Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I continue with the contribution I was making before question time. The Indonesian government has an enormous length of coastline to observe and police across its huge archipelago. We commend the Indonesian government for intercepting more than 20 boats heading for Australia since the new surge in people-smuggling began in August last year. There had been no people-smuggler boats since 21 November 2007, when 16 people were picked up from a sinking boat off the coast of Western Australia. We are very pleased that we were able to rescue those people. But some nine months later, after the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Senator Evans, announced what unfortunately can only be construed as a green light for people smugglers, Labor’s new look border control and asylum seeker response was made clear.

What was this response? Embedded in it was a reference to the two months stand-down of Army, Navy and Air Force over Christmas. The three forces were to have extended leave, and you can imagine the message that sent out to the people smugglers waiting in Indonesia with their customers, looking for the window of opportunity.

There was also reference to the fact that from August, and the commencement of the new Labor policy, it did not matter how you arrived in Australia in your bid to seek asylum. It did not matter whether you came via our carefully managed refugee and humanitarian program, with record-breaking numbers of people coming to this country—numbers that the coalition, from 1996, had built from a much smaller cohort of accepted arrivals needing asylum. The policy announced in August was that, if you came via boat because you had the cash and contacts to deal with international criminals, the people smugglers, you would have the same processing, outcomes and fast management of your needs that you would have through our lawful, legitimate pathways.

The tragedy is that across the globe we have increasing numbers of some of the most heartbreaking, difficult circumstances—whether it is in Africa, on the Myanmar border or in parts of the globe where the tragic circumstances are related to natural disasters—but every time someone with the cash and contacts arrives via people smugglers they unfortunately replace one of those on our humanitarian and refugee intake list. So the queue just gets longer for those in the Congo, Sierra Leone and on the Burmese border.

In Australia we have a long and proud record of looking after humanitarian and refugee new settlers. We have some of the world’s best new settler programs. They are some of the better resourced programs and are commended by UNHCR whenever they come and look closely at what we do. Under the coalition, I was very proud and pleased that we did not focus only on new housing and homes for new arrivals in the capital cities. We understood that a lot of our new settlers, particularly our torture/trauma refugees, had come from a rural background. They had never seen a developed city or lived in urban congestion, so for them the most comfortable, peaceful, secure place to be newly settled would be in a rural or regional part of Australia. In the Congolese new settler refugee program people were taken literally from the plane to the Goulburn Valley. That was hugely successful. It was a very proud moment for me when one of those Congolese refugees, now an Australian citizen, after only three years in Australia stood for local government at the last elections for the Greater Shepparton City Council. Another of those refugees, now a great Australian citizen, is in the process of becoming a justice of the peace.

Unfortunately, the Labor Party is not pursuing the settlement of refugees, torture or trauma victims or humanitarian settlers beyond the capital cities, because it is easy, of course, simply to look to the ‘same old, same old’ policies and strategies. Yes, I admit there are many more purpose-built migrant resource centres in the capital cities and that lots of the key NGOs have their bigger numbers in places like Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane, but we should look at the needs of our newly arrived settlers first, see what is most comfortable for them and embed them in communities where there may not be specialist services but where there are services which are mainstreamed and can help those settlers become part of the Australian economy and community much faster and much more comfortably.

We as a coalition moved a long way in doing what we know is right in Australia when looking after asylum seekers, those who have through no fault of their own experienced the most shocking of threats to life and family. But what we also did as a coalition was to understand that if you have absolutely uncontrolled borders—if your border security is so lax and weak that the people smugglers take heart—then you risk lives. I have to remind people who might have forgotten that in 2000-01 there were 54 boats and 4,137 arrivals. In 2001-02 there were 1,212 arrivals. But, as I mentioned in my remarks before question time, with our new coalition strategy of excising migration zones, having a set of offshore processing facilities and making sure that if you arrived as a boat person then you had a temporary protection visa in the first instance and waited several years before moving on to full citizenship, we ensured that those strategies turned off the tap of people-smuggling. So in 2002-03 there were no boats and no arrivals, there having been 1,212 arrivals the year before. We again had no boats and no arrivals in 2004-05. There were only four boats in the following year and three boats in 2007-08.

But, unfortunately, things have changed since the announcements of Minister Evans in August last year—where, I stress again, he perhaps did not understand what he was doing but announced loudly and proudly that this government was having a go-slow on border control over Christmas, was abolishing temporary protection visas and was introducing a ‘no difference at all’ processing strategy for those who arrived via the people smugglers. There was at that time absolutely no mention of Labor continuing mandatory detention or the Christmas Island detention as an offshore processing strategy. Certainly Labor did not mention that it was retaining the excised migration zones. So the message that went out to Indonesia, where the people smugglers had their queues, was, ‘Come on down.’

Tragically, the consequences have already been lives lost. There have been bodies found washed up on Indonesian shores from boats sunk on their way to Australia. We have already intercepted sinking boats in Australian waters, just a few months ago. On 13 August, police in Indonesia were able to intercept nine Afghani asylum seekers on the island of Flores; they were on their way to Australia in a fishing boat. That was a sign of things to come and the floodgates starting to open. On 30 September 2008 a vessel carrying 14 people was intercepted in the Ashmore Reef area; there were 11 men and one woman from Afghanistan in that particular boat. Then there were incidents on 6 October, 20 October, 3 November, 11 November, 20 November, 28 November and 3 December.

I mentioned 3 December. It was interesting that on 1 December I put a question to the Prime Minister in this place during question time. I have just listed to you the numbers of boats coming down since August, some intercepted by the Indonesians on our behalf and the others intercepted by our own defence forces, usually the Navy. I asked the Prime Minister whether he was concerned about the stand-down of half of Australia’s patrol boats for two months over Christmas, leaving only 320 naval personnel on active duty in Australian waters over that period, and whether in fact this was a case of giving the people smugglers a green light. His response was mock outrage—how dare I imply that people smugglers were back in business in bringing people down to Australia? There was no careful response—‘Look, we’re concerned about people-smuggling resurging.’ There was a denial that this was in fact resurging. This was followed by the chairman of the Joint Standing Committee on Migration standing in this place within 24 hours of the Prime Minister denying that there was a new problem and also saying that what I had said was wrong; there was no re-emergence of this difficulty and problem. So today I am very pleased that there is at least an acknowledgement that people-smuggling is a heinous crime.

The victims are not just those who pay the cash and have the contacts to come down by leaking boats which may not get to our shores at all. The other victims are the Indonesian fishermen who, maybe, imagine that it is not going to be much more serious than being caught for illegal fishing when they deliver their human cargo into the hands of the naval patrol boats. In fact, of course, those Indonesian fishers, when charged with people-smuggling, face a much more serious sanction: 20 years in prison is the maximum penalty, as well as very hefty fines. So I see those Indonesian fishermen, with impoverished families in coastal villages, also as victims of the people smugglers.

I am concerned, I have to say, if this bill is only about a name change from ‘Australian Customs Service’ to ‘Australian Customs and Border Protection Service’. There has to be more. You cannot just change a name, stand back and say, ‘The job’s right; the longer nameplate will scare off the illegals and the international criminals whose profit is in bringing boatloads down.’ We have to look at what resources are being committed to this newly rebadged agency or entity. We have already seen the consequences of squeezed resources for the Department of Immigration and Citizenship. We are already aware of the squeezed resources for Customs that our shadow minister referred to in her speech. In the case of the Department of Immigration and Citizenship, some 200 officials have been taken out of the service.

Whenever you start to rely more on home country immigration-processing officials—locals employed in our high commissions and embassies offshore—you invite a great deal of difficulty due to the fact that those locally employed officials bring to the jobs their own cultural biases and their own sense of who is worthy to be at the head of a queue in applying for visas. You start to have allegations of corruption. People applying for visas to come to Australia, if they are part of a minority group in that country, find themselves at the back of the queue. Money starts changing hands. It is a serious problem when Australia can no longer afford to have its own Australian citizens offshore working in those most sensitive and important posts.

We have heard of the problems in Afghanistan where, via the Indonesian embassy, there was a racket selling visas for Afghanis to go to Australia via Indonesia. It took the media to mention that problem before there was real action from the Department of Immigration and Citizenship, it would seem. We are also alarmed about the two boats that have recently come to Australia. The most recent one came several days ago with 54 on board. Children standing on the beach were the ones who saw that boat coming and reported that to a ranger. As we know, a boat of Sri Lankans came onto the coast of Western Australia, and local tourists saw, to their astonishment, a couple swimming ashore.

What is it that we have to do to make sure that this government pays serious attention to the resources needed for our border security and the protection of asylum seekers who are in the hands of these international criminals? We have to be serious about the longer queues in our offshore places like our high commissions and embassies. People become frustrated when they are told that it will perhaps take years for their visa applications to be properly considered. Yes, some will turn to people smugglers. When you have queues back in Indonesia waiting to see if it is worth the risk to push off in those leaking vessels—to literally put their lives in the hands of people smugglers who have taken the cash upfront—it is not helpful to hear on the news triumphal announcements that it has taken the shortest possible time to process the last lot of people smuggled into Australia and they are now enjoying a good life on the Australian mainland.

These are serious problems, and we have to wonder what will come next from the Labor Party. Will there be additional resources? The budget will tell us, but we are not holding our breath. We have already seen this Labor government commit, campaign after campaign, to a coastwatch. We were told a US style coastwatch was the way to go. Well, that has been thrown out the window. We were also told that there would be a mega department of home security and this department of home security—this great monolithic entity—would look after our coastline and make sure that no-one died in their run to the country in the hands of criminals. Well, the department of home security vanished as well. Now we have the Australian Customs Service renamed as the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. We in the coalition really do wish this service well. It needs to succeed. The safety of this nation and the safety of very vulnerable people depend on this service succeeding. But we are very, very worried. This government has already got the nation heavily into debt. There are no surplus funds anywhere in sight. We have heard about the $2 billion per week being borrowed. So will this service be properly resourced? It must be, but I am very afraid that the Australian nation will be more vulnerable because, quite simply, this economy is not being properly managed so that important aspects of the nation’s safety can be properly looked after in the future.

Craig Thomson (Dobell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It was an amazing contribution that we just heard from the member for Murray—based more on fantasy than reality. There have been two Customs pieces of legislation that have come before this House. Both have been supported by the opposition—and quite rightly so, because both are about strengthening our border protection and strengthening protection for this country. There is nothing wrong with making sure that you have a system that is tough but fair, and that is certainly the approach of the Rudd government. And we heard such hypocrisy in her contribution about needing to send a strong message to people overseas. This bill, the Customs Legislation Amendment (Name Change) Bill 2009, is about sending a strong message by renaming the agency to make plain that it is about customs and border protection. The honourable member for Murray cannot have it both ways. Either she wants this strong message to go out internationally through legislation like this—which she supports—or she does not. She needs to appreciate the work that has been done by the Rudd government in making sure that the shores of our country are well protected and well resourced.

The purpose of this bill is to amend the Customs Administration Act 1985 to rename the Australian Customs Service as the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. The bill will also amend 24 other Commonwealth acts, including the Customs Act 1901, to replace references to the ‘Australian Customs Service’ in these acts with ‘Customs’. The bill will also update the wording used on the Customs seal to refer to ‘Customs and Border Protection’.

On 4 December 2008, the Prime Minister released the government’s National Security Statement. The statement outlined the government’s national security policy and vision for a reformed national security structure. As part of the statement, the Prime Minister announced that the Australian Customs Service would be renamed the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service to better reflect its new role as the lead Commonwealth government agency on maritime people-smuggling issues. It will do this, in conjunction with partner agencies, through the coordination of intelligence collection across government; analysis of intelligence gathered on people-smuggling ventures and networks; coordination of surveillance and on-water response; and engaging internationally with source and transit countries to comprehensively address and deter people-smuggling. These are important roles that this agency will be playing—important roles in making sure that our borders are better protected.

It is absolutely vital that, as a continent surrounded by sea, Australia is equipped with the best ways and means of protecting itself against the illegal movement of cargo, people and prohibited items. The key agency for this protection is the Australian Customs Service. In December 2008, the Prime Minister announced an enhancement of this agency’s capabilities. Its new name, the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service, recognises our important border protection responsibilities, including this country’s new role in ensuring a coordinated response to any resurgence of threats to our borders of maritime people-smuggling.

We are all aware of Australia’s vast coastline, especially those of us in this place whose electorates make up part of that coastline. Smugglers or any other persons with criminal intentions who use the sea as a means of conducting their illegal activities will try anything and use any area of Australia’s coast to attempt their criminal actions. We must always be aware that exposure to the ocean can also mean exposure to these potentially illegal activities at any time of the day or night. That is why we must ensure that the key agency engaged in overseeing our coastline is properly empowered to enforce the law.

At the start of this decade, Customs officers and federal agents intercepted an estimated half a ton of cocaine in a raid on a yacht, in the early hours, at Patonga on the New South Wales Central Coast, just near my electorate. It was, to that date, Australia’s largest ever haul of a drug from a yacht off the New South Wales coast. This was more than twice the size of the previous largest haul. Seven people were arrested and two vessels were seized as part of this 18-month intelligence-driven operation. The operation was significant not only for the size of the haul but also for its success in disrupting an organised criminal syndicate. It goes to show that criminals will use any means and any destination, whether it be a quiet seaside hamlet such as Patonga or a bustling city port, to try to conduct their illegal activities.

The enhanced Australian Customs and Border Protection Service is set to meet the complex border security challenges of the future by providing unified control and direction and a single point of accountability. The planning framework aims to bring together all agencies involved in border management and attempts to ensure consistent and complementary functions. Additional capabilities given to the Customs and Border Protection Service under the new arrangement include analysing and coordinating the gathering of intelligence, coordinating surveillance and on-water response and engaging internationally to deter maritime people smugglers.

Let us just have a brief look at what Customs is and what it does. The Australian Customs and Border Protection Service manages the security and integrity of Australia’s borders. It works closely with other government and international agencies, in particular the Australian Federal Police, the Australian Quarantine and Inspection Service, the Department of Immigration and Citizenship and the Department of Defence, in order to detect and deter unlawful movement of goods and people across the border. The agency is a national organisation employing more than 5,500 people in Australia and overseas, with its central office here in Canberra. It has a fleet of ocean-going patrol vessels and contracts two aerial surveillance providers for civil maritime surveillance and response.

Australian Customs faces a number of risks, but probably the more imminent safety and security risks are those posed by the use of sea cargo by criminal syndicates. Commonly this illegal activity is the import of illicit drugs, firearms, tobacco and counterfeit goods. Just last month alone, Customs officers were very busy, including uncovering one of the most intricate concealments ever. In Melbourne, Customs and Border Protection Service officers examined an air cargo consignment from Pakistan, which contained a number of rugs. During the examination, officers discovered a white powder substance intricately concealed within the rugs. Initial testing of the substance indicated the presence of heroin. Two Melbourne men were charged with conspiring to import 20 kilos of heroin into Australia. In another case, in March, a 31-year-old Austrian national was charged with importing drugs—in this case, ice—into Australia in chocolate bar packaging, after a baggage inspection by Customs and Border Protection Service officers. Just last weekend, approximately two kilos of ice was allegedly found, during an X-ray by Customs and Border Protection Service officers, concealed in a suitcase carried by a Canadian national. These are just some of the typical examples of the daily challenges Customs and Border Protection Service officers face.

There is a real increase in the threat to public safety by the counterfeiting of poorly manufactured and hazardous goods, placing greater emphasis on the integrity of consignments entering Australia—food, children’s products, medicines, explosives and other hazardous chemicals. Customs border protection approaches start off-shore. Customs is an active participant in a number of international counterterrorism and counterproliferation forums, including the chemical and biological weapons convention, the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the Missile Technology Control Regime and international forums focused on developing border security capabilities. Customs also participates in international exercises, such as the proliferation security initiative, a global initiative aimed at impeding the movement of weapons of mass destruction by rogue states and terrorist groups. These exercises are invaluable in testing our abilities to respond to potential terrorist incidents and provide valuable lessons in how to develop our capabilities.

Clients of Customs include the Australian community, the government, industry, travellers and other government agencies. The Australian Customs and Border Protection Service is headed by a chief executive officer and is supported by three deputy CEOs. The service operates nationally through three programs: passenger and trade facilitation, border enforcement and corporate operations. Customs plays an important role in protecting Australia’s borders from the entry of illegal and harmful goods and unauthorised people. Naturally, it must carry out this role while not impeding the legitimate movement of people and goods across the border.

Customs also contributes to whole-of-government efforts to protect Australia’s waters through its part in the Border Protection Command. The command is a Customs and Defence partnership to ensure that any threat to Australia’s maritime assets and coastline can be quickly detected and defeated. Illegal foreign fishing in Australian waters also poses a threat to our borders. Customs is on the front line of Australia’s efforts to combat illegal foreign fishing in the northern and southern oceans. Customs is leading the way in the breeding and training of dogs to detect drugs and other prohibited items, including explosives, firearms and chemicals. Customs is committed to continuous improvement in its people, systems and technology, and it has the full support of the Rudd government to ensure that it is well placed to meet emerging challenges, including the constantly changing security and regulatory environment. Customs’ authority stems principally from the Australian Constitution, which provides for the levying of customs duties and for laws concerning trade and commerce.

Schedule 2 of the bill proposes to amend 24 Commonwealth acts to change references to the ‘Australian Customs Service’ to read simply ‘Customs’. I will not name all of those 24 acts, but they are very wide ranging. To give a sample, we are including acts such as the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006, the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority Act 2006 and the Criminal Code Act 1995. There are a variety of acts across all areas, which shows how widespread and important the role of Customs is to Australia. Also part of the amending legislation is the requirement to change the Customs seal to read ‘Customs and Border Protection’, a change from ‘HM Customs’.

We live in a rapidly changing world, and the name change from the Australian Customs Service to the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service will better reflect its new role of being the lead Commonwealth agency on maritime people-smuggling and associated issues such as the trade of illegal weapons, drugs and other items. This is an important piece of legislation and will send a strong message to all of those who think that because we are a country with a wide coastline it is easy to breach our borders. This will send a message that border protection is something that this government take very seriously. I commend the bill to the House.

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Customs Legislation Amendment (Name Change) Bill 2009 is probably the silliest bill I have seen come into this House in my very short time here, but it is one that really provides a narrative on this government. We have seen a lot of bad bills come into this place, and those on this side of the House have taken the opportunity to vote against bad bills. But the reason I think that this is a silly bill is that it does nothing of substance other than to change a name.

We have seen from the government that they are great at announcements, they are great at getting the packaging right but, when it comes to the substance, you open the box and there is nothing there. That is what this bill is: you open it up and there is nothing there. Maybe the wordsmiths who crafted the bill might want to call it the ‘Customs Spin Bill 2009’. I do not recall, when the previous government decided to do actual things on border protection, that John Howard as Prime Minister felt the need to go around changing names to prove his point. John Howard and his government did everything that was necessary to ensure that Australia’s borders were protected. As a result, our borders were protected. It was never part of his plan or strategy to change the name of a government agency which would have the people smugglers cowering in their pathetic little dens and would somehow be the thing that would bring about the great turnaround in protecting our borders.

This bill is about the shopfront but it does nothing about the shop. The bill is an empty gesture. It is more poll-driven Ruddspeak designed to kick up dust on an issue without actually doing something. Their idea is that if they change the name of an agency it will send a message out there that this is somehow a priority of the government. You need to do more than change the name on the letterhead to establish credentials to do what is necessary to protect Australia’s borders. The government is great at announcing but woeful at delivering.

This reminds me again of the process, in portfolio areas where I have some responsibility, where the government back in November brought 500 mayors together and said, ‘Now means now. The money is ready to go now and it is all immediate.’ The Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government has been running around the country making announcements about new funding and approvals, yet we found out in estimates hearings that only one funding agreement had actually been signed. I have letters and emails coming to my office asking, ‘Where’s the money?’ This is a government that likes to announce things but cannot actually follow through on the delivery. Building 20,000 new public housing dwellings may be, from a social policy perspective, very worthy of doing over a long period of time, if the country can afford it. But if you cannot afford it and you cannot deliver it, it hardly delivers an effective stimulus.

Just today we had the announcement of some new housing commencement data which showed that over the last two years some 7,000 or so public housing dwellings were completed. The government think that they can build 20,000 dwellings in less than that period of time, through state agencies. My point is simply that this government like to make announcements, like to make cosmetic changes to get their messages out there, but if you are serious about border protection you need to do more than change the letterhead.

The bill amends the Customs Administration Act 1985 to change the name of the Australian Customs Service to the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. As a consequence, we have in this bill amendments to a further 24 Commonwealth acts to replace references to the Australian Customs Service. Honestly, big deal. What the Australian people are looking for in border protection is actual action. The bill simply proposes a change of name. It does not make any substantial policy shift to combat people-smuggling as outlined by the Prime Minister in his national security statement in December last year.

The positive steps taken by the previous coalition government under John Howard to secure Australia’s borders meant the following. They increased the funding for the Customs Service by $640 million between 1996 and 2007, an increase of 180 per cent or just over 100 per cent in real terms. The increased budget allowed Customs to significantly expand its operations in the detection and seizure of illicit drugs being imported into Australia. The additional funding provided by the Howard government allowed Customs to increase its staff numbers and introduce new technology. This sped up the processing of arriving international air passengers to about 95 per cent through the barrier within 30 minutes of arrival. Resources were provided for the deployment of new drug detection dog teams in Brisbane, Cairns, Darwin, Melbourne and Perth. The decision maintained Australia’s reputation as a world leader in best practice for detector dog breeding, development, training and deployment. In 2007 there were 59 Customs dog detector teams maintained nationwide. Funding of $23 million was provided to enhance Customs’ ability to identify international travellers who may be of interest. This included a new passenger evaluation system to improve data sharing between agencies. Customs liaison offices were established in a number of overseas cities, including Beijing and Jakarta, to enable Customs to engage directly with key overseas counterparts on issues of mutual interest, including border security, drugs and counterterrorism.

The Howard government established the Border Protection Command in 2004 to strengthen Australia’s Civil Maritime Surveillance and Response Program. The Border Protection Command identifies and manages threats and shares information. It is legislated to allow offshore processing of illegal arrivals, with the establishment of processing centres on Nauru. Australia has also pursued an excellent relationship with our neighbours, particularly Indonesia, to improve the relations between Canberra and Jakarta to ensure greater cooperation and shared intelligence. As a government we introduced legislation to exclude from Australia’s asylum processes those who have access to effective protection elsewhere. We maintained a commitment to the principle of mandatory detention for all persons without authority to be in Australia as a central part of maintaining the integrity of the migration program. We excised from Australia’s migration zone those Australian territories that were magnets for people smugglers. By doing these things, the government of John Howard was able to get results on border protection. We made serious changes and took serious actions to protect our borders—not name changes and Ruddspeak.

Between 1999 and 2001 around 12,000 people arrived illegally in Australia by boat. After the changes to Australia’s migration laws introduced by the Howard government, only 56 people arrived in that same manner between 2005 and 2006. Since the election of the Rudd Labor government we have seen a change to these measures on their watch that cannot be papered over by the spin bill that we have before us, which merely seeks to change names to create an impression. That is what this government likes to do. They like to create impressions in the minds of Australians. But those impressions do not always match their intent, their actions and their follow-through. My warning to Australians is this: do not be fooled by a simple change of language. Go to the record to see which side of this House has a true commitment to border protection backed up by actions over a long period of time that delivered real results.

The Rudd government has announced a softening of border protection measures. Unauthorised arrivals will only be held in detention until health, security and identity checks have been completed. Beyond this, mandatory detention will continue to apply only to those people presenting an unacceptable risk to the community and to unlawful noncitizens who have repeatedly refused to comply with visa regulations. Another example of Labor’s softening of border protection includes the abolition of the temporary protection visa program and its replacement with permanent visas. These sorts of changes really do start to give a nod and a wink to those who would seek to engage in the despicable act of people-smuggling.

As a new member of parliament, I took it upon myself to go and visit the Villawood detention centre early in my time as a member of this place. The thing I was struck by was how very few people were actually in that detention centre. That should be our goal. We should not have these places full. We should not be in a situation where we have to do this. The way to do that was demonstrated by the Howard government in having strong, tough border protection laws. That is how these places emptied out. That is how we got to a position where there were fewer and fewer boat arrivals. I am happy to stand here in this place and identify myself totally with the policies of the Howard government on border protection, because they worked. That is why I am happy to do it—because they worked. I am as opposed to people-smuggling as anyone else in this House. But the best way to ensure that these detention centres are not full and the best way to ensure that children are not on boats going across the strait is to ensure that there is a massive deterrent for them to engage in this activity. That is the way to stop them. That is the humane approach. We do not want those boats leaving those shores. We do not want them coming across in a position of danger where people’s lives are being put at risk. To achieve that you have got to have tough border protection. That is what the Howard government did.

When in opposition, those opposite wanted to feign that they had some sort of similarity to the Howard government on these things. They would not come out before the election and beat their chests on this issue and talk with the Australian people about the changes they have now made. You did not hear the Prime Minister being honest with the people by saying that he was going to change temporary protection visas and detention laws. No, he did not have the courage to put that to the Australian people. He sat here in this place today and had the gall to tell people he was keeping promises. That was one promise he never made to the Australian people; it was something he was happy to do quietly after he got into government—not unlike his changes on the issues of aid and abortion. He was quite happy to go out there and send a message to the Christian community—

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Cook has been wide-ranging and I would say he is now being totally irrelevant to the bill before us. I would ask him to come back to the bill before us now.

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Madam Deputy Speaker, I am making the point that the government has been out there failing to promise things before an election and then doing them in government. I think that is a very valid point.

Ms Anna Burke (Chisholm, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Cook needs to refer to the bill before the House.

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This bill seeks to simply put a superficial gloss on actions that are not being undertaken by this government—and this government has form on doing this. And I make reference to the government’s and the Prime Minister’s form on this issue, particularly in relation to his appalling stand on aid and abortion. But I will move on.

In addition, serious and organised criminal groups pose a significant risk to Australian border protection by engaging in the illicit cross-border trafficking of a range of goods. Such goods include drugs, precursor chemicals, tobacco and cigarettes, performance and image enhancing drugs, counterfeit goods, wildlife and currency. Mr Jeffrey Buckpitt, the National Director of Intelligence and Targeting at Customs, outlined to the Joint Committee on the Australian Crime Commission on 29 September 2008 the Customs role in combating serious and organised crime at the border, which encompasses the detection and interdiction of illegal movements across the border, the investigation of certain border offences, and cooperation and collaboration with partner law enforcement and regulatory agencies to disrupt and dismantle serious and organised criminal activity.

A warning has come from the Australian National Council on Drugs that Australia is at risk of an influx of heroin, thanks to the surplus in supply from Afghanistan and Burma. The council says that, after a few years of heroin drought, the drug is once again readily available on Australia’s streets. The Australian Bureau of Crime Statistics has been looking at the border detections, and they were the highest on record last year. That was coupled with an 80 per cent increase in the weight of the drug seized in the previous year. Considering opium cultivation in neighbouring South-East Asia has increased by 22 per cent after six years in decline, it is of grave concern to the coalition that the Labor government is not taking tough measures to stem the flow of drugs onto Australian streets.

The Prime Minister speaks about national security, but his government is delivering budget cuts in that very area. Efficiency dividends have seen $24 million cut from the operating budget of the Australian Federal Police. His budget cuts have seen 169 Australian Federal Police staff take voluntary redundancy packages. Fifteen staff from the Australian Crime Commission have also take voluntary redundancies, with another 50 staff required to leave in the next 12 months. The ACC has had its budget cut by $2.7 million between 2007-08 and 2008-09. The Rudd Labor government needs to explain how it can say it is not soft on border protection, when it is cutting resources to the law enforcement and security agencies that play a crucial role in protecting our borders.

Labor are all front and no shop on border protection, and that is what this bill says. They can change their name as often as their leader changes his ideologies, but it does not change the fact that Labor are soft on border protection and the Australian people should not be fooled by a simple name change. I am sure they will not be, because the Australian people are very perceptive on these matters and, at the end of the day, they are looking for action.

Mike Kelly (Eden-Monaro, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Support) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Dr Kelly interjecting

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I say to the Parliamentary Secretary for Defence Support, who is at the table, that, when the Australian people are promised action and it does not happen, they get very disappointed. They get very, very disappointed. You have made a lot of promises on these issues and you are not following through on them. You mislead people before an election, you create perceptions out there in the community and, when you get into government, you start to shuffle away and the only way you can try and paper over it is with a bill such as this, which seeks to change a name. You cannot change your name if you are not going to change the attitude that sits behind it. There is no change of attitude in this bill. There is nothing in terms of a change of action in it. It is all just papering over the top.

Labor are no more tough on protecting our borders than they are economic conservatives, believe in reducing debt or deliver surpluses. These are all things the Labor government promised in opposition and have been absolutely hopeless at delivering in government. They are quite happy to create perceptions out in the community and lead the community to believe that their vote was safe with them, whether on border protection or economic conservatism, which is about responsible economic management and not driving up interest rates and talking up inflation. But the community have a right to expect that the government that has been elected will follow through on their pledges and their statements of philosophy on these issues—whether on reducing debt, on delivering surpluses or, for those in the Christian community who thought their vote was safe, on things like aid and abortion. What we have seen from this government is a betrayal of all of the perceptions they created, and what we have seen in this bill is their willingness to try and cover over all these things with a simple name change. Labor are no more tough on protecting our borders than they are economic conservatives who believe in reducing debt and delivering surpluses.

Tony Zappia (Makin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of the Customs Legislation Amendment (Name Change) Bill 2009. Before I get to the substance of my remarks, I will respond to some of the comments made by members opposite, in particular the member for Murray and the member for Cook. The first comment I make is that, if I were in their shoes, I would not be too proud of the Howard government record when it comes to the issue of refugees and asylum seekers. It was a deplorable record and one that I have heard condemned more than any other single policy issue that I have been associated with since being elected to this parliament.

I am a member of the Joint Standing Committee on Migration. I have visited almost all of the detention centres in Australia, including the Christmas Island facility. I have spoken with people in detention and I have also spoken with countless people who are associated with providing services, support systems and the like for those centres and the people within them. We as a committee have received countless submissions and representations in respect of them. Not one submission received by the committee supported what was being done in the past in respect of the way asylum seekers and refugees were treated in this country—not one. I think that speaks for itself.

I want to refer to another matter—that is, the perception given by the member for Cook and the member for Murray that this government has gone soft on dealing with border protection and refugee matters. On 29 July last year the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship announced a policy change. I make this very simple point: that policy change was considered by the Joint Standing Committee on Migration. The member for Murray, the shadow spokesperson for immigration and citizenship, is a member of that committee. The committee presented an interim report in December. In that first interim report the committee not only embraced the minister’s new policy but also suggested that it should have gone further—that it should have been softer.

But the issue goes further. There was a dissenting report written by the member for Kooyong, Senator Eggleston and Senator Hanson-Young—and that list includes two members of the coalition party. They dissented because they believed that the committee did not go far enough in softening the policy in the recommendations that we put to the government. So they thought not only that the minister’s policy did not go far enough but also that the committee’s recommendations did not go far enough. They wanted the committee to go even further. So for the member for Murray and the member for Cook to come into this chamber and suggest that this government has gone soft on border protection and refugee matters, when the coalition have signed off on that report to this parliament, is totally contradictory to what the coalition have done in terms of their position on the committee.

The bill implements a measure outlined by the Prime Minister on 4 December 2008 when he presented the government’s national security policy and vision for a reformed national security structure. In that statement the Prime Minister announced that the Australian Customs Service is to be renamed the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service to better reflect its new role of being the leading Commonwealth government agency on maritime people-smuggling issues.

People-smuggling has become a lucrative international criminal activity. It is generally a well-organised, relatively low-risk activity for people smugglers and is carried out by sophisticated and well-organised international networks. It is an activity that seems to have flourished in recent years, probably because of the number of people fleeing from war-torn countries or other appalling conditions that they are living in. People smugglers, however, appear to have little regard for the wellbeing and safety of those who are fleeing and little regard for what confronts them when they reach their country of destination. One need only look at the poor condition of the vessels that have been intercepted by authorities to understand the callous nature of smugglers. Many of these vessels have been found to be both unseaworthy and overcrowded. In fact there is much anecdotal evidence that many of these vessels never reach their intended destination. Just how many lives have been lost will never accurately be known, but there is little doubt that people smugglers are placing at extreme risk the lives of those who pay for their services.

I will just digress on that point. That was one of the matters I raised as part of the inquiry on detention centres in Australia with some of the agencies that were presenting evidence. I was trying to get a handle on just how many lives might possibly have been lost. It is not possible to get accurate figures about illegal matters and therefore there is no factual material to use. But from the evidence given by people who had come here as refugees there was no doubt whatsoever that many of their fellow refugees never made it to the mainland, or to any other country for that matter—and that is of real concern. That people are prepared to pay people smugglers and place their lives at such risk is evidence of the desperation of people fleeing from their homeland. I say this to the members opposite: at the end of the day it will not be the policies of any country which determine whether someone will attempt to flee to that country; it will be the desperation that they face in the land from where they come—desperation which in many cases is a matter of life or death. And if you are faced with a life or death situation, you will flee anywhere regardless of what the possible outcomes might be further down the track. That has been substantiated by the authorities we spoke to during the course of our inquiry.

Whilst people smugglers use very crude vessels they are nevertheless highly organised and have access to up-to-date sophisticated technologies so as to avoid detection. Routes and methods of arrival change at short notice in response to detection activities by authorities. The most effective action by authorities to prevent people-smuggling operations comes from governments working together and sharing intelligence information. In 2002 ministers and law enforcement agencies from 42 countries initiated what is referred to as the Bali process. The Bali process was aimed at combating people-smuggling, drug trafficking and related transnational crime in the Middle East, Asia and Pacific regions. As a consequence of initiatives taken, regional countries have been active in preventing and deterring the activities of people smugglers and the movement of potential illegal immigrants towards Australia.

Since 2002 the number of maritime people-smuggling ventures to Australia has reduced significantly. In 2001-02, six vessels carrying 1,212 illegal immigrants reached Australia. In 2007-08, 25 people arrived illegally on three boats. This shows the difference that process has made—all because governments and authorities were working together, sharing intelligence information and cooperating in their efforts to stop people smugglers. Over that same period there have also been several successful prosecutions of persons associated with people-smuggling activities, with some of those people having been extradited to Australia in order to be prosecuted.

Of course, in addition to people-smuggling there has also been an ongoing problem with illegal fishing in Australian waters. Again, as a result of greater cooperation with neighbouring countries and a more effective sea and air surveillance strategy by Australian authorities, there has been a steep decline in illegal fisher apprehensions over recent years. The detention of illegal fishers, the apprehension and destruction of their vessels, and the prosecution of key people in the trade are clearly having a deterring effect on illegal fishing activities in Australian waters.

Border protection, whether it relates to people-smuggling, illegal fishing, illegal drug importation or any other security purpose, is of national importance. There is, of course, a secondary benefit from and purpose to the need to have an effective border protection strategy in place, particularly with respect to people-smuggling activities. Many of the people seeking refuge in Australia are exploited and deliberately misled by the people smugglers. I certainly heard, in evidence to the inquiry, stories of people being misled. And, when you hear it firsthand, you understand just how callous these people smugglers are. Fees of up to $18,000 per person are reported to have been charged, with smugglers knowing full well that those seeking refuge are very likely to lose their lives along the way or, if they do reach their destination, are highly likely to either be returned to their country of origin or spend lengthy periods in detention and then still be returned to their country of origin—as has happened with so many of them. People smugglers have little regard for human life and largely prey on desperate people fleeing from a life-threatening situation in their own homeland. For those people who may be fortunate enough to reach their intended destination and to be allowed to remain here in Australia, the whole experience—going across the seas, being in detention centres and then being released years later—can be soul destroying. These people might be free at the end of that journey but, from the evidence received by the committee, most of them come out of it very deeply scarred.

In closing, I simply want to quote the remarks of the Prime Minister when he introduced this proposal to parliament on 4 December 2008. He said:

The government has decided therefore to move quickly to better enable the existing Australian Customs Service to meet this resurgent threat to our border integrity. To this end we will in coming weeks establish new arrangements whereby the Australian Customs Service is augmented, retasked and renamed the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. This arrangement will create in the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service a capability to task and analyse intelligence, coordinate surveillance and onwater response, and engage internationally with source and transit countries to comprehensively address and deter people-smuggling throughout the operating pipeline from source countries to our shores. … The colocation of agencies and capabilities in this way is a concept strongly supported by the Homeland and Border Security Review.

I commend this bill to the House.

Bob Debus (Macquarie, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Home Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Can I especially thank the member for Makin for his contribution to the debate. It was very gratifying to hear such a sensible, compassionate and well-informed explanation of the issues of people-smuggling and border protection. People-smuggling is, indeed, a most serious crime. It preys on the vulnerability of desperate people, and it puts lives at risk. The government is committed to combating people-smuggling.

The Customs Legislation Amendment (Name Change) Bill 2009 implements the Prime Minister’s announcement in his national security statement last December which created the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service from the existing Australian Customs Service. The bill reflects the role of Customs as not only an important civilian service but a service that deals directly with transnational crime. Customs deals firsthand with activities like trafficking in persons, drugs and arms, and maritime people-smuggling.

The Rudd government is committed to ensuring that all agencies work together to prevent, detect and deter people-smuggling, and, as a result, the government is creating the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service as a single agency responsible for the coordination of the response to people-smuggling. This change was a highlight of the Prime Minister’s first national security statement, as I have said. It signals the seriousness of our commitment in particular to combating this crime of people-smuggling, and I am very pleased to be putting this change into legislation today.

The member for Cook asked during the debate what changes will actually occur for the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service. I am pleased to be able to tell the House that, under the new arrangements, Customs and Border Protection will have an unprecedented capability to coordinate intelligence collection and analysis on people-smuggling ventures and networks across government. This will include the transfer of a number of resources from the Department of Immigration and Citizenship to Customs and Border Protection; the co-location of the Australian Federal Police people-smuggling strike-force team with Customs and Border Protection; and the collocation of the newly established people-smuggling intelligence and targeting unit, comprising intelligence analysts from various agencies. Customs and Border Protection will also lead government efforts to engage internationally with source and transit countries so that we may comprehensively address and deter people-smuggling—specifically, by early intervention initiatives to provide alternatives to displaced people and refugees in source and transit countries; by diplomatic representation and active support to foreign governments, which is aimed at improving official controls on people-smuggling in transit countries; and by on-the-ground operational advice and technical support to overseas law-enforcement agencies to stop imminent launches of people-smuggling vessels. So I hope the member for Cook can see from that description that, in fact, a great deal is going to be done to improve our capacity for coordinated and purposive responses to the problem.

For those vessels that do depart for our shores, the government will continue to maintain extensive patrols of our borders, with Customs and Border Protection continuing to coordinate surveillance and response on the water. Our maritime surveillance operates every day of the year, and it includes 11 Customs and Defence aircraft, flying more than 2,400 missions a year, and 16 Navy and Customs patrol boats.

Members of the opposition have criticised these arrangements today. The member for Farrer called these arrangements lax and said that she did not believe the government were doing enough. Though I do welcome the opposition’s apparent final support for this bill, I do wish to address those comments. The facts are that this government have either the same number or more boats patrolling under Border Protection Command than the previous government had and our aircraft are actually more capable. Recent detections and interceptions show that our surveillance is indeed strong and effective. The response time for aircraft locating the most recent boat to be intercepted was less than 30 minutes. The AFP was also involved in February this year in an investigation with Indonesian police which led to 41 passengers along with six suspected people smugglers being detained before they got to leave Indonesia. These examples only highlight the necessity for a more coordinated approach across agencies—something the government have recognised and which this bill is now delivering.

In speeches today several opposition members also made some alarmist statements about maritime arrivals being on the rise. They said that that was linked to the government’s humane policy for dealing with asylum seekers. The member for Murray called this a ‘new surge’ and went so far as to say the government had given a green light to people smugglers. To the opposition I would say this: people-smuggling is a problem that is not determined by domestic policies. Australia has had a comparatively small number of arrivals over the last five years. Of course, we have to remain vigilant and we have to approach people smugglers as the criminals they are—threatening innocent lives as well as Australian sovereignty. But these are not Australian problems in isolation. There was a report in the Sydney Morning Herald on 7 February this year that figures from the United Nations established that 36,952 refugees landed on the coast of Italy last year. That was a jump of 75 per cent on the previous year. Thirty-one thousand of those people were rescued by the Italian Coast Guard. Last year’s arrivals in Australia were entirely comparable to previous years, with seven vessels arriving in our waters with 179 people. There were not 37,000 people but fewer than 200 people, so let us keep this in some kind of perspective.

Of course our maritime threats are different from those of Europe. We have a smaller potential volume of illegal immigrants but we have a massively larger area to keep under surveillance—the archipelago of Indonesia and the vast coast and territorial waters of Australia. To back up her claims about a purported new surge in arrivals, the member for Murray quoted figures on arrivals over a number of years. But, interestingly, she failed to quote the number of arrivals during 2007. That was of course a Howard government year. There were 148 people that year. As I have said, that figure is comparable to the figures we saw last year. The figures simply reiterate what the government has been saying all along: the number of people seeking asylum in Australia fluctuates, and the fluctuation is actually influenced by conflict overseas—in Afghanistan and Sri Lanka, for instance, and elsewhere in our region—by seasonal conditions and by the actual state of the sea. I repeat that these arrivals are not for the most part affected in any way by government policy in Australia.

The government has maintained a system of excision and mandatory detention on Christmas Island for all unauthorised boat arrivals. We have ended the embarrassing and inhumane Howard government policies that saw women and children locked up in detention centres and people languishing for years in detention without any review of their cases. That change in policy was part of the platform upon which the present government was elected. In my view, and in the view of all of my colleagues on this side of the House, that new policy has restored our honour as a nation.

We have also strengthened the Australian government’s response to the crime of people-smuggling. On the one hand we have established some humanity in the way that we deal with illegal entrants to this country but, contrary to what has been said by those opposite, we have also strengthened the Australian government’s response to the crime of people-smuggling through the measures that accompany the legislation that we are introducing today and the simple improvement in the material circumstances of the surveillance efforts that we carry out.

Customs also deals with the detection of drugs at the border. The member for Farrer criticised Customs container-screening operations this morning and criticised the harm minimisation component of the government’s drug strategy. I would like to briefly respond to those criticisms. The fact is that the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service has one of the best cargo inspection and examination regimes in the world. All Australian sea cargo imports and exports are risk assessed. We think about and collect intelligence on the risks associated with all cargo that enters Australia and then, where appropriate, through Customs and Border Protection we conduct further examination and inspection of that cargo.

In criticising the government’s wider drug strategy, the member for Farrer has apparently failed to understand that this is not a circumstance that one might ordinarily have expected, but the fact is that there has not been any change in the government’s tough stance on drugs from that of the previous government. We have not gone soft on drugs; in fact, the present government’s approach to illegal drugs is exactly the same as that of the previous government. We have adopted the National Drug Strategy of the previous government. We did so because it was a sensible one, and it encompasses the three elements that any good drug policy should have: it looks to reduce supply, it looks to reduce demand and it looks to reduce harm. Harm minimisation is in fact an integral part of our fight against drugs, but it does not in any way mean that we have dropped the ball on detection and supply. It is hardly a dramatic proposition to say that all three components of a policy are just as important as each other—reduction of supply, reduction of demand and reduction of harm.

On the bill at hand I want to be clear: the government has as many, and sometimes more, patrol boats in operation than the Howard government had in place. We have more capable aircraft than the Howard government had in place, and now we are improving coordination on people-smuggling to a level that is without precedent and is, by its nature, bound to be more effective than any arrangement that existed under the Howard government. We are doing all that without leaving asylum seekers in detention indefinitely without review of their case and without putting little kids into confinement. We are behaving like a civilised nation again. We are achieving this while also having better and more coordinated arrangements in place for dealing with people smugglers than those opposite ever had. I have pride and pleasure in commending the bill to the House.

Question agreed to.

Bill read a second time.