PRESENTER:
This week the Government will ask its Party Room and the Parliament to endorse changes to the anti-terrorism powers in the crimes act to toughen up action against suspected terrorists in Australia. Under the proposal suspects could be questioned for 24 hours, it will be an offence to train with an organisation even if it';s not listed here as a terrorist group. It will also be unlawful for a convicted terrorist to profit from books or movie deals and the Government has also proposed extra resources and agents for ASIO. The Opposition says it';s not proposing to stand in the way of the changes and we';ll hear more from them later. But first to the announcement from the Prime Minister, to discuss the ideas in further detail we';re joined by John Howard, he';s speaking to chief political correspondent Catherine McGrath.
MCGRATH:
Prime Minister, good morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Good morning.
MCGRATH:
Your announcement yesterday, is this a reflection that not enough has been spent, not enough has been done before now?
PRIME MINISTER:
No Catherine, it';s a reflection that strong anti-terrorism laws are always in a way a work in progress, that you can never say you';ve got it absolutely right. One of the things we discovered was that you have a certain amount of dead time when you have to get information from overseas when you';re interrogating somebody and from a practical point of view having an initial period of four years, or four hours rather, and then interrogation up to an additional 20, making a total of 24 will allow more opportunity for interrogation than the existing maximum of 12. But it';s hardly an oppressively long period of time, 24 hours.
MCGRATH:
The New South Wales Police Commissioner Ken Moroney has said in regard to the terrorism battle that we must look at being more hunters not fisherman, the hunting the terrorists, finding them out, rather than mopping up after them, is this a hunting activity or…
PRIME MINISTER:
I don';t think it is either hunting or fishing, it';s necessary. You do need strong intelligence services and that is why we';re putting hundreds of millions of dollars more, we';ve something like doubled the provision for our intelligence services since the 11th of September and when the latest round of recruitment is completed they';ll be at their highest level since even the Cold War. So we recognise that the front line in the fight against terrorism is in fact strong intelligence services, but once you get intelligence, if you can';t do something effectively with it that means interrogate people who may be suspects and interrogate them effectively then that intelligence gathering is wasted.
MCGRATH:
What about ASIO, they';ve been given a virtual blank cheque from you, what about the AFP, is this a reflection of Mick Keelty and his comments?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no it';s got nothing to do with that at all. We have in fact put enormous additional resources into the Australian Federal Police and I am certain that the Australian Federal Police would see the latest amendments of which I spoke yesterday as being very desirable and very necessary.
MCGRATH:
Well do you have any further plans?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well as I say it is a work in progress, as far as the law is concerned, and I don';t rule out further changes to the law but what we propose at the moment is what I announced yesterday and Mr Ruddock will be taking that to our Party Room tomorrow and then we hope to introduce it this week and we would hope that the Federal Opposition would give it its strong support. Quite separately from that the Government has decided, and work has already begun, on producing a White Paper on terrorism which is going to analyse the international dimension of terrorism, the character of it, this is all part of the process of informing the Australian public about the nature of the terrorist threat and why…
MCGRATH:
Well that';s the first we';ve heard about this, what are the resources into it, when would it be delivered?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well I would hope that as work has begun on it already that it will be available within the next few months, it';s just another element of what the Government is doing. This is a long struggle and it';s a struggle that needs different techniques, particularly in the wake of the Madrid bombings, we do not want to be sending signals to anybody that there';s any weakening of resolve, that is why we are so concerned about Mr Latham';s unilateral decision to announce the withdrawal of Australian forces from Iraq if he were to become Prime Minister.
MCGRATH:
Well this White Paper, would it look for example at the expanding role you';ve given the AFP and whether the funding they have…
PRIME MINISTER:
It';s more about the nature of the terrorist threat, Catherine. I don';t rule out some reference to things like that but the purpose of it is to analyse and go into more detail about the character and the origins of the terrorist threat, where it has struck, where it might strike, what the responses ought to be and overall to develop further public understanding and public awareness…
MCGRATH:
Isn';t that the sort of thing that we should know about already, don';t we know that now?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, well I don';t think you can ever know enough about the character of this sort of threat and it';s all part of the responsibility of a government to better and further inform the Australian public.
MCGRATH:
If we don';t know where they';re striking, what they';re doing, what have we been doing for the last couple of years?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well we do know a lot of information but that doesn';t mean you shouldn';t bring it altogether in one particular document and make that available to the public. You can never talk, in a sense you can never inform and explain enough when it comes to the nature of the threat such as this and I';ve certainly seen in the debate in the past week or so about our forces in Iraq, a misunderstanding of the character of what is needed to respond to terrorism, the proposition that';s being advanced by the Opposition is although we have 52,000 Australian Defence Force personnel in Australia we have to immediately return some 900 that we have in Iraq in order to defend Australia, well that just betrays a rather amateurish misunderstanding of the nature of the threat that this country faces.
MCGRATH:
But going back to Ken Moroney, he';s saying that we have to get out there and hunt them, so if you';re collecting papers, collecting general information in what ways…
PRIME MINISTER:
Well you do both, you do both. You can walk and chew gum at the same time, you can have strong police forces, you can have strong intelligence services, and you can also have a proper intellectual understanding and exposition of the character of the terrorist threat.
MCGRATH:
What about…
PRIME MINISTER:
I mean for example one of the common misapprehensions is that terrorism is totally born of poverty. In fact there';s plenty of evidence that many of the people who are involved in terrorism come from extremely affluent backgrounds and they';re driven more by religious ideologies than they are by economic circumstances.
MCGRATH:
Prime Minister, what about the success of the laws you introduced last year, particularly looking at the freezing of funds, out of 400 individuals of groups listed only two freezing actions have taken place, one of them was wrong, one of them was a Melbourne record store rather than a terrorist group. You must be disappointed, why haven';t more been listed?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well that doesn';t mean to say the law was wrong, it just means that over that particular period of time you only had that number of prosecutions. Unfortunately you';re dealing here with an area where you can never, I mean I suppose success or failure is ultimately determined by whether or not you prevent a terrorist attack occurring in this country or whether you prevent a number of attacks occurring, I mean the aim of all these things is to deter, part of deterrence is capturing people, part of deterrence is interrogating people, in getting further information. So all of these things coming together are all part of the fight.
MCGRATH:
However how can only two be frozen over that period of time, that would presumably mean that they';re not active here or the agencies aren';t doing their job.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well the question of whether which of those two, I can';t obviously talk about individual cases and I';m not going to start talking about what internal assessments are of which of those two explanations might be. But the fact that over a measured period of time such of that you only have that number does not for a moment suggest the law has been a failure.
MCGRATH:
Prime Minister, thank you for speaking to AM this morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you.
[ends]