SABRA LANE: Joining us now to discuss the terror plot is the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, who is on the line from Perth. Good morning, Mr Turnbull. Welcome back to AM.
PRIME MINISTER: Thank you very much. Good to be with you.
SABRA LANE: It's now more than 24 hours since the nation was alerted to this plot. How close was this group to carrying it out?
PRIME MINISTER: They were advanced. I can't say precisely how far they were advanced at this stage, because that's a matter that's being investigated. But I can say that certainly the police will allege they had the intent and were developing the capability. This is a very fine example of the way in which intelligence was acted upon - very, very swiftly - by our agencies working together. The Government working with our agencies, swiftly, to put measures in place and then to move to a quick investigation and operation as I described with the two police commissioners and the Justice Minister yesterday morning. So there will obviously be more to say over coming days, but right at the moment the investigation is continuing.
But Australians should be reassured that we have the finest security and intelligence agencies in the world. This is now the 13th terrorist plot that has been disrupted by our agencies since 2014.
SABRA LANE: There are conflicting reports, Prime Minister, that this was an alleged bomb plot, or a plan to gas passengers . Can you clarify?
PRIME MINISTER: I won't go into any further detail on that, Sabra. I’ve noticed there's been a number of reports in the press speculating about the method of attack. But again, forgive me, I have to respect the integrity of the investigations. Again, Australians can be assured that we have very fine intelligence services and we moved extremely quickly on this one and - as you can see - with the right outcomes.
SABRA LANE: The information that triggered the arrests came from an overseas intelligence agency. How concerned are you that on home soil, it appears that our agencies weren't aware of it?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, I wouldn't comment on that. Again, I'm not going to go into details and I think Australians will understand the importance of me being circumspect about the sources of intelligence. But I just want to make this observation, and I've made it many times in recent days: Intelligence is a function of collaboration. We cooperate with other agencies within Australia. We cooperate with members of the community, with business. We cooperate with international agencies. So it is absolutely seamless. You need to be picking up pieces of information - they may seem unrelated - stitching them together, making connections, creating that fabric that then leads you, in this case, to an alleged conspiracy.
So, you know, we have very fine intelligence services. But, every nation, every nation depends on the work of others. We're all in this together and this is one of the key themes of the G20. We are intensifying, all the time, our collaboration with other countries and other agencies. Because, you know, the threat, there are no borders; I mean, nowhere is far away from anywhere else nowadays. In an age of the internet and the age of social media and the age of over-the-Internet messaging applications, Syria is not a long way away from Sydney.
So that's the criticality of it, seamless cooperation.
SABRA LANE: On that theme of the interconnectedness, are you able to tell us whether this group was being guided by someone overseas?
PRIME MINISTER: Again, I won't go into further commentary on that at this point, but I can assure you it was, as the Federal Police Commissioner said yesterday, it'll be alleged that this was an Islamist extremist terrorist motivation.
SABRA LANE: How long will the additional checks at airports be required, or will they become a permanent feature for travellers?
PRIME MINISTER: They'll be required for as long as the threat is assessed as requiring them. I've been discussing these matters this morning with the Federal Police, with ASIO and we continue to discuss them with our Office of Transport Security, of course, who act on the advice of ASIO. We will be working closely with all of these agencies.
This has been a very, very, very rapid response. I am very proud of the professionalism and the dedication of our security and intelligence agencies.
But just over the last few days we've seen, since last week, we have seen a rapid response, as I said, seamless cooperation, integration. The way in which all of the agencies, including with the state police, are pulling together, to ensure that we move swiftly on this, on this threat. And at the same time of course, ensure that they gather all the evidence to deliver successful prosecutions, because clearly disruption is a critically important objective, but also we want people that are planning conspiracies like this to be prosecuted and be imprisoned.
SABRA LANE: Prime Minister, security experts have told AM that they're worried about vulnerabilities in freight and catering services to airports. Do those things worry you?
PRIME MINISTER: Well as I always say, Sabra, there is no place for ‘set and forget’. I am constantly seeking to improve and optimise our security arrangements. That's why I'm bringing our domestic security agencies at the federal level into one Home Affairs department, so as to make that close integration and cooperation of which I just spoke, even closer. Now, as far as airports are concerned, we have very robust security measures in place, including the vetting of people who work at airports. Changes that have been put in place that we're talking about at the moment, the changes that we're asking passengers – and again, I want to thank the travelling public for their forbearance, having to get to the airport earlier and wait longer to get through security - but all those changes have been put in place on the advice of ASIO and the Federal Police and the Office of Transport Security. So we are constantly reviewing our security measures.
Again, my message to the agencies that work for the Federal Government and to all security agencies around the nation, is that there is no place for complacency; you have to be constantly improving what we're doing.
So, that's my mission. You can see that I'm delivering that, whether it's in new legislation, whether it is in new resources - everything I'm doing every day, is designed to keep Australians safe.
SABRA LANE: Prime Minister, Labor has detailed a policy to crack down on disbursements of some family trusts. It might well prove to be popular with the electorate, will you match the policy?
PRIME MINISTER: Well, Bill Shorten doesn't have any policies for jobs, or any policies for investment. He's got just one attack on business after another. He hasn't provided any details for this crackdown he's talking about. It's just -
SABRA LANE: On the substance itself though -
PRIME MINISTER: Well, Sabra, you say "on the substance itself". Mr Shorten has provided no substance. All he provides every day is another outburst about inequality and the targets for his outbursts are invariably hard-working Australians in small businesses. He wants to make it harder for small businesses to invest -
SABRA LANE: Well sorry for my skepticism, but the Coalition previously derided Labor on its taxation policies on superannuation and tobacco and yet you ended up unveiling your own policies.
PRIME MINISTER: Well Sabra, let's just focus on what he's talking about; he wants to increase the tax on small businesses. He's now threatening changes to tax on trusts - which again, he's got to provide the details - but it's perfectly clear that most of those affected will be small businesses. He has got not one policy to encourage anyone to invest a dollar. When your fellow ABC journalist, Fran Kelly asked him about what he had to do to encourage employment and investment, he started talking about investing in public transport. Well, that's a very worthy objective and we have plenty of programs to do that too. But what does he have to encourage business? Nothing.
He wants to increase taxes on business. He wants to reduce the opportunity for people to invest and get ahead. Whereas, for our part, what are we doing? We are reducing business taxes. We've reduced personal income tax on middle-income Australians by increasing the tax-free threshold from 80, the second tax threshold up to $87,000, before it begins. That has, as you know, reduced tax for 500,000 middle-income Australians, that was a vital reform. We're also reducing and right now taxes have been reduced for small and business businesses. Bill Shorten wants to increase all those.
SABRA LANE: Okay, Mr Turnbull, thank you very much for joining AM this morning.
PRIME MINISTER: Thank you so much.