ALAN JONES:
Prime Minister, good morning.
PRIME MINISTER:
Morning, Alan.
ALAN JONES:
Prime Minister, I note today that the RAAF F/A Super Hornets have conducted combat missions over Iraq. So, in other words, our men and even women are over there and I saw you at the War Memorial yesterday honouring ANZACs and people who’ve served our country in difficult times in the past and you then have this celebration I think of the quality and courage of these people. Do you understand, therefore, and yesterday this board here was on fire, the unyielding anger that an outfit Hizb ut-Tahrir – regarded as a terrorist outfit in other countries – is going to host a public lecture in Lakemba this Friday at seven o’clock?
Now this is a crowd who say on their website America has initiated yet another war, rounded up its puppets and allies to attack the Syrian revolution, while using intervention in Iraq as a convenient excuse. Now this wouldn’t have been tolerated at the outset of World War One and World War Two, but this mob are banned in virtually all Arab nations in the Middle East – Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, they’re banned Tunisia and Libya and Turkey. They’re regarded as such a threat that they’re banned in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan which are already cauldrons of extremism; banned in the former Soviet states in central Asia. Since February 2003 even banned in Russia. Banned in Germany on account of their anti-Semitism; banned in the Netherlands. Are you before Friday as Prime Minister of Australia going to proscribe this movement? That is put them outside the protection of the law, reject them as dangerous and exile them?
PRIME MINISTER:
Alan, I understand your frustration and anger and I’m frustrated and angry myself. Under existing law we can’t ban them, we’ve looked at banning them, but we were advised under existing law we can’t do it. The law is changing – at the moment we can only ban organisations that engage in terrorism. Under the law that we are bringing through the Parliament hopefully before the end of the year, it will be an offence to promote terrorism, not just to engage in terrorism, but to promote terrorism and then I suppose we have to have another look at Hizb ut-Tahrir to see whether they fall under the definition of promoting terrorism. I’ll need to get fresh legal advice once the law has changed, but there is no doubt they are an organisation that campaigns against Australian values, that campaigns against Australian interests. They are a thoroughly objectionable organisation and the thing that I do want to do swiftly because I don’t believe there is any need for a law change to do this, the thing that I want to do swiftly – I’m sorry it hasn’t yet been done – but the thing that I now want to do swiftly is put in place a system whereby these preachers of hate, such as the individual who I believe is the top draw speaker on Friday night, these preachers of hate are not allowed into Australia because we just don’t need them.
ALAN JONES:
They’re the enemy.
PRIME MINISTER:
By all means let Australians who want to say stupid things say stupid things, but there’s no point importing troublemakers from overseas to stir people up and that’s what I want to see in place very, very swiftly. We are changing to law that will make it easier to ban organisations like Hizb ut-Tahrir. But before that even we should have a system in place which red cards these hate preachers and stops them coming to Australia.
ALAN JONES:
Just so that you know, one of my listeners has said it’s beyond belief and logic that freedom of speech should be extended and afforded to the enemy in times of war. Hizb ut-Tahrir are not our equal, they are our enemy and the enemy is well and truly within and it appears to be walking all over us. People are angry, you understand that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, Alan, I am angry and frustrated myself. I am sorry we have not red carded these hate preachers before now, but it will happen and it will happen quickly.
ALAN JONES:
Just on this whole business and I note now the border between Turkey and Syria has most probably been lost to these people. I don’t want to canvass that with you today, but the public support for what you’ve done and how you’ve done it I think is overwhelming. I just wonder whether there isn’t a lot of legislation going through the Parliament that people don’t really understand or the consequences of which aren’t fully explained. For example, I’ve heard no one talk about the Crimes Act 1914 Section 24AA and it says that a person shall not, “do any act or thing with intent to overthrow the Constitution of the Commonwealth by revolution or sabotage or to overthrow by force or violence the established Government of the Commonwealth or of a state of a proclaimed country”, that would require Iraq or Syria to be proclaimed. And it goes onto to say, “or do any act preparatory to levying war against a proclaimed country, assist by any means whatever, with intent to assist a proclaimed enemy of a proclaimed country, instigate a person to make an armed invasion of a proclaimed country”. So all it would require government to do would be to proclaim certain countries, like if it wanted Iraq or Syria or whatever, and then a person would be guilty of treachery who’s sought to overthrow by force or violence the established government of that particular country. And it says they’d be guilty of an indictable offence and that’s imprisonment for life. Why haven’t we heard more about the powers of the Crimes Act and the section which is headed treachery?
PRIME MINISTER:
That’s a very good question, Alan, and I don’t know the answer to it, I rely on – as you can imagine – on advice from my officials and this is not a section of law which has been brought to my attention, but now that you’ve raised it.
ALAN JONES:
24AA.
PRIME MINISTER:
I will ask them to look at it and see whether that can’t be deployed against people like Hizb ut-Tahrir because, Alan, I assure you and I assure your listeners, I am angry and frustrated about this as well. I looked at this in opposition; I was told that there was little we could do about Hizb ut-Tahrir under existing laws. We are changing the laws but we are still getting these preachers of hate coming into our country. I don’t like it, I don’t want it. We don’t want to import troublemakers here who will stir up division in our society, who will promote hatred, who will effectively promote terrorism – although they might deny that they’re doing that. What they are promoting is the ideology which spawns terrorism, that’s what they’re doing, they are promoting the ideology which spawns terrorism and frankly it is absolutely and utterly unacceptable. We can’t always stop Australians from doing it, but we certainly should stop people coming to this country and exploiting and abusing our hospitality to stir up trouble like this.
ALAN JONES:
Listeners are also asking why we’re preventing people from going to Syria and Iraq. They say why not let them go and don’t let them back in.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, again, it’s a very understandable reaction because when people are up to no good the thought is let them do their evil overseas and let’s be rid of them, understand that. If they are Australian citizens, they do have a right to return to this country and if they have no other citizenship we can’t render them stateless by taking away their Australian citizenship. The problem with letting them go is that if they survive and if they want to come back, we can’t stop them coming back and they’ll come back radicalised, militarised, brutalised. They’ll be much more capable of doing us harm coming back as experienced terrorists than before as – dare I say it – inexperienced would be terrorists.
ALAN JONES:
Is there a mixed message though now being sent out? You said at the outset and most Australians agreed with you. Life as normal, get on with your life and I’ve said here on this programme, look we leave this to the Government, our security and intelligence to date have done a wonderful job, our Government seem to be on top of all of this, leave it to the Government which is I think the famous words that Bill Clinton issued when we had that 9/11 and he said we must support the President. So get on with your life and yet army personnel are being told not to wear their uniforms and now students, very impressionable teenagers, told not to wear their cadet gear. Now, given that education comes from the Latin to lead, aren’t these young people being led in the wrong direction? The Prime Minister’s saying get on with your life, be normal, security and intelligence will look after things, now we’ve got teenagers frightened to wear their cadet gear.
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don’t want anyone to be frightened to do what’s normal in Australia. I can’t absolutely promise that under every circumstance everyone will be safe; no one can promise that there won’t be a car accident on the way to work; no one can promise that there won’t be an accident at work; no one can promise that there won’t be an act of God at some point in time. But people should be able to go about their daily lives here in this country, safe in the knowledge that we are a peaceful, tolerant, broadly happy country.
ALAN JONES:
So say something to these kids about their cadet gear, what are you saying to them?
PRIME MINISTER:
I don’t know who has issued warnings about not wearing uniforms…
ALAN JONES:
Well letters have been written to parents.
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, I haven’t written any such letters and my advice, which you’ve correctly cited Alan, is that people should go about their normal life because what terrorists want to do is scare us out of being ourselves and we should be proud of who we are, we should be proud of what we do. We should be grateful and thankful that we live in a country such as Australia and we should be proud of the Australian uniform, whatever it is because it’s a uniform that stands for decency, for tolerance, for justice, for freedom and these are things that we should be proud of.
ALAN JONES:
It’s very difficult for people to understand and I’m sure difficult for you to understand where this might end, but at the same time all we can do it be trained for whatever contingency we are to meet. Forgive me for asking you again, because I’ve spoken to you many times on this programme about the Oakey Army Base. This was designated in World War Two as a national piece of infrastructure designed in the training and preparation of Australia’s commitment to war. It’s been in the very recent past responsible for training Black Hawk helicopter pilots, Singaporean Black Hawk helicopter pilots, and you’ve told me many times on this programme that that airspace was sacrosanct. Julia Gillard as prime minister denied a private millionaire Wagner access to that airspace so that he could make his airport, the construction of which has been secured without any compensation to the people concerned, no environmental impact statement, no noise impact statement, no community impact statement, no nothing and you’ve heard about this many times before. But you’ve told me the airspace belonging to the Oakey Army Base was sacrosanct – your word. Julia Gillard was approached as prime minister to seed that airspace to Wagner, she denied that approval and indeed Stephen Smith, her defence minister, wrote a letter denying access to that airport. Ms Gillard was sacked as prime minister between the time she was sacked and you were sworn in as Prime Minister, this fellow Wagner in Toowoomba who seems to have bent every ethical rule has access to now 40 per cent of the airspace at the Oakey Army Base for nothing. This seems to be in defiance of a Prime Ministerial statement by you that that airspace is sacrosanct and it will not happen, in defiance of the national interest, how could a valuable piece of airspace in this critical time be handed over to some bloke for nothing?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Alan, I’m not sure what the property rights in airspace are, so I’m not sure whether airspace is something that is sold. I’ll put that to one side. What I was very anxious about was anything that interfered with the ability of this base to serve our operational purposes. Now, as you know from the many conversations we’ve had on and off air on this subject, I think that this is a whole process which leaves a very great deal to be desired. I think that’s the best we can say about this – the process left much to be desired. The advice I got in Government as opposed to being in opposition was that the changes that were made to Oakey airspace to accommodate the Wellcamp Airport were changes that would not compromise the operation of the base. Now, I was surprised and I questioned officials on this. I’ve gone back to them several times on this, but the official advice I’ve got is that the operation of Wellcamp Airport is not going to compromise in any significant way the operation of Oakey Air Base because what I said before I say again, Alan, the operational requirements of our Defence Forces must take precedence over other proposed changes. But the advice I’ve got after repeated probing is that Wellcamp and Oakey can coexist without compromising Oakey’s operations. Now I know that’s a disappointment to the people…
ALAN JONES:
It may be tainted advice – is there a thin edge of the wedge here? Can you guarantee that the Oakey Army Base won’t be sold?
PRIME MINISTER:
I can say that we have no plans to do that, in fact quite a lot of money has been invested in Oakey in recent times – there are a lot of new facilities that have been built there.
ALAN JONES:
It’s beyond belief though that this accommodation can be made. Why would Stephen Smith and Julia Gillard have said no and as you know Stephen Smith wrote a letter – have you sighted that letter?
PRIME MINISTER:
I’ve certainly seen advice from Stephen Smith where he said that it shouldn’t go ahead – I’ve certainly seen that.
ALAN JONES:
Just before we go, Ukraine seems to be forgotten – where are the bodies of those poor people murdered in MH17?
PRIME MINISTER:
Over 200 passengers have been positively identified, my understanding is that there is still a small number of the passengers who have not yet been identified and for whom it seems there are no remains and that is why it is important to get back onto the site and try to conduct a very thorough professional search. Unfortunately, we have to wait until the site is safer then it currently is because we wouldn’t want to add to the casualties, add to the 298 people who were murdered with more deaths, and that is what we are waiting for – a safer site.
ALAN JONES:
It is 7.30 but I will just stay, if you wouldn’t mind, for a couple of minutes Prime Minister, just two things. You would be aware, and you would be getting advice every day, that experts around the world are now arguing that without a substantial ground campaign we won’t be able to win against the Islamic State mob. Are there any circumstances under which Australia would, down the track, be contributing to such a ground campaign?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Alan, as you know we have got a Special Forces team of up to 200 that are ready to go. They’ll be performing advise and assist missions with the Iraqi Security Forces, with the best of the Iraqi Security Forces, and we will be in a better position to judge what might be desirable down the track once we are in there. So, we have got an absolutely crystal clear overall mission to disrupt and degrade ISIL inside Iraq – that is what we are doing – disrupting and degrading ISIL inside Iraq. We have got a very clear way to do this by flying combat air patrols over Iraq, which we are doing, and by advising and assisting some of the better units of the Iraqi Armed Forces. Let’s put that mission into practice, fully into practice. Let’s see how it goes. What we can’t do is save Iraq, outsiders can’t save Iraq, only in the end Iraqis can save Iraq. We want to help them to help themselves – that’s what we want to do.
ALAN JONES:
Just finally, has your attention been drawn – I mean this is pretty terrifying stuff – to this document from Islamic State’s highly secretive six man war Cabinet, picked up by an Iraqi Special Forces unit during a raid in March. It is thought to be a policy manifesto prepared for senior members of Islamic State and is now being examined by western security officials. They say it is authentic and it offers an insight into the ambitions of this mob but basically they say their aim is to get hold of nuclear and chemical weapons with the help of Russia. What they are proposing is offering the Kremlin access to gas fields that Islamic State currently control in Iraq, provided Russia in return gives up, and I quote the words, “Iran and its nuclear programmes and hands over its secrets.” Now, a security source familiar with the document said, and I quote, “when you place their future aspirations against their current achievements this document which proposes to be the groups manifesto does stop and make you think.”
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Alan, look, I am not aware of this document.
ALAN JONES:
It is supposed to have been written by this bloke, Abdulla Ahmed Al Mashhadani. You know, he is the head of the Islamic Cabinet, Islamic State Cabinet apparently. Basically, they want chemical and nuclear weapons.
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, they will get their hands on whatever they can and they will use it for evil. I mean this is a death cult – a death cult that has declared war against the world and whatever trouble they can create, whatever mayhem they can wreck, they will. That is why it is so important that it be defeated – absolutely vital that it be defeated.
ALAN JONES:
It’ll last years won’t it?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, Alan, no one is saying that this is going to be a short job, no one is saying that Australian forces will be home by Christmas, so to speak, no one is saying that. What we are saying is that outsiders, such as us, can’t do it on our own. There needs to be a mobilisation of all decent people, including decent people in the Middle East, to bring about the defeat of the ISIL death cult. The encouraging thing is that we have got not just US air strikes, we have had Jordanian, Saudi, Emirati, Bahraini, Qatari combat aircraft join these US missions over Syria. We have got British, French and now Australian war planes over Iraq to assist the United States. There is a broad coalition forming here because ISIL are everyone’s enemy – they are everyone’s enemy – and the first people they are coming for is the current leadership of all the countries of the Middle East.
ALAN JONES:
Finally, I note, coming to home, an intelligence report has now told us that staff from the Save the Children Foundation at Nauru’s detention centre have been accused of encouraging and coaching self-harm in order to achieve evacuation to Australia. Now, this is Australia’s largest government-funded aid organisation, Save the Children Foundation. Ten employees have been removed from Nauru by the Department of Immigration and an intelligence report alleges some staff have been involved in a propaganda campaign to manufacture conditions to embarrass you and your government. The fabrications include manufactured cases of sexual abuse against children by security staff, you had that Green Senator Sarah Hanson-Young claiming children had been sexually abused by guards at the centre. The intelligence report refutes those claims, alleging some Save the Children staff had helped manufacture situations for political purposes. What are you doing about that?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, my understanding, Alan, is that the staff who are suspected of having been involved in this kind of fabrication have been removed and that is as it should be. Certainly, this is an organisation which has always had a high reputation and that is why it was involved in providing these services in Nauru but where people have acted unprofessionally, and it seems that there has been an abuse of trust here, they’re dealt with and that is how it should be.
ALAN JONES:
Just before you go, how much is this going to cost – the deploying of troops to the Middle East? Who is going to pay?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, in the end Australians taxpayers will pay. That is what happens when Australian Forces are deployed Australian taxpayers pay, but the point I make Alan, is that this is an investment not just in international security, it is an investment in our national security because at least 60 Australians are fighting with this group and its allies. At least a hundred Australians are supporting this group and its allies and if we can disrupt and degrade, if we can defeat this group, obviously we remove something which is causing all sorts of problems here at home as well as terrible, terrible problems abroad.
ALAN JONES:
Prime Minister, thank you for your time and I think we all wish you well. These are difficult times to be in a position of leadership in any country of the West. Thank you for your efforts. They’re tiring I am sure and I hope you know that people appreciate them.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you so much, Alan.
ALAN JONES:
Tony Abbott, the Prime Minister of Australia.
[ends]