Scott Ludlam (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Minister. So we have established one point. When we go back to the remarks you made in your second reading speech, I think we will find that you introduced this bill as relating to sharing of intelligence between intelligence agencies, and we have just established that that is not strictly the case at all; it is about sharing intelligence right across Commonwealth and state agencies according to criteria which we will come to.

Sticking with clause 12 of schedule 6 for the moment, my reading is that there are two very broad criteria on which ASIO might take this kind of action. One is if the information relates or appears to relate to the commission of a serious crime, and that is reasonably well-defined elsewhere; or if the director-general or his or her delegate is satisfied that the national interest requires the information to be shared. So now we are contemplating the proposition that no crime is being committed or alleged but the DG or his or her delegate is satisfied that the national interest in fact requires this information to be shared. Minister, could you provide us with the definition of ‘national interest’?