Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Leader of the Opposition in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

I, too, rise to make a contribution to the debate in private senators' time on the Criminal Code Amendment (Keeping Australia Safe) Bill 2026. The No. 1 priority of any Commonwealth government is keeping Australians safe. The coalition has always fundamentally understood that, if you as a Commonwealth government are unable to discharge that responsibility, then, quite frankly, you are failing the Australian people. Sadly, with the Albanese government, when it comes to national security, the Australian people are learning that they say one thing in public, but then, when you scratch the surface, a very different thing is happening behind closed doors. The ISIS brides, and the return of them to Australia, is the perfect example. Mr Albanese is prepared to stand up and say one thing to the Australian people, but behind closed doors it is a very, very different situation.

The Prime Minister tells the Australian people that ISIS sympathisers are not welcome in Australia, yet what we do know is that passports have been issued to them. The government says it's not assisting the return of the ISIS brides, yet what we also know is that federal and state agencies have been meeting for months and months to coordinate that exact outcome—that is, the return of the ISIS brides to Australia. In fact, after weeks of obfuscation, the Foreign minister finally admitted in question time that, yes, indeed, those meetings had taken place. But the Prime Minister still maintains to the Australian people that the ISIS sympathisers are not welcome in Australia.

I would have thought, based on those facts—that passports have issued to this cohort and that state and federal agencies, as we know because the Foreign minister confirmed this on the record, have been meeting for months to coordinate the return of the ISIS brides—Australians may be entitled to ask: 'Hold on; who exactly is telling the truth?' The Prime Minister says the ISIS brides are not welcome in Australia, but then we have a small problem because the Foreign minister then issues passports. The home affairs minister goes on TV and says: 'We're doing nothing. We're actively doing nothing.' Yet, again, as I said, the reality is that federal and state government agencies have been meeting for months to coordinate the return of the ISIS brides. Sadly, that is not a coherent national security policy. This is a government that is prepared to stand up and say one thing to the Australian people to try and look tough but at the same time, behind closed doors, is doing everything it can to facilitate this return.

Australians should remember exactly who these women are. They're not innocent bystanders caught up in a series of events. These are individuals, women, who chose to leave our great country of Australia, turning their backs on the values that we hold so dear and the freedoms that we have on a daily basis, and to travel—it was their own personal choice—to a terrorist declared area. They made a personal choice to leave Australia, to leave a democracy, and join the terrorists and live under Islamic State. They also chose to remain there while gross acts of atrocities were committed by ISIS, who enslaved women, executed civilians and, worse than that, broadcast that brutality to the entire world.

Let us be very clear. Islamic State is not a misunderstood organisation. It is not ambiguous. It was, is and remains one of the most violent terrorist organisations in modern history, and these women made a personal decision to leave the great country of Australia, travel overseas and live with these terrorists. Yet, as I said, we now have the Albanese government wanting Australians to believe that the return of individuals associated with that terrorist regime is somehow happening through what they are now calling 'self-managed returns'. Well, the Australian people are, quite frankly, better than that. They can see through that.

But, more than that, the phrase 'self-managed returns' should send a chill down every Australian's spine. What does it actually mean? This is what it means; it's black and white. The Albanese government has created a loophole whereby third parties can organise the return of people linked to terrorist organisations—but, conveniently, without direct Commonwealth organisation. Think about that. Decisions that go directly to the heart of Australia's national security are effectively being outsourced by this government, and they stand up and they say to the Australian people, 'There's nothing to see here.' Decisions are not being transparently made by ministers accountable to this parliament but arranged through intermediaries operating outside of public scrutiny—but, at the same time, there for everybody to see. That is utterly extraordinary. It is also reckless.

ASIO—it is a fact—already have around 18,000 individuals on their watchlist. Every additional high-risk returnee increases ASIO's surveillance burden. Every additional returnee stretches our intelligence agencies further. Yet, again, the Prime Minister, the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Minister for Home Affairs stand up, they look the Australian people in the eye—they treat them like mugs, of course—and they tell Australians, 'Very sorry—our hands are tied.' That is simply not true. Why? Because it is a fact that the passports act allows refusals on national security grounds. Temporary exclusion orders exist precisely to delay or control such returns. The government have that option available to them today, but instead of using it they've decided, for political reasons and nothing else, to adopt a strategy of plausible deniability.

But the questions keep mounting. Why were public servants asked to leave the room when Minister Tony Burke met with Save the Children before a previous cohort returned? The more confronting one is this: why was a political ally of the government, fundraiser and campaigner Dr Jamal Rifi, travelling into Syria carrying dozens of Australian passports? I'm sorry, but Australians aren't mugs. Nobody carries over 30 passports into a conflict zone without serious coordination. Worse than that, Dr Rifi himself—a great supporter of Minister Tony Burke; you saw him in the election night video, there with Minister Tony Burke, congratulating him on his win—now says he doesn't even know who these individuals are that he's helping to return. This is someone who is over there on the ground and has in excess of 30 passports—that in itself raises legal questions—but he says he doesn't know who they are. Well, I can tell him who they are. They're women who turned their backs on Australia and turned their backs on everything that we hold dear here—in particular, our fundamental freedoms—to travel to stay with Islamic State. That's who these women are. They made a conscious decision.

Dr Rifi, who is over there helping them come back to Australia, cannot assess their mentality, he cannot assess whether or not they've been radicalised and he cannot assess the risk that they will pose to the Australian public when they do return—because let's be very clear; under this government, the ISIS brides will return to Australia. It's not a matter of if; it's a matter of when. And yet, for some bizarre reason, he has been entrusted with facilitating the ISIS brides' return.

Australians deserve answers. When was this self-managed returns policy created? Who authorised it? Did the National Security Committee of cabinet approve it? Did ASIO support it? Or did the government, in typical Albanese government style, just hope Australians wouldn't notice? Well, guess what? We've dealt with this issue before, when we were in government, and we acted decisively. We didn't try and pull the wool over Australians' eyes. We were upfront with Australians in relation to the repatriation of orphans. What we are saying to the government is they need to be upfront with Australians as well, and that is why we have introduced this bill into the parliament—to keep Australians safe.

Our bill closes Labor's loophole. We will make it a criminal offence, punishable by up to 10 years imprisonment, to assist without ministerial authorisation the return of individuals associated with terrorist organisations. On what planet did we ever think that a government would allow someone to go overseas to a terrorist hotspot carrying in excess of 30 passports, who admits he doesn't know who these people are whose return he is helping to facilitate, and allow them to return?

Our bill will restore something that should never have been absent in the first place but is, sadly, under this government, absent on a regular basis—that is, ministerial accountability. If ministers believe that these individuals—the ISIS brides, women who left Australia by choice to join the Islamic caliphate—should be coming back to Australia, then they should own that decision. Be upfront with the Australian people. Don't treat the Australian people like mugs. Don't say, 'We're doing nothing to repatriate them,' when, mysteriously, passports have been issued to these women and the relevant DNA checks have been undertaken on their children. It's a very strict process that government officials have to follow to establish whether or not a person is indeed a relative, yet government officials have been able to establish that fact.

How did 30 passports get over to this cohort? Well, we know how—Dr Jamal Rifi. Again, the government knows these women are coming back and is treating the Australian people like mugs. We are saying: 'If you want them to come back, you own this decision. Be upfront with the Australian people. Don't outsource it to someone else.' This bill will ensure that that outsourcing to another person—like that friend of Labor, the No. 1 T-shirt wearer for 'Friends of Burke', Dr Jamal Rifi—and that type of behaviour is criminalised. If ministers believe the ISIS brides should return to Australia, they should sign their names to that. Don't hide behind NGOs, don't hide behind democratic ambiguity and do not treat Australians like mugs by saying, 'We have nothing to do with this, because these are self-managed returns.'

National security decisions of this magnitude—in other words, bringing terrorist supporters back into the country—must be made openly and transparently and by elected ministers accountable to the Australian people, not by activists, not by intermediaries and, quite frankly, not through arrangements which the Albanese government hopes the Australian people will not notice. That is what our bill does. Our bill restores accountability and closes a dangerous loophole. More than that, it says clearly to the Australian people that the coalition, the alternative government, will always put their safety first. We fundamentally live and breathe that the first responsibility of a Commonwealth government is the safety of the Australian people. The government should support this bill. If Labor truly believe these returns are safe, they should have the courage to take responsibility for them.