Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On behalf of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, I present the committee’s report entitled Review of administration and expenditure No. 6.

Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper.

The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security’s oversight of the Australian intelligence community is a key element of our national security architecture. I am therefore pleased to present the sixth review of the administration and expenditure of the Australian intelligence community by the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security.

The review examined a wide range of aspects of the administration and expenditure of the six intelligence and security agencies, including the financial statements for each agency, the reorganisation and consolidation of agency structures, the impact of any recent legislative changes, their human resource management including separation rates, training, recruitment and accommodation and budget growth, and financial governance systems associated with expenditure.

With regard to human resource management, the committee found that maintaining adequate levels of language skills, particularly with expertise in local dialects, remains a challenge for a number of agencies. The committee also noted that some agencies experienced higher separation rates in 2006-07, exacerbated by a competitive job market and internal policies encouraging staff mobility.

All Australian intelligence community agencies indicated that performance management and evaluation continued to be a key service delivery priority. In some agencies this process has involved developing more user-friendly intelligence product, more stakeholder engagement programs, annual customer surveys and formal performance reviews.

The committee also noted that, in recognition of an upward trend in its litigation workload, ASIO introduced a new Legal Division and a Terrorism Litigation Advice Branch within the Investigative Analysis and Advice Division.

The committee identified the challenges associated with e-security across the Australian intelligence community. It heard that agencies are working collaboratively and diligently to maintain optimum levels of e-security in a fast paced and global threat environment.

The committee found that despite facing the challenges associated with considerably increased budgets and the rapid, large-scale recruitment of staff all agencies are currently managing expenditure appropriately. The committee is satisfied that the administration and expenditure of the six intelligence and security agencies is sound. The committee found that all agencies continue to effectively manage rapid expansion while maintaining high standards of integrity and professionalism.

On behalf of the committee I thank the heads of the Australian intelligence agencies and all those who contributed to this review, in particular, the committee secretariat: Dr Margot Kerley, Mr Robert Little, Ms Phillippa Davies and Ms Donna Quintus-Bosz.

Philip Ruddock (Berowra, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for his very erudite contribution in relation to what is on its face a fairly ordinary report. I want to say that I thought his contribution was one that, if I were speaking to the report itself, I would have made. It picked up all the right points and, more importantly, he took a moment or two to reflect upon the competency of the staff that served the committee and thanked them for their work. I thank my colleague but also the chairman and those who I worked with in relation to this committee.

I think this report in its rather unassuming nature nevertheless does demonstrate why people ought to be confident in the way in which Australians’ security needs are met. This is the sixth review of the Australian intelligence agencies. It covers a wide range of aspects of their administration and expenditure, and when you go through it you find that there is little about which there is complaint. We have the work of the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, IGIS. Very little of a critical nature is noted there. We have had issues in relation to the submissions we received as to whether there might be matters of complaint there.

We canvassed a wide range of issues relating to e-security, accommodation, breaches of security and some of the delays in relation to security clearances. But, for me, it is important to look at this report in the context of what it says about the intelligence agencies of Australia. There was a time in which people were very suspicious about these agencies. They were downsized very considerably and when we saw, on 9/11, that we had new and very special demands to identify—potential security risks in Australia related with terrorism in particular—each of our security agencies in various ways contributed very significantly to ensuring that we were able to properly support our law enforcement agencies and to know something of the risks that we face. Having in another role in another life had one of the agencies in particular accountable to me and, as a member of the National Security Committee of Cabinet, having had the opportunity to witness each of the others and be briefed on their activities, I think this report is saying we should be well confident in the professional way in which they go about their duties.

It is very interesting to look at the recruitment. These agencies have been growing very quickly because the risks that we face are very considerable. The potential for counterespionage activity in Australia still remains with us. The agencies are recruiting large numbers of people. The report makes it clear that ASIO itself had to recruit in one year something in the order of 350 people and to train them and develop their skills. The report outlines the way in which that training is undertaken. It outlines the special emphasis that is put on training, leadership, management, security awareness, IT, finance budgeting, strategic policy, languages, ethics and accountability and general administrative skills. I am grateful that there are people who have the experience who remain and assist with that training, but I am extraordinarily impressed with the quality of people who are devoting themselves to this service for the nation and I thank them for it. This report endorses the value of the work that they are undertaking.