Australian Security Intelligence Organisation Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2025
Senator McKIM (Tasmania—Australian Greens Whip) (12:53): It's been a pretty dire week here in the Senate, and I dare say many of the people impacted by the events in this chamber this week would describe it as diabolical. We have got disabled people punched down on. We've seen pathetically weak gambling laws rammed through this place, and, now, we are seeing, again under a guillotine—the third in three days—a bill that massively increases the power of the intelligence and security apparatus in this country.
What's the common theme between all these three things—punching down on disabled people, passing gambling laws drafted at the behest of the big gambling corporations and creating extraordinary new powers for the security industrial complex in this country? What is the common theme? That's right—the so-called parties of government in this place.
Let me give a warning to the parties of government. Firstly, if you rise to the head of a police force, a security group or an intelligence organisation like ASIO, you are primarily concerned with things like law and order, security and safety. That is an obvious statement.
But let's be very clear about what our job is here in this place. Our job is to question when we get asked whether new powers are necessary. Our job is to ask the question.
When we get told by the head of ASIO or the head of the AFP or the head of any of the other myriad law and order and security organisations that exist in our country that we have to give them new powers, our job is not to say, 'Of course, here you go,' as the parties of government do every single time in this place. Our job is to question the need and to balance a genuine need that people be kept as safe as possible in this country with the fundamental rights and freedoms that we used to go to war and fight and bleed and die to protect.
That is our job in this place, and that job and that responsibility is being abrogated, as it is so regularly, by the so-called parties of government in this place. So, of course, here the Greens find ourselves yet again standing for fundamental rights and freedoms—in the complete absence, I might add, of a charter or a bill of rights in this place, in the complete absence of the rights of citizens of this country being enshrined in the Constitution, which is where they actually should be enshrined in a country like Australia.
In the complete absence of those things, it is left to the Greens, as we do every single time, to run the balance argument, to run the reasonable argument. I want to associate myself with the words of Senator Shoebridge in his excellent contribution to this debate, as well as Senator Hodgins-May's and Senator Faruqi's excellent words. We should be really scared about what these powers allow ASIO to do.
You can be literally dragged off the street for secret questioning, no crime required. You don't get a lawyer of your choice and you don't get a right to silence. This can apply to children as young as 14—kids!
They get dragged out when they're walking home from school and dragged into ASIO for questioning. They don't get a lawyer that they might choose or that their family might choose. In fact, they may well not be allowed to tell their family what's happened.
Certainly if you're an adult you won't be able to tell your family what happened. It'll be a crime to tell your family what happened, where you were and what you were asked. These are draconian, coercive questioning powers.
It is a disgrace that in a so-called liberal democracy like Australia we are even thinking about creating and extending powers like these. Of course, the Prime Minister, back in the day, was right when he opposed these coercive questioning powers when they were first introduced and said: Its provisions— the provisions that underpin the provisions that we are debating today— potentially allow for the mistreatment of ethnic minorities, the suppression of dissent and the detaining and investigation of wholly innocent Australians.
He was right about that. But I'll tell you what—the office of Prime Minister empowers some people and diminishes others, and this current prime minister is someone who has been abjectly diminished by the office of Prime Minister. He has shrunk in office, as Senator Shoebridge said.
He's a deeply unimpressive Prime Minister. A mediocre— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Grogan ): Senator Shoebridge, I'll ask you to be mindful of reflecting on other members of this parliament. Senator McKIM: On the basis that you were directing that towards Senator McKim— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: My apologies.
Senator McKIM: I will indeed consider that. We need to understand what some of the detail is in this legislation. Let's be clear about who can sign the warrants here.
The warrants can be signed by the Attorney-General. The warrants don't have to be signed by a judge, as is overwhelmingly usual in our justice system. To make the obvious point, the Attorney-General—so that I don't fall foul of reflecting on a particular person I'll say any Attorney-General—is a political appointment.
The Attorney-General is a political appointment made by the Governor-General on the advice of the Prime Minister. That's how we end up with an Attorney-General. They're not an independent person who is going to dispassionately and reasonably apply the law; they're a political appointment.
And yet it's the Attorney-General who can sign warrants. The Attorney-General—give me a break! We've seen what attorneys-general have done over the years.
Without even casting my mind very far back, we can look at the case of Witness K—a prime example. We can look at the case of Mr Collaery—another example. Senator Shoebridge interjecting— Senator McKIM: And, as Senator Shoebridge reminds me, more recently Mr David McBride.
And what about when we bugged the Timor-Leste embassy, which of course gave rise to the circumstances that Witness K and Mr Collaery found themselves in. Australian history is literally littered with examples of attorneys-general behaving in a highly questionable ways. Senator Shoebridge interjecting— Senator McKIM: Yes.
As Senator Shoebridge also reminds me, they're doing the government's dirty work. Our history is littered with it. And then you bring in a bill that's going to let the Attorney-General sign a warrant.
They don't have to suspect that you did anything wrong; they could just be putting the shakes on you. Shaking you down, squeezing you for information. This is absolutely police state stuff, surveillance state stuff.
And people know that they are living in a surveillance capitalist society where you get surveilled by corporations like Coles when you go to the supermarket. They've got a contract with Palantir, one of the most evil corporations that exists anywhere in the world—one of the most dangerous corporations that exists anywhere in the world. They know they're going to get surveilled, that digital recognition software will be deployed.
They get you in the aisles; they get you in the check-outs. People understand that's happening in the capitalist parts of our society, the big corporate controlled parts of our society, and people need to understand it's happening with regard to the state. Do you remember the absolute uproar when a former Labor government tried to introduce the Australia card?
How far down the road to a surveillance state have we travelled since those days? Quite rightly, Australians back then were concerned about the government centralising information that the state held on individual people. There was an absolute uproar about it.
Well, here we find ourselves, because of the curtailment of these debates by the so-called parties of government, where these laws are being smuggled through this parliament. There was no committee, no public inquiry and no opportunity for these laws to be scrutinised even in the committee stage of the Senate. Here we are, again, where fundamental rights and freedoms that Australians, fought, bled, killed and died to protect back in the day, including family members of mine and ancestors of mine who died in wars against totalitarian and fascist states.
Here we are becoming one. It's pathetic. It's mostly pathetic from the so-called parties of government in this place, where we have a Labor Party that has completely lost its way, captured by fossil fuel interests, captured by Zionist interests, captured by the Five Eyes security— Senator Paterson: Really?
In the middle of an antisemitism crisis? Senator McKIM: Mate, you're captured by Zionist interests as well. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT ( Senator Grogan ): Senator Kovacic.
Senator Kovacic: Those remarks must be withdrawn. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Feel free to put the point of order. My issue is the disorder—yelling across the chamber.
Senator Kovacic: My point of order is on the comments made by Senator McKim. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator McKim, will you please withdraw those comments? Senator McKIM: I withdraw the comment I made about Senator Paterson— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: No, I don't think that was quite the point.
Senator McKIM: Well, I don't know what the point was. Senator Kovacic: It was both. It was in relation to what is occurring now in our country and the comments in relation to Senator Paterson.
Senator McKIM: I have withdrawn the comments made in relation to Senator Paterson. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Senator McKim— Senator McKIM: I'm entitled to say that Zionist interests— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: You are, but you are entitled to have an orderly debate within this chamber, and it is my role here to keep that order. There have been wide-ranging comments so far this morning, some of which have been offensive to others.
You are entitled to your opinion, and you are entitled to continue on this debate, but I will ask you to do it in a respectful and inoffensive fashion. If you can withdraw those comments, please. Senator McKIM: I have withdrawn the comments I made in regards to Senator Paterson.
I'll leave it there. I will make— The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: I feel like you are completely missing the point intentionally. Senator Paterson.
Senator Paterson: In the interest of being helpful, to assist Senator McKim so he has the time to reflect on this, we have a royal commission right now into antisemitism. Standing up in this chamber and accusing other people of being 'captured by Zionist interests' is a dangerous and reckless thing to do. I encourage him, in the spirit of good debate in this chamber, to reflect on the consequences of language like that.
The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Thank you, Senator Paterson, this is not a further debate. I am conscious that you have time left and you have a right to continue your contribution. For the orderly conduct of this chamber, I would ask you to consider withdrawing those comments so that we can proceed.
Senator McKIM: If I might address the point of order, then, if you're going to make such a ruling. I'm not certain what standing order Senator Paterson is alleging that I've broken— Senator Paterson: Good judgement, class, taste, decency. Senator McKIM: Good judgement?
I'm not aware of that being part of the standing orders. I'm happy to reflect on what Senator Paterson has asked me to reflect on. The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT: That would be much appreciated.
Senator McKIM: In the very short time I have left, because of the dirty deal between the Labor Party and the coalition—by the way, I will provide the minister with two or three minutes before the 1.15 guillotine because I am genuinely curious at how the indefensible is going to be defended by this minister or at least the attempt to defend the indefensible will be rolled out.
I will make the point again: these are bad laws, they're bad for the country, they're bad for the values—they offend the values—of this country, and they are bad for the people of Australia. They not only offend the values of this country now, they offend the values that we used to go to war for and fight to protect and enhance. Here we find ourselves actually becoming the very thing that we fought against for so long in this country.
The Labor Party should stand condemned for being captured by so many vested interests in this place, including the military industrial complex. The coalition should and does stand condemned for the same thing. The Australian Greens will proudly vote against these terrible provisions.
We will proudly stand up for the people of Australia against a political duopoly that is determined to turn this country into a police state and a surveillance state.