Michael Keenan (Stirling, Liberal Party, Minister for Justice) Share this | Hansard source

I just want to put on the record some of the reasons that the government is concerned about these amendments and cannot accept them. The changes within our national security environment over the last few years are exceptionally significant, and anyone with the idea now that we can just carve out terrorism and think that is somehow completely separate from serious and organised crime just does not understand the way this threat has evolved. What we are finding is that terrorist suspects or people who have committed terrorist acts in particular almost inevitably have had some criminal connection prior to them being radicalised and prior to them wanting to commit terrorist attacks here in Australia.

We find this experience in Australia and we find it extensively overseas, with people who are on the fringes of organised criminal movements and people who have been involved with things from petty criminality through to very serious criminality. The idea that we can just carve out a distinction and say, 'We're going to only look at terrorism when it comes to assessing people's suitability to work in the very sensitive areas of ports and airports'—and I think everyone can appreciate how sensitive these areas are from a security sense—and, 'Terrorism is the national security issue,' and think that that is somehow separate from organised crime, is not going to provide the Australian people with the protections that they expect from their national government.

I appreciate that some in the Senate have made these amendments probably in good faith and believe that they are restricting the ASIC and MSIC regime purely to terrorism related offences, but that would be an enormous mistake. The government cannot possibly accept this, because we have a very firm understanding about the national security challenge that this country faces, and it would be very misguided for anyone in this House to think that accepting the Senate amendments would do anything other than make our people less safe.

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