncompromising biosecurity standards.

Let us be clear: efficiency must never come at the expense of protection. Australia's biosecurity system is rightly regarded as one of the strongest in the world. It is a system built on vigilance, expertise and a commitment to continuous improvement. However, past performance is not a guarantee of future success. If anything, the evolving nature of biosecurity risks means that we must work even harder to stay ahead. Maintaining the trust of our farmers, our communities and our international trading partners requires us to constantly adapt—to embrace new technologies, to refine our processes, and to ensure that our legislative framework remains contemporary and fit for purpose. This bill reflects that mindset. It facilitates the long overdue transition from paper based systems to modern digital solutions. It enhances procedural fairness and transparency. And it ensures that our biosecurity laws continue to support effective, real-world outcomes.

For electorates such as Pearce, where local industries depend on strong biosecurity protections, these reforms matter. They matter for growers who rely on pest-free conditions to maintain productivity, they matter for exporters who depend on Australia's reputation for clean, safe produce and they matter for communities who understand that a strong biosecurity system underpins economic stability and environmental protection. More broadly, they matter for Australia's place in the global economy. Our ability to compete on the world stage is closely tied to the strength of our biosecurity system. Trading partners need to have confidence in our standards, and that confidence is built on a system that is not only strong but also modern, efficient and transparent. By strengthening the links between innovation, operational delivery and legislative clarity, this bill helps ensure that Australia remains resilient, adaptive and trusted. It is a forward-looking reform that recognises the realities of today while preparing us for the challenges of tomorrow.

In closing, this bill is not about sweeping changes or unnecessary complexity. It is about practical improvements that make a real difference. It is about ensuring that our biosecurity system continues to evolve in step with the world around us. And it is about protecting what matters most: our environment, our industries, our communities and our way of life. I commend the bill to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.

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