Rex Patrick (SA, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

[by video link] Thank you very much for allowing me the opportunity to speak on this bill, the Surveillance Legislation Amendment (Identify and Disrupt) Bill 2021. I must say I am very concerned that it has been dropped on the Senate. In the very last minutes or hours, we found out that this bill is on. That has caused some difficulty for me because there are some amendments to this bill that I intend to move, and I foreshadow that I intend to move an amendment in the committee of the whole. This bill seeks to broaden powers in relation to the AFP. In principle, I support what the government is trying to do, but this bill gives further powers to our police force. These powers are used in secret and are quite coercive, and they require the appropriate checks and balances. I note that Senator Roberts raised some concerns in this area as well, noting that these powers can potentially be abused.

I intend, in Committee of the Whole, to move an amendment—it's an amendment that I've moved before—that seeks to expand the powers of the PJCIS to look at matters that are operational and go to information gathering by our intelligence services. The importance of this is something that I raised in my first speech, basically pointing out that the parliament of course has the power to conduct oversight of our intelligence agencies but it simply doesn't, because it has carved out that ability in the Intelligence Services Act. The parliament has censored itself or prevented itself from conducting intelligence oversight. That is an aberration amongst our Five Eyes nations. We see very strong oversight from the US in the Senate. It's the same in the UK. We are effectively not doing our job properly. I have on several occasions sought to remedy this. I mentioned it in my first speech. On 7 December 2017, I gave much greater detail. I moved an amendment on 9 May 2018 to the Home Affairs and Integrity Agencies Legislation Amendment Bill 2018.

I moved an amendment on 26 June 2018 to the National Security Legislation Amendment (Espionage and Foreign Interference) Amendment Bill 2018. I also moved a private member's bill in relation to this. I moved a similar amendment in relation to the Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019. I did that on 29 July 2019. On 3 September 2019 I moved an amendment in relation to the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Cessation) Bill 2019. On 10 December I moved an amendment to the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill 2020.

I have consistently sought to move an amendment to increase the ability to balance out the powers with some appropriate checks and balances. I might point out that, on each occasion I've done this, Labor has committed from an intent perspective. They've said they recognise the intent—in fact, they have their own bill that does exactly this. People might recall that in the last sitting week I moved a motion in relation to a referral to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee in relation to the operation that grounds the claims that are before the ACT court in relation to Bernard Collaery and witness K, who has now been dealt with by the court. Labor stood up at this time and said, 'We will investigate this. We will move a referral when we get into government after we have amended the Intelligence Services Act to permit the PJCIS to conduct these sorts of investigations.' Well, Labor, money where your mouth is: I'm going to move this amendment in the Committee of the Whole and I anticipate that you will support it. You keep saying that you want to have the PJCIS conduct oversight, as it should, but consistently you [inaudible].

I apologise for the delay in circulating this late amendment, but that was caused by the fact that the government brought this legislation on this morning basically unannounced. As crossbenchers, we work with the government on legislation making sure that we understand what it is we are voting on and making sure that we can contribute by way of amendments. We don't need to have a blitzkrieg of bills where we don't have an opportunity to participate in our democracy and to put forward amendments. I thank very much the clerks and the drafting office for assisting me this morning in getting this amendment circulated as quickly as possible. Again, the government has not done democracy any favours this morning.