Rex Patrick (SA, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in support of this bill, the Migration Amendment (New Maritime Crew Visas) Bill 2020. I also supported the Transport Security Amendment (Serious Crime) Bill 2020, but I think that this bill adds a proper dimension. The logic of Senator Van in his contribution—where he suggested we simply drop security because it might take a little bit of time—is hugely problematic. In terms of visa processing, if you care about time, why don't you care about the time it takes to give visas to people who want to come here and contribute to Australian life? The logic that's been put forward is fundamentally flawed.

We need to understand that ships are very large and complex machines. There's lots of working space, and there are lots of places where crime can be set up. It's an obvious place for criminals to exploit. On top of that, we know that customs doesn't have the resources to screen every container coming in from another country. That's just not possible. We know that they use intelligence to work through some of the selection processes for that screening, but we certainly don't get every container screened. When we're dealing with ports, there are two elements to the cargo that is transiting through them: there are the offshore parties that could be loading contraband and there are the crews working throughout the journey. That is problematic. We need to understand something about the seafarers who are on the ships that are transiting our coastal regions.

There have been a whole bunch of recent events in relation to criminal activity. I won't go through them, because of time. One of the problems we've got—and this has been quite typical of what I've seen coming from the Liberal Party—is that the Liberal Party says, 'We want a free market; we want to make everything easy,' but we load up the requirements for Australian companies, like leave loadings, super, long service leave, occupational health and safety standards, environmental standards and quality standards, and then we say, 'Let's buy stuff over here because it's cheaper.' We're doing the same thing in coastal shipping. Coastal shipping in Australia has been decimated as a result of the disproportionate measures that are applied. This is another good example of what's happening here. We've got Australian industry having to jump through hoops in order to make us safe, but then we drop the ball on the international component. Of course, that makes it cheaper for them, and their vessels may not of the same standards as the 13 ships with the Australian merchant flag. We've got all these ships running around with different standards and with crew that are simply not properly screened. That is hugely problematic. Because of the destruction of our coastal shipping, we've got more and more foreign ships ploughing through our waters, more and more of these people coming into Australia's maritime jurisdiction who have not been checked to the same standards that we check Australian workers. That is hugely problematic. We do not want to have a situation where we have a difference in the way we assess the security risks of foreign workers compared to Australian maritime workers. Risk is risk, and you have to deal with it. You don't say, 'It's going to take too much time to deal with our security risks; we're only going to apply that to the Australians and not to the international seafarers.' It doesn't make sense.

Ultimately, what we should be doing is restoring our Australian merchant shipping fleet. We need to be building a capability—we're going to be talking about fuel security a little bit later today. If we get to the end of 2027 or 2030 and we don't have any refineries, we're going to have to wean ourselves off these fossil fuels. I think it's inevitable anyway. One of the ways to do that is to have more efficient transport, and that may well be coastal shipping, and it ought to have an Australian flag at the back of any ship that is ploughing through our waters. That ought to be the goal of government, not to try and make it easier for the foreign entities to carry out that business.

I will be supporting this bill. This bill is a good bill. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate interrupted.