I rise as the shadow minister for home affairs to express the coalition’s support for this legislation, the Australian Crime Commission Amendment (Special Operations and Special Investigations) Bill 2022. The Australian Crime Commission Act establishes the Australian Criminal Intelligence commission, the ACIC, with powers to authorise special ACIC operations and special ACIC investigations.
This bill makes a series of technical but important definitional changes to provide greater clarity regarding determinations the ACIC board take. The main change replaces the current definition of ‘federally relevant criminal activity’ in subsection 4(1) with the new definition of ‘federally relevant crime’. The current definition of ‘relevant crime’ in subsection 4(1) is also amended. The bill also makes minor consequential amendments to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Law Enforcement Act 2010 and the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act 1979.
The bill will ensure the board can continue to make the necessary determinations to authorise special ACIC operations and investigations to occur by simplifying the determination drafting process and making it easier to understand. These changes reduce the multilayered definitions that currently exist which add unnecessary complexity. I want to make the point very clearly, in this debate, that the coalition will always back legislation that appropriately supports the work of our law enforcement agencies.
The ACIC’s purpose is to protect Australia from criminal threats, through coordinating a strategic response and the collection, assessment and dissemination of intelligence and policing information. It does an outstanding job of collaborating with domestic and international partners to deliver real outcomes against Australia’s most significant transnational serious and organised criminals, like we saw with Operation Ironside last year.
The ACIC’s work includes the collection, assessment and dissemination of intelligence and policing information, and the provision of national policing information systems and services as well as providing a nationally coordinated criminal history checking capability. Through the ACIC’s assistance to our law enforcement partners, more than $3.1 billion of drugs and precursors have been seized, helping keep Australian streets cleaner and safer.
I am very pleased that in the March budget we provided $116.8 million, over two years, to the ACIC to increase intelligence outputs and drive more disruptions, seizures and arrests by partners, and to support the National Criminal Intelligence System, which will provide a national, unified picture of criminal activity, further equipping Australian agencies to disrupt TSOC. I was very proud as the home affairs minister to see, firsthand, the pivotal role the ACIC plays in our national security apparatus, and I have paid tribute many times in this place to the men and women who work in our national security agencies. Strengthening our national security defences has to be our No. 1 goal. That’s what this legislation does and we support it for that reason.
The ACIC plays a very important role when it comes to intelligence and information sharing. It would take much more time than we have available today to run through the list of the vital work that is undertaken by the ACIC, but among some of those things is the National Wastewater Drug Monitoring Program, which commenced in August 2016 and provides leading-edge coordinated, national research and intelligence on illicit drugs and licit drugs, with a specific focus on methamphetamine and other high-risk substances. Wastewater analysis is widely applied internationally as a tool to measure and interpret drug use within national populations. The program gives us valuable insight into trends in drug consumption across Australia and can identify new sources of threat. By analysing the findings of the program, government, law enforcement, health, education and community organisations are able to engage in a national conversation about drug trends and develop targeted policies.
I know that this program is something that is viewed as incredibly important by the Chief Executive Officer of the ACIC, Mr Michael Phelan. I want to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the massive contribution that Mike Phelan has made to law enforcement in Australia. Mike is retiring this week, so I would like to place on record in this place the deep appreciation we in the coalition have for the work he has done over many years in helping to keep Australians safe. He has been CEO of the ACIC since November 2017, but he started his life of public service with the Australian Federal Police in 1985.
He was appointed director of the Australian High Tech Crime Centre in 2004 and was promoted to assistant commissioner later that year, undertaking the role of national manager, border and international network. In September 2007 he was appointed Chief Police Officer for the Australian Capital Territory. He served with distinction and was awarded the Australian Police Medal in 2008. In 2010 he was promoted to deputy commissioner, with oversight of the AFP’s high-tech crime, forensic intelligence, serious and organised crime, counterterrorism and protection operations portfolios.
He has made an enormous contribution to our law enforcement and national security over many decades, and it was my great honour to work with him during my time as the Minister for Home Affairs. Mike was and remains passionate about the serious threat that illicit drugs and organised crime pose to the Australian community. As he said in Senate estimates last night, he views it as ‘the biggest threat that we face as a nation’. Certainly, I and, I’m sure, all members of the place wish him well in his retirement and thank him most sincerely for his contribution to law enforcement.
As I said at the outset, the coalition remains very determined to support any measures this government brings forward that strengthen our national security and law enforcement agencies because we are committed to keeping Australians safe and secure. The coalition has a strong record on that; it’s in our DNA, so whether it’s the Attorney-General or the Minister for Home Affairs bringing forward legislation, we will judge it on whether it makes Australians safer and support it accordingly. I’m pleased to commend this bill to the House.
Debate adjourned.