Arch Bevis (Brisbane, 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 Annual report of committee activities 2008-2009.

Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper.

Since the last annual report, which I had the privilege of tabling in this parliament just on a year ago, the committee has tabled four further reports. In addition to those tabled reports there are a number of active reviews underway. The committee has also been engaged in the course of the last year in an important continuing round of briefings and visits with the various agencies involved in national security and intelligence work on behalf of the Commonwealth. The committee has received private briefings from the Defence Security Authority. The committee has also received a private briefing from Mr Duncan Lewis, AO—well known to many members in this parliament and outside—the newly appointed National Security Adviser. The committee has also received briefings from representatives of the Office of National Assessments, the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet and, of course, all of the other agencies involved in Australia’s intelligence and security community.

There is one matter raised in this annual report review which is the subject of a recommendation that I should make some comment on. When the committee did its review of administration and expenditure No. 6, that draft report was provided to the agencies on 10 March 2009. It was not until some three months later that we received the final vetting letters from the relevant ministers agreeing to the details. Those provisions may not be well known by the public, or indeed around this parliament, but the act does require the committee to provide a copy for vetting by the relevant agencies to ensure that no information that might be regarded as security sensitive is inadvertently published. That is a practice that the committee endorses.

However, the delay of three months does mean that there is not a timely capacity for the committee to report its views on these matters to the parliament, and there is a recommendation, which I would commend to the government, to put in place procedures to allow those reports of the committee to be vetted within one month of their presentation to the relevant ministers. Typically, those matters that do arise, where there are issues or suggestions from agencies or ministers as to possible changes, tend not to be matters of great moment and are fairly easily dealt with, but it does delay the capacity of the committee to report fully to this parliament when those vetting procedures take three months, as occurred during the course of the last year.

The committee during the course of the year also inquired into some matters raised in the Senate concerning intercept warrants. Concern was raised by one of the senators there about what appeared to be an extraordinarily large number of warrants being issued in Australia compared with other jurisdictions such as the United States. I would commend that section of the report to all members interested in these matters, because it provides a useful comparison and demonstrates how easily the media, the public and indeed members of this parliament can misconstrue or misunderstand simple or superficial information. I guess the easiest way of conveying that difference is to note, as the report does, that in the United States the average number of people whose communications were intercepted per order was 92—that is, 92 people had their communications intercepted on average for every single warrant that was issued. The system in Australia would simply not allow that to happen. If you multiply the US number of warrants by 92, of course, you get a dramatically different picture of what has occurred.

The committee has continued to be well served by its secretariat. I thank Robert Little and the other members of the secretariat who provide the committee with support. I also want to again thank the members of the committee. It is a pleasure to serve on this committee and it is a privilege to chair it.

Finally, I report that the committee was represented at the 2008 International Intelligence Review Agencies Conference. This is an important international gathering. It was actually started some years ago by Australia and next year will return to Australia—we will host that international conference. It saw participants last year from Belgium, Canada, New Zealand, Poland, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States, and hopefully next year we will see a number of other participants here in Sydney.

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

I thank the chair for his comments and I thank him for his leadership in relation to this committee. It is a committee that has quite unique responsibilities. It is regarded as one in which those who have had a degree of experience around the parliament might contribute. I notice reference is made to some changes in our committee membership. Might I just note that the former foreign minister, Alexander Downer, was a member of this committee until he left the parliament fairly recently. He of course was succeeded by Andrew Robb, who is also a very senior member of the opposition. It is a matter of note that this committee is one that does deal with very sensitive and difficult issues.

As one who has had the responsibility in a previous life of supervising the issue of warrants for security purposes, I commend the chair for taking up, first, the issue of intercept warrants. I know that proposals are not lightly advanced, nor is approval given, unless it is clearly warranted. Senator Ludlam tried to bring the interception process, which is fundamental to investigating organised crime as well as protecting the safety and the security of the Australian community, into disrepute by comparisons which bear no examination. Senator Ludlum commented that Australian citizens are vastly more likely than citizens of the United States to have their telephones tapped by various agencies. As the chair outlined, a fairly rudimentary examination of the Australian data with the way in which it is kept in the United States of America would seem to me to indicate that you are five times more likely to be the subject of an intercept in the United States of America than in Australia. And the data indicates that the American warrant system, which enables multiple intercepts off one warrant, translates into approximately 170,000 individual authorisations under the Australian system. When you look at the Australian figures, which vary between 3,000 and 3,500, you can see how the assertion that was made was quite flawed.

But the committee has been dealing with some other issues. One that was quite contentious for the committee in its consideration related to issues of parliamentary privilege. When the committee was advised by a presiding officer that documents might be sought by the Australian Federal Police in relation to inquiries that they were undertaking, there was this question as to whether or not documents of the committee should be made available for police investigations. I think people would want to know that the committee took this matter very seriously and received advice from the Clerk of the House of Representatives as well as from the Clerk of the Senate. While in the end the committee had no objection to the documents being sought being made available there was a very careful consideration of that issue.

Finally, might I say that the committee has had a very active program, and the report outlines that. I am privileged to be the deputy chair of the committee and I might say that the continuing scrutiny of these matters by people who are vitally interested in them should reassure the Australian public.

Arch Bevis (Brisbane, 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 the listing of Al-Shabaab.

Ordered that the report be made a parliamentary paper.

One of the regular functions of the committee is to look at proposed listings and relistings of organisations. As the member for Berowra just noted, it is an important function that all members of the committee take particularly seriously. The implications of listing do have impacts, potentially, on Australian citizens and we look carefully at these matters.

As this and other reports have identified there are a number of considerations that the committee takes into account. These reflect considerations that ASIO itself takes into account, which of course do not replace the requirements of the act but are nonetheless useful tools that we and the committee, in previous parliaments, have adopted. One of those considerations is whether or not the organisation in question has been involved in peace and mediation processes. The committee found no evidence whatsoever to support the view that al-Shabaab is involved in any peace or mediation processes—indeed, far from it.

The al-Shabaab organisation has been involved in a significant list of terrorism related activities, a number of which are documented in the report. I will mention just one. On 13 April this year, al-Shabaab claimed responsibility for an attack on which an aircraft carrying a United States congressman came under mortar fire when departing Mogadishu airport. There are a number of examples of those sorts of attacks on African Union military bases and on the use of improvised explosive devices, and the kind, from an organisation that publicly proclaims its commitment to terrorist related events.

In August 2008, al-Shabaab released a video by al-Qaeda in East Africa network operative, Saleh Nabhan, in which an al-Shabaab spokesperson and Nabhan appeared together. In the video, Nabhan pledged allegiance to Osama bin Laden, encouraged Muslim youth everywhere to go to Somalia to wage jihad and was shown instructing recruits at an al-Shabaab training camp in Somalia. I think by any reasonable test al-Shabaab certainly complies with the provisions set out in the act.

There is one matter that I should report to the House on in respect to this listing. Members would be aware that in August of this year five people were arrested in Melbourne and charged with offences arising out of an Australian Federal Police investigation. There were some concerns to be addressed to ensure that the proceedings we were embarked upon did not in any way impact on those court proceedings. Assurances and advice were sought by committee members in respect of that matter. The Attorney-General’s Department advised:

This listing has nothing to do with assisting us to prove the charges with which we have charged these people. Where the listing is important is the potential for the need for the legislation in relation to other people in the future.

The committee quite properly sought to ensure that its consideration of this matter, both its timeliness and its substance, did not in any way affect an ongoing matter before the courts and received those assurances from the Attorney-General’s Department. Accordingly, the committee does not recommend the disallowance of the regulation listing al-Shabaab as a terrorist organisation.

I again place on the record my thanks to the committee members and the secretariat for the work they have done in reviewing these matters. I guess it is true to say that some of these are more taxing than others when looking at the detail, background and implications. I am quite sure that the overwhelming majority of Australians would share the view that the committee presents here that supports the listing and does not recommend the disallowance of al-Shabaab as a terrorist organisation.

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

I endorse the comments of the chair of the Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security in relation to the listing of al-Shabaab. It should be noted that Australia does have, through our refugee and humanitarian program, a significant number of people who have settled here from Somalia. In relation to the listing of this organisation, it was a matter of very substantial concern to me that there were five people arrested in Melbourne and charged with offences arising out of a police investigation known as Operation Neath. The main charges were conspiring to do acts for preparation of a terrorist act contrary to the criminal code and aiding and abetting in the commission of an offence against the Crimes (Foreign Incursions and Recruitment) Act, and that was by another person to undertake armed hostilities in Somalia and undertaking preparations for incursions into a foreign state, namely Somalia.

Properly, the committee did raise the issue as to whether or not proscription of this organisation at this time might, in relation to these proceedings, prejudice them. I was pleased that the Attorney-General’s Department was able to point out that none of the charges related to membership of a terrorist organisation and listing would not make it easier for the Commonwealth to prove its case. In fact, I think we were further advised that it was preferable that the proscription proceed as early as possible to separate it from proceedings when they may be brought. It was a relevant issue of course in relation to another matter that the committee had to examine in this report—that is, links to Australia. The report noted that the statement of reasons does not refer to any links between al-Shabaab and Australia, but it goes on to say that it is well known that recent terror suspects have been reported as linked. While the organisation itself denied it, the committee noted that these matters will become the subject of consideration in the judicial proceedings.

The chair mentioned in relation to al-Shabaab that there was a great deal of information about it that is made available on the public record. I refer to another paragraph in the report that notes that the organisation that examines these matters, namely ASIO, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, checks that those publicly available details are accurate and reliable and have been corroborated by classified information. I mention that because there are other inquiries which we are conducting where people believe that it is merely a matter of finding information on the web and that is sufficient. I just want to make the point that the fact that information is publicly available is not sufficient in itself without the further corroboration.

Al-Shabaab, formerly the most prominent of the militia groups comprising the militant wing of the Council of Islamic Courts, is seen as an organisation that is involved in insurgency in Somalia and elements support the global ideology of violent extremism. I note that the report itself lists terrorist activities—three events in 2009 and seven events in 2008—and statements that clearly demonstrate that the organisation has militant intentions to continue an insurgency and has demonstrated that it is directly preparing, planning, assisting and fostering the doing of terrorist acts. These inquiries demonstrate very clearly that this is an organisations that we would not want Australians to be associated with and, if they are, it would be likely to pose a risk not only to the broader international community but in the longer term to Australians. I think the proscription was the correct decision for the government to take and I am pleased that the committee was able to review the matter and to confirm that it was an appropriate course.