Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Customs Amendment (Strengthening and Modernising Licensing and Other Measures) Bill 2024, with what is called the Customs Licensing Charges Amendment Bill 2024. This bill amends the Customs Act 1901 to modernise and strengthen the customs licensing regime and makes amendments to streamline administrative processes, including through the digitisation of forms. The customs licensing regime encompasses depot, warehouse and customs broker licences. The bill also amends the AusCheck Act 2007 to allow for the disclosure of security identity card information to an officer of customs for the purposes of the Customs Act. The Customs Licensing Charges Amendment Bill modernises and streamlines the calculation of depot licence charges alongside the primary changes to the Customs Act by the bill. Amendments to the Customs Licensing Charges Act 1997 will strengthen licence fee compliance by aligning licence renewal payments requirements and calculations across the customs licensing regime. The charges bill will also rectify deficiencies in calculating depot licence renewal fees.

Together, these bills introduce a range of sensible changes to simplify and streamline the cross-border trade environment to ensure Australia remains globally competitive, building on the previous coalition government's simplified trade system—SDS—reform agenda. That simplified trade system work which was done by the previous coalition government has been incredibly important for driving down the cost of trade, and my hope is the government will continue to drive that SDS work and make it a focus and a priority. It needs to work across departments, and coordinating cross-departmental reform can be incredibly challenging unless it's driven by ministers in a very coordinated fashion. My hope is we will see that from the government so that the simplified trade system work—very important micro-economic reform—can continue.

The customs amendment bill is informed by the recommendations of the review of customs licensing regimes. It was a review that was conducted by the then Department of Immigration and Border Protection in 2015. The scope of the review was to assess all licensing regimes under the Customs Act, including licensing of custom brokers, depots and warehouses. It's also informed by the Australian Border Force's Operation Jardena, which was established in November 2021 to coordinate ABF efforts in combating organised crime in Australia's international supply chains and identify supply chain vulnerabilities to inform longer term supply chain reform. Measures in the bill address some of the identified vulnerabilities that are related to the customs licensing regime. So important work has been done, and now what we're seeing through this bill is that work, work which was done with two important reviews and other work, coming about in these amendments.

The amendments to reduce red tape and strengthen the integrity of the Australian customs licensing regime are supported by the coalition because we've done a lot of work that has led us here. In conjunction with amendments to modernise and streamline aspects of the licence administration, the amendments strengthen the eligibility to hold a licence and maintain a licence, which ensures the integrity of goods under customs control and that the applicant is adequately able to report, store and move goods under customs control, in line with the obligations of a licence.

The amendments in the bill are set out thematically according to each part of schedule 1 to the bill. Part 1 enables the digital transformation of depot warehouse and customs broker forms. Part 2 modernises provisions in respect of serving notices for the customs licensing regime. Part 3 modernises the publishing of notices by the Comptroller-General of Customs. Part 4 streamlines the disciplinary and licence cancellation process for licence customs brokers. Part 5 removes restrictions on the eligibility of contractors to be a nominee of a customs broker that is a company or a partnership. Part 6 facilitates the disclosure of information by AusCheck for a purpose or function under the Customs Act. Part 7 strengthens the fit-and-proper-person test in the customs licensing regime, including updating and ensuring that 'management or control' has the same meaning with regard to depots and warehouses. Part 8 strengthens the criteria for the grant and cancellation of depot and warehouse licences and strengthens integrity controls, such as by extending the powers of authorised ABF officers to give directions to persons operating in a customs licensed place and matters relating to the conditions attached to depot and warehouse licences. Part 9 streamlines and strengthens licence fee compliance by aligning payment and renewal requirements and enhancing suspension and cancellation provisions for non-payments. Part 10 facilitates the surrender of a licence upon request and removes the requirement to return or surrender licences after or when they are in the process of being cancelled. Part 11 provides for the refund of licence charges only where the licence has been voluntarily surrendered. Part 12 enables digitised forms relating to the loading, unloading and use of aircraft's and ship's stores and for these stores to be taken on board an aircraft or ship. Part 13 enables digitised forms relating to claims for return of seized goods. Part 14 makes amendments in respect of provisions for warehouses licensed under part 5 of the Customs Act and which are contingent on the commencement of the Excise and Customs Legislation Amendment (Streamlining Administration) Act 2024. The bill was introduced in May but has not yet passed, which up-states the drafting of these provisions.

The reforms benefit government by reducing the administrative burden associated with managing the customs licensing regime and strengthening the Border Force's ability to effectively manage threats of criminal organisation infiltration in the supply chain. These are important reforms, and that's why they're getting bipartisan support. As I've said previously, it builds on work done by previous reviews and what the coalition did through its reforms of the simplified trade system. It's good to see, especially in this area, the work that's being done on digitisation and on further streamlining, because the more we can do to simplify trade, red tape and licensing requirements, the better our trade will be and the smoother the customs processes will be, especially for Australian businesses.

As I've said previously, the coalition is happy to support this legislation. It builds on important work that we did in government, and my hope is that, especially when it comes to the simplified trade system, that very important and hard microeconomic reform work will be continued by the government.

Debate adjourned.

Ordered that the resumption of debate be made an order of the day for a later hour.