Michael Keenan (Stirling, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Justice, Customs and Border Protection) Share this | Hansard source

I want to touch on another aspect today of Labor's border protection failures. We often—and rightly—spend a lot of time talking about their inability to control illegal boat arrivals. Why wouldn't we? Under this government we have had over 33,500 people arrive illegally on 577 boats. We have wasted $6½ billion because of the Labor Party's failed border protection policies. But I would like to spend a little bit of time talking about not just their failure to control people who come to this country but their sustained and savage cuts to our law enforcement capabilities at the Commonwealth level and the way in which this has contributed to the failure at our borders to stop contraband from hitting our streets.

The cuts made to Australia's law enforcement capabilities by the Labor Party since they came to office have been sustained and very real. Every Labor budget has seen cuts to the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service—the agency that has been most savagely affected by Labor's neglect of their law and order responsibilities. This is an agency with just over 5,000 staff. It has been the subject of cuts of 750 staff since the Labor Party came to office, which is over 15 per cent of its workforce. Over 15 per cent of the workforce of the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service has been removed by the Labor Party.

What this means is that, when cargo comes into this country, through our airports or through our seaports, the chances of it being inspected are incredibly slim indeed. Under the Howard government, up to 60 per cent of cargo was inspected when it crossed our threshold. Under this government, less than 10 per cent is inspected when it crosses our threshold. That means criminals have a much better chance of bringing in guns, drugs and contraband. These are the sorts of things that we see on our streets because Labor has failed in its fundamental responsibility to resource Customs and Border Protection properly and to make sure that they stop this sort of contraband from hitting our streets.

The results are plain to see all around the country. The member for Cook made a reference in his contribution to the 220 Glock pistols that were smuggled in through the Sylvania Waters Post Office—220 Glock pistols that have been turning up at crime scenes all over Sydney because of Labor's failures to resource Customs properly. Indeed the Premier of New South Wales put it very succinctly in February this year when he said:

Last year the New South Wales Police certainly embarrassed the federal police with its discovery of the importation through the mail, through a sub-branch of Australia Post, authorised by the federal government, of 220 Glock pistols

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And they're only able to come here because we have a federal government that seems to look the other way with the illegal importation of guns into this country.

That is what the Premier of New South Wales said last year. The reason he said that is because Customs have been the subject of sustained and systematic cuts since the Labor Party came to office, both to their personnel and to their budget, in a way that is clearly affecting their ability to do their job, which is to stop these guns and other contraband from hitting our streets.

It was exactly one year ago that this was discovered—and this was uncovered by the New South Wales police and, unfortunately, not by the federal authorities who are tasked with doing this job. The New South Wales Premier commented further on this yesterday. He is commenting on this because he knows that the federal government has made the job of the New South Wales police a lot more difficult because they are not doing the job that they are tasked with. Indeed, what we have had instead is this sort of destruction that we get from the government where we see the Prime Minister, with her very successful swing through Western Sydney, coming up with a plan for an antigang task force. For the past five years, the Labor Party has systematically degraded the federal government's law enforcement capabilities but, suddenly, at five minutes to midnight, they have discovered that the Commonwealth actually have a role to play in keeping our streets safer in Australia.

Unfortunately, the most important thing that the Commonwealth government could do is to actually do the job it has already been allocated properly. You cannot do that job properly when you have cut 20 per cent of the workforce of the Australian Crime Commission, when you have cut 15 per cent of the workforce of the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service, when you have failed to keep your promise to increase the sworn officers of the Australian Federal Police by 500 and when you have systematically attacked the ability of the Commonwealth to properly fulfil its law enforcement responsibilities.

The Premier of New South Wales again put this very succinctly yesterday when he made a contribution in relation to the Glock pistols that have been found in various crime scenes around Sydney. He said yesterday that the federal government should be tackling the importation of illegal weapons before it tinkers with antigang laws.

… the first priority of the federal government ought to be to stop the importation of illegal drugs and weapons across our borders.

The fact that police have seized a handgun and machine gun in today's raids, as well as a Glock pistol yesterday which was linked to an illegal importation from Germany last year, could provide no better evidence of Australia's porous borders.

This is so typical of the way this government go about business. They neglect their responsibilities for five years—they not only neglect them but wilfully attack the capability that the Commonwealth has to police our borders and to enforce law and order—then, at five minutes to midnight when they realise they have a serious political problem on their hands, they decide that they must be seen to be doing something. So on the Prime Minister's swing through Western Sydney last week she came up with the idea of $64 million for an antigang task force—an idea that actually mirrors something that we promised at the last election. But this time it of course comes with no real resources and it comes through at a time when the Labor government have already attacked the agencies that they have tasked with taking part in this antigang task force so significantly since they have come to office.

I want to just go through the cuts that have been made by the Labor Party since they have come to office. We know that, in 2007 when the government changed, the Labor Party came with an agenda to reduce the funding that law enforcement gets on a national basis. They had the view, and their shadow minister at the time was telling stakeholders, that the Howard government had overfunded Commonwealth law enforcement agencies and that when the government changed they were going to rectify this. This is one promise they have actually kept, because they have systematically attacked and degraded all of the Commonwealth's law enforcement capability. In Customs they have cut $58 million from the budget that Customs has to inspect cargo when it crosses our borders.

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