Luke Simpkins (Cowan, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

The minister did not need to rush all that much, but it is good that he is backing me up here! I will always take these opportunities to speak on aviation security matters. Ever since I first graduated from the AFP College back in 1986 and then had postings with the AFP, which included at various times Sydney airport and then Perth airport, I have had a bit of an appreciation of some of the security issues in airports and the need for strong aviation security measures. So I will take this opportunity today to make some comments on those matters.

I would like to think, and I am sure, that aviation security has moved forward in leaps and bounds in the last 20 years. There is no doubt that it needed to do so in response to the threats that the world faces and that indeed Australia faces as well. When we had an AFP exercise back at the start of 1987 at Sydney airport, it was a very bizarre thing when people were rostered on for a no-notice security exercise. They turned out basically everyone they could get into uniform, so people were told several days before, ‘Make sure you’ve got a uniform so that we can bus you out to the airport.’ Maybe it was not very legitimate so far as the preparation for a no-notice exercise was concerned, but that was the way things happened in those days, in 1987. As I said, things have moved on.

I think things do need to move on, and I am sure that the minister will cover this to a degree today as well. The most concerning report today is from Sky News regarding those Australians or Australian residents who are currently missing, you might say—22 Australian citizens or residents have disappeared in Yemen in the last four months—and are strongly suspected of being in al-Qaeda training camps or in other camps to do with terrorist organisations in the subcontinent area. It is most concerning that we have traitors to this nation who are prepared to take up arms for all the bad things in the world. Of course, this is not the first time that this has occurred. I am sure that ASIO, ASIS, the government, of course, and—rest assured, I hope—all political sides have the right commitment to deal with those people when the time comes.

During my time in aviation security—from the absolute base level, you might say—in our day at Perth and Sydney airports we had patrol vehicles. We even had rostered locations so that we knew that, no matter which terminal an incident might be in, there was always someone there, whether it was in a secure area or out in a public area. There were always going to be personnel there who could react to incidents. I know that back in 1987 I made two arrests, one in relation to the possession of cannabis at the security control point for the Perth domestic terminal, and the other incident regarded drink-driving in the car park—not exactly the big issues but things that we dealt with at the time. Following those arrests, we went to court to deal with those things. It was an onerous task, with a full brief of evidence required for what was really pretty basic work by community policing standards.

I cannot help but feel that the circle is being completed again following the 2009 review of airport security and that the AFP are once again back in complete control of the airports, with the exception of the joint policing and agency effort concerning intelligence and the serious investigations. The community policing role is back with the AFP in the 11 major airports throughout Australia. Under the provisions of the Aviation Crimes and Policing Legislation Amendment Bill 2010 [2011], in the future there will be joint aviation investigation and intelligence groups.

On the everyday policing responsibility, I have always believed that airport police need to have specific systems in place to facilitate the day-to-day processing of minor infringements, rather than have to go to court and produce that full brief of evidence I spoke about before. State police around the country probably feel that they labour under onerous responsibilities for the presentation of evidence—before magistrates particularly—and there is a need to try to streamline those. Especially in regard to the airports, it is important to have those processes in very good shape, but I am sure that the AFP in the modern age would have these basic considerations well and truly covered.

The other problem that I hope is covered concerns training. Although the AFP are the community police here in the ACT, I thought that sort of experience was lacking in the past in the federal airports. Certainly, when I was there, there were very few people who got transferred out of Canberra into the airport jobs, so a lot of people would spend almost their entire career in the AFP in one of the regions. For instance, in the Sydney eastern region there were some people who moved forward with the drug investigation and fraud squads, whilst others seemed to spend a lot of their time in the airports. In that uniformed role, there was not the frequency of criminal investigations that you would find in community policing in the cities by a state police force. The incidents were a little bit on the infrequent side, so there was a loss of continuity and a loss of experience—because incidents were fairly few and far between.

I would assume that the AFP has those sorts of considerations in place and that the influence and the training of the community-policing element of the AFP that exists here in Canberra would be able to make sure that the 11 major airports are well and truly covered by community-policing efforts. The point is that training is required, and then the maintenance of skills must occur. Therefore, there is a lot to be said for posting into airport positions a number of experienced community-policing sworn officers from the ACT. As I said before, that is something that I believe the AFP would cover in the modern age.

Being at the airport is one thing, but the police and, of course, Customs need the assets in order to be truly effective. They need access to both technology and traditional assets that are tried and true. In the reforms announced in December 2009, there were resources for the Enhanced Passenger Assessment and Clearance program as well as additional resources for advanced data analysis and risk profiling, and additional cargo screening and screening at certain regional airports.

As I said, the processes for community policing need to be in place, but modern laws also need to be in place to meet the changing threat environment. It is therefore without doubt that enhanced legislation is welcomed in a bipartisan way. I am very much in favour of sending clear messages about offences against aviation. As the minister said in June 2010, making a bomb threat should have a greater penalty these days than just two years in jail. We certainly welcome that change. In fact, this bill introduces tiers of penalties based on the severity of the offence and ranging from 10 years in jail through to life imprisonment.

Given that I have probably exceeded the time that I originally indicated that I would take, I will be brief in summary. What appeals to me in this legislation and a number of reforms that have taken place over the last 10 years and in other legislation that has come before the parliament is that the types of offences and the penalties involved are very important to send a clear message of deterrence. At the same time, the assets, skills and experience of personnel on the ground need to make sure that not only is the deterrence of penalties in place but also the deterrence of the certainty of being caught. So the intelligence aspect and the ability of the uniform and the non-uniform personnel at the airports need to be ready to go and capable of detecting, making arrests and dealing with people whether they are national security traitors, like those who have gone off for training with al-Qaeda or other groups, or whether they are just troublemakers within the airport area. The capacity needs to be there so that these people are caught quickly and dealt with appropriately. I thank the House for this opportunity and I welcome the bill.

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