Topics: Vandalism of Electorate Office, attribution of malicious cyber activity to China’s Ministry of State Security, returning Australians.
NEIL BREEN: Karen Andrews joins me on the line now.
KAREN ANDREWS: Good morning.
NEIL BREEN: Tell us about that vandalism.
KAREN ANDREWS: Yes. Well, look, it was obviously pretty disappointing and unsettling for my staff. So when they arrived at the Electorate Office, they could see the vandalism, where windows had- or doors actually, had been smashed, and writing was on the walls. So, it’s unsettling for them. Look, I’m just grateful that there was no one in the office at the time and no one was hurt. But, it’s unnecessary to behave that way, to vandalise things. It’s a cost to taxpayers because now that has to be repaired and there’s much better ways to resolve differences. So, it was just pretty ordinary behaviour.
NEIL BREEN: It’s a tough issue for you though, Karen Andrews, as Home Affairs Minister. Obviously, we don’t want boats arriving, we don’t want people drowning, paying money to dodgy people smugglers and all that sort of stuff. But, we always talk about migration and being an open country and most of us are here – except for Indigenous Australians – as a result of migration. So, it’s not a simple issue.
KAREN ANDREWS: It’s not a simple issue, but there are ways to come to this country in normal circumstances. Safely, and to come here lawfully, and we are actively working along those lines. But, we do have very strong border protection policies and they have worked very well over the last few years to make sure that we haven’t had the deaths at sea that we had before. I mean, no one wants anyone to be dying at sea. And whilst the figure is 50,000 people who had been arriving here by boat, we know that there’s 1,200 of those who have died at sea, but it could well be more that we just don’t know. And I don’t want that to be happening on my watch. I don’t want people to be drowning at sea. So I’m actually very strong on the point that we are not going to change our border protection policies, and I do feel for people who want to be here, without a doubt, but I don’t want people dying at sea, or dying trying to get to Australia illegally or unlawfully.
NEIL BREEN: This week was a pretty seismic week. I know that we haven’t been getting on well with China lately. Karen Andrews, yourself, the Defence Minister, Peter Dutton, the Foreign Minister, Marise Payne, released a joint statement in coordination with about 38 countries around the world, including the United States, the European Union were all involved, blasting China for its malicious cyber activity, and this was basically the Chinese state and their cyber activity. We know that there’s been these cyber-attacks on businesses all over the world and it went back to January. And now that you are confident enough to say they did it, we are in a cold war with China aren’t we, or we’re very close to it?
KAREN ANDREWS: Look, there’s a range of issues, without a doubt, that have impacted on the relationship between Australia and China. I view these cyberattacks quite separately because they had worldwide implications. We know that there are issues with our trading relationship with China. But I do have to say, we still have a strong trading relationship. We want to make sure that we continue to have a good relationship with China, but we are going to call out behaviours that are wrong and clearly cyber-attacks are, and we aren’t going to compromise on our sovereignty or our national security. So, we will continue to call out these attacks. But in the past, we have also called out attacks and given attribution for these attacks or similar attacks to North Korea, to Iran.
NEIL BREEN: But they’re not as important to us. We rely on China for money. We sell them a lot of coal and we don’t use it ourselves. We’re not building any coal-fired power station because politicians in this country are petrified of coal-fired power when it comes to the electoral ballot. But, we rely on China. They ain’t North Korea. We can say anything we want about North Korea because they’re worth like a peanut to us.
KAREN ANDREWS: Well, look, I understand the point that you’re making. And China is a very, very important trading partner for us. So, yes, whilst we have called out Iran, we have called out North Korea, we have called out Russia, China is a significant trading partner for us. Now, we would like to get that relationship back on track. They are important to us, and we don’t want to further damage that relationship, but we are also going to stand up and say, ‘actually, your actions with cyber-attacks are not appropriate, you shouldn’t be doing it’. Everyone should be acting appropriately in cyberspace. So we can’t not call it out.
NEIL BREEN: Yeah. I’m with you on it. I think we need to call out China no matter how big a trading partner they are of ours, because there’s only one thing they want and that’s world domination. They’re playing up like a ‘two bob watch’; China. Right through the South China Sea, we know what they’re up to there. It’s hard for the average Australian to know or understand what China’s end game is. But the end game isn’t a war of words with China. The end game is something physical, something real.
KAREN ANDREWS: Well, we will always make sure, as a Government, that we are protecting Australians. So, yes, there’s cyber-attacks that we will be dealing with. But we’re also taking strong action in respect of our Defence Forces and making sure that they are properly equipped. So, we are going to be taking the action that we need to protect Australia. That work is well underway and we will continue to make sure that happens. I understand people’s concerns. It is raised with me all the time. They want to be safe; they want to be secure. And that is making sure that we do have strong Defence Forces and we do have strong cyber defences.
NEIL BREEN: Yeah, well, we’re working with the US on that defence. But I got to move on to this. On a separate matter, we spoke to a Sunshine Coast woman yesterday, Ms Thurlow. She’s trying to get her parents back to Australia from South Africa. They went to South Africa a while ago because their parents are sick and their father ended up dying of COVID and everything. But now they’re trying to get back in the middle of this violence. Travelling around the world is impossible at the moment and the price is too much. Had there been many Australians trying to get back from South Africa since these riots started?
KAREN ANDREWS: Look, there are people trying to come back to Australia from all parts of the world. Whilst I don’t know the particular circumstances of this family, I’ve only been able to read what is online at the moment, and I understand that they’ve been there for about six years caring for someone. And of course, the riots that are happening at the moment are absolutely appalling. And I understand why people are trying to get back to Australia. I also understand that the cost of an airfare to get into Australia is exorbitant at the moment.
NEIL BREEN: Terrible.
KAREN ANDREWS: And yeah, there’s availability of flights, availability of quarantine spots when you get here. And that affects the numbers that can come into Australia. And we know that there’s been a halving of the hotel quarantine caps. But it’s an awful situation. We have – in fact – facilitated about 150 flights. We’ve bought over 22,000 Australians back home. So, we will continue to bring back vulnerable Australians as quickly as we possibly can.
I feel for people who are caught overseas and they can’t afford the airfares to come back. And I guess that’s why we’re actually asking people to get in touch with DFAT, because DFAT does have loans available to people who are vulnerable and who need support to get back to Australia. So, the people who are listening, who do have people overseas, they should contact DFAT and have a talk to them about what the options are for loans to be able to afford the airfares to get back into the country. And of course, if they are vulnerable and needing support, DFAT will be able to help them.
NEIL BREEN: You know what drives up the price of flights, Home Affairs Minister Karen Andrews? It’s business travel and people going overseas to do mining jobs, its Channel 7 bringing peanuts out here to be involved in Australian Survivor and all this sort of stuff. Those are the things that are driving the prices up because the big businesses have got the money. Then mum and dad who are stuck overseas can’t compete with that money because they’ll always be outbid by some business who’ll say, ‘I can get these miners back and I’ll pay the price’. The problem is there’s too much travel for work leaving and coming back to Australia.
KAREN ANDREWS: Look, that is without a doubt a contributing factor and States are bringing people in over the hotel quarantine caps and are making applications for that to happen. And on the one hand, as the Federal Government, we actually do want to be supporting people coming into their country, particularly for business and economic opportunities here. So, we do generally support States when they apply for exemptions for people to come in. But we want to make sure that your everyday Australians have access to hotel quarantine opportunities and that they have flights available to them. So, there’s a lot of work yet to be done. I continue to look at what the options are to bring in more people, but it is a case of having to work with the States and Territories. And we do know, like in Queensland, we’ve had the border shut to South Australia as of yesterday with very few cases in South Australia. You go, ‘well, what’s your rationale for doing that? Why are you stopping people from South Australia coming into Queensland? What was the basis for that decision?’ and you never get a clear answer.
NEIL BREEN: Health advice, health advice. But apparently the health advice for regional South Australia is different than it is from regional New South Wales. But I digress. Karen Andrews, Home Affairs Minister, thanks for joining us. Talk to you next week.
KAREN ANDREWS: Take care.