Peter Dutton (Dickson, Liberal Party, Minister for Home Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his question. I acknowledge the efforts of all those on my side who have supported the frontline agencies who have contributed significantly to the safety and security of our country. The Prime Minister, like me and like all of our colleagues, takes very seriously the investment we put into the frontline services—including not just the Australian Federal Police but also ASIS, ASIO, the ACIC, the Office of Transport Security and AUSTRAC—all of those agencies which work day and night. The Australian public doesn't see much of the work that they do but, together, they have been able to thwart 14 attempted attacks. We have been happy to support them through an additional $2.2 billion, including $448 million in the 2018-19 budget.

We do know that the threat has not gone away and never will. As the Minister for Defence pointed out, we are worried about returning foreign fighters. We have over a million Australians who holiday in Bali, Indonesia and across South-East Asia each year. We are worried about them, and we work very closely with our counterparts to keep those young Australians safe. But we are determined on our shores to make sure we can do everything possible to help the agencies—including the Australian Border Force, who has been involved in a significant effort to gather intelligence—to have a look at people who are seeking to go to the Middle East or coming back from having fought on behalf of ISIL in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. We know that more than 200 people are currently under investigation for supporting groups in Syria and Iraq or for planning to travel to join the conflict.

We know that there is a lot that we've done domestically. We have cancelled the Australian citizenships of people who would seek to do harm to the Australian public, we've denied the return of people coming back into our country and the government is actively investigating ways in which it can legislate to make Australians even safer. Every effort that we make is aimed at making sure we can realise the threat and making sure that we can do whatever is possible to defeat it but also to be realistic about it. Where people are gathering in shopping centres or wherever you might see a place of mass gathering—as we've seen overseas—is a potential threat for us. I pay tribute today to all of our frontline agencies for the work that they do.

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