Jason Wood (La Trobe, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Public Security and Policing) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Werriwa, Chris Hayes, for the great work he did previously with the Police Association of New South Wales. Today, he hit the nail on the head when he spoke of his great concern—one on which I will elaborate—about the reduction in the number of seconded members to the Australian Crime Commission. I also note the comments on this same matter made by the chair of the Joint Standing Committee on the Australian Crime Commission, Senator Steve Hutchins. He said on the public record that, if the Prime Minister knew what was going on with the cut-backs, he would do something about it. Sadly, that has not taken place. However, both government and non-government members realise that this is a big issue.

The government plays a huge role in the ability and effectiveness of the Australian Crime Commission. The budget cuts have really hurt. At one stage, we had an economic crisis and we needed the stimulus package. Sadly, rather than see money go into law enforcement where it should have gone, the government has been cutting back on it. The efficiency dividends imposed on the ACC in 2008-09 resulted in a budget cut of 7.4 per cent in real terms. These efficiency dividends led to 15 staff taking voluntary redundancy packages. During 2007-08, there was a net decrease in ACC staff of 25, which were predominantly people employed on a contract basis. When you get rid of contract staff and unsworn members, someone has to pick up the tab and do their duties. This is similar to what occurred during my days in the organised crime squad. As soon as you lost someone in the IT area, for example, and then something went wrong with the computers that the members could not fix, someone eventually had to come in and fix it. This can happen in the administration area, and its effect can be felt the whole way through the organisation. That is why the support staff are so important.

A further 13 officers seconded from state and territory forces were returned early due to budget cuts. Seconded members also play a vitally important role. For those who do not know, the best way for law enforcement to tackle very serious and organised crime is for the federal agency, the Australian Federal Police, to work with state and territory police. There is no better example of this than in the gang capital of the world, Los Angeles, where FBI and LAPD teams work together to take on gangs. To me, that is vital in this country. Rather than cutting back the funding of the seconded members, I think the priority should be to keep them there. Obviously, I do not support any budget cuts.

At the budget estimates in May 2009, it was confirmed that staffing numbers had further declined in 2008-09. At 30 April 2009, the ACC had a total of 584 staff—a reduction of 57 staff from June 2008. The decline was all in contract staff. Between 2008-09 and 2009-10, the Australian Crime Commission’s workforce was cut back from 688 to 584—a net loss of 104. More than 100 officers who had been seconded from the states and territories were sent back home, leaving only 15 full-time investigators. That is not enough for an AFL footy team. This shows us how bad it has been getting nationally. During recent inquiries into the ACC’s annual report, it was revealed that the current budget is $94.904 million. That is a reduction on the previous financial year of $2.5 million. In that time, there were also wage increases of 2.75 per cent.

Last year, when there was the bikie brawl at Sydney Airport, the Prime Minister promised to act on organised crime and gang violence. When he visited Washington last year, he again promised to act on organised crime and gang violence. The committee has made recommendations time and time again, which the government has ignored. This is no fault of committee members of both sides. What has been very good about this committee is that, under the previous government, government members like me spoke out on this issue, and the current government members on the committee are doing the same now. I ask the government: what is it doing to tackle organised crime and violence, especially through the ACC?

If you go back to the initial tabling of the report on the set-up of the ACC, it clearly states that the organisation’s role is intelligence gathering and investigation. If you listened carefully to the member for Werriwa’s words, a lot of them were about intelligence. The reason was that it is hard to talk about investigation when the capacity for investigation has been ripped out of the heart of the ACC. Remember that anyone employed at the ACC does not have the power of arrest and does not have the power to take out a firearm. The only way that can happen is with the help of seconded members from the state and territory police forces and also the AFP. The act says that AFP members must be seconded to the Australian Crime Commission and that state and territory members may be seconded. It is a vital partnership.

There is another issue I want to raise which greatly concerns me. In the inquiry into legislative arrangements to outlaw serious and organised crime groups, a number of government members and I were greatly concerned about the lack of information on outlaw motorcycle gangs in particular. The ACC appeared before the committee a number of times and we tried to put together a picture of the impact of outlaw motorcycle gangs in this country. We specifically looked at the anti-association laws which the South Australian government had introduced. I believe Queensland, New South Wales and Western Australia have now done the same. I also read in today’s Herald Sun that the Victorian opposition have that as one of their policies.

When we had the recent inquiry into the ACC’s annual report, the ACC officers and John Lawler himself were a bit perplexed when I asked what they are doing about establishing a national gangs task force. A recommendation of the inquiry was:

The committee recommends that the ACC work with its law enforcement partners to enhance data collection on criminal groups and criminal group membership …

To me, that means looking at gangs in particular, whether it be OMCG or mafia gangs or serious organised crime groups. The quote continues:

… in order to quantify and develop an accurate national picture of organised crime groups within Australia.

The ACC were of the opinion that that was nothing to do with crime gangs. I recently received a letter from the ACC referring to that and to the inquiry that was held on 22 February 2010. That letter said that they had heard my reasons for setting up a national gangs database but that it was not possible because of the concerns about sensitive information on organised crime gangs getting out there. They would rather not have a national gangs database for the states and territories to use. Can I say that that is completely wrong. The ACC are so far off the mark with this. But, in fairness to them, I firmly believe it is because of government cutbacks and the fact that they do not have the ability to do it.

If the ACC want to have a look at a first-class gangs database they should have a look at the background of Sheriff Baca. He was the Los Angeles County Sheriff who established the CalGang database. Cal stands for California. California is the gangs capital. His database is so good that the FBI have used it and now the LAPD are using it. It is used right across America. They realised that to have a national gangs database you have to, firstly, work out how many gangs you have in the country and, secondly, their membership. If you go to the UK, you find that they have a national gangs database. In France they also have a national gangs database. Therefore, they can work out how many gangs they have, and which gangs are the most violent and troublesome, and then they can direct their police resources accordingly. I hope the ACC really have a good look at that, because it is one thing they need to do. With that, I again thank my fellow committee members and, in particular, the committee secretary, Mr Tim Watling, and the former secretary, Jaqui Dewar. They have done a fantastic job. I therefore commend the report to the House.

Debate (on motion by Ms Owens) adjourned.

See this speech in context