David Johnston (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice and Customs) Share this | Hansard source

All I can say is that, in order to receive the information, it has to be a designated agency. My instructions are that Interpol, for example, is not a designated agency and therefore would not be able to be the beneficiary of any information. I simply reiterate all of the fail-safes that I went through yesterday. That is, the application has to come from the CEO of, in this instance, ASIS, for the government’s amendments. He has to be satisfied of certain things, namely that the information is necessary in the fulfilment of his role and powers. The CEO of AUSTRAC must then make a similar assessment. The information must be designated, no other information must pass, and the agency itself must be a designated agency from the beginning of the chain. If it is not a designated agency, it cannot access the information. I think that indicates that the concept of an onshore agency, as designated, passing to a non-designated agency in a sort of third person type event would render the initial assessment process such that the information would not be permitted to flow.