MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
We’re joined now by the Prime Minister, Tony Abbott. Prime Minister, welcome to AM.
PRIME MINISTER:
Good morning, Michael.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
The repeal of Section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act was one of your election promises. Now you say circumstances have changed. What’s changed?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well we have a very serious home-grown terrorist threat. Anyone who has been looking at the internet images of born and bred Australians holding up the severed heads of Iraqi police and military personnel would know that the last thing we want is to have people like that coming back to our country militarised and radicalised and walking the streets able to do whatever they want here. So, the Government is very concerned about these things. We have promised substantially increased resources to our security and intelligence agencies and we are introducing new legislation to make it easier to charge, to prosecute and to jail people who engage in terrorist activities overseas…
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Sure, sure. We’ll get to that in a minute, but what has that got to do with the changed circumstances around 18C?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I want to crack down on the kind of incitement to terrorism which we are now seeing in our community. I want to crack down on that and the changes to 18C were a needless complication. I want the different communities of Australia to be our friends, not our critics, when it comes to cracking down on terrorism and cracking down on things that aid and abet terrorism and, as I said, the 18C proposal was becoming a needless complication. As Prime Minister, my first responsibility is, at least on the essentials, to maintain the unity of our country.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Is this also an admission in a sense that you failed to bring public opinion along with you, because you were pretty strong on this before?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well it was certainly one of the commitments that we made pre-election, but the circumstances have somewhat changed and sometimes one priority has to give way to a greater priority and the anti-terrorist campaign, the need for stronger counter-terrorism measures, is really absolutely critical right now. The safety of our community has got to be the first priority of government and that’s why the Government has made the announcements that we have.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Have you given any guarantees to people, like the commentator Andrew Bolt, who want 18C repealed that you’ll try again?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well it’s off the table, and look, I had a conversation with Andrew Bolt yesterday and I explained that it was off the table. I knew he would be disappointed…
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Off the table forever?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, it’s off the table – it’s off the table, it’s gone, it’s disappeared. Our intention is to work as effectively as we can with the communities of Australia to ensure that we take a ‘Team Australia’ approach to countering terrorism and to building our nation.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
So it’s off the table for now.
PRIME MINISTER:
No, no – it’s off the table. It’s gone.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
In how many other areas will circumstances change, do you think? I mean, can you give a guarantee for instance that your paid parental leave scheme will be legislated in time for it to start next July?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I can say that this is an absolute signature policy of this Government. We took it to two elections, not just one. Now that doesn’t mean that it hasn’t been adjusted; I adjusted it in the run up to the election and that’s something that happens from time to time. We…
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
So there could be more adjustments coming?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, Michael, I know what you’re doing here. You’re trying to say that nothing is certain, nothing is constant, that all is flux, that the current Government is as bad as the Gillard government, we’re not.
Let me assure your listeners, let me assure you, we are a Government that takes its commitments absolutely seriously. But in the case of Section 18C, one commitment that we gave was running into the rocks given another very, very important commitment that we have and that is to keep our country safe.
The fundamental priority of government is to keep our country safe and that is my absolute concern as Prime Minister: to unite our country and to keep our country safe.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Ok, you’re obviously aware that there’s a lot of criticism about this from civil liberties groups and the like. Why do Australia’s intelligence agencies need even more power to invade our privacy?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well they’re not invading privacy. The metadata that we’re talking about is information which is already kept, and all we’re saying is that the telecommunications providers should continue to keep this organisation.
An interesting, and I think instructive, metaphor is that the metadata is the material on the front of the envelope and the contents of the letter will remain private. All we want is for the telecommunications companies to continue to keep the person sending the information, the person to whom the information is being sent, the time it was sent and the place it was sent from. It’s, as it were, it’s the information on the front of the envelope which is currently kept, has been kept, we want it to continue to be kept; that’s what we’re proposing.
We’re not proposing anything new, we’re just saying that the information that is currently kept by the telecommunications providers should continue to be kept, because all of the expert advice from our counter-terrorist agencies is that this is absolutely critical, not just in the fight against terrorism, but in crime fighting more generally.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Is it going to include our internet search histories?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well my understanding is that if it’s generated by you, it’s content and that won’t be kept. If it’s generated by the service providers, that’s metadata and that will be kept.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Tim Wilson, the Human Rights Commissioner, says this morning that this is a very serious threat to privacy and he’s hardly someone from the Left, he’s a libertarian from your own political side, isn’t he?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well look, I think that’s a fair description. He is a libertarian and good on him. I think it’s important that we have that strand of thinking, that important and honourable strand of thinking represented in our human rights establishment, I think it’s very important. But we’re not asking anyone to do what they don’t already do. We’re simply asking that they continue to do it as technology changes, because this is an important weapon in the fight against terrorism, in the fight against crime more generally. So, this is not a new proposal so to speak; it is simply a proposal that they continue to do what they’ve always done.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
But you will be asking people travelling to areas where terrorist groups are active, like Iraq and Syria and presumably others will come, to prove that they have a legitimate purpose. Now that’s effectively a change, a reversal of the presumption of innocence, isn’t it?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well no, I’d rather say that it’s more the creation of a new offence – the offence of travelling to a place which is well known to be a hotbed of terrorist activity without a legitimate reason. It’s the creation of a new offence. Let’s face it, why would someone who doesn’t have family or humanitarian reasons want to go to Mosul for instance? I mean, why would they? Now, if those…
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
But those people will now have to prove that that’s what they’re doing, won’t they?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, it will be an offence to travel to places which are, on expert advice, designated terrorist areas without a good reason.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
On the cost of data retention, who’s going to pay for that because iiNet for instance is saying it could cost their customers an extra $5 to $10 a month?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well, I don’t know why they would be saying that because this is information which is already kept. It’s information which is currently kept, it’s information which is currently done, it’s embedded in the current price – it’s already factored in to current pricing structures.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Data retention laws like this have been implemented in other parts of the world but they have also been challenged elsewhere. Do you expect that you could face some sort of legal challenge to this?
PRIME MINISTER:
Well as I said, Michael, we’re not asking people to do anything new, we’re just asking people to keep doing what they’re currently doing. We’re just asking them to keep doing what they’re currently funding from the charges that they currently apply. So, look, I have no doubt that the civil libertarian brigade will do their best to stop this, but my responsibility as Prime Minister is to keep our country safe. That’s my responsibility and all of the expert advice from every single counter-terrorist agency is that this information is absolutely essential if we are to maintain our vigilance against terrorist activity.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Alright. Can I just ask you one quick question on MH17 while we’ve got you? The latest from the Ukraine and the Netherlands, are you able to say yet just how many Australian bodies have been retrieved?
PRIME MINISTER:
No, I’m not, because what people need to understand, Michael, is that if you have an explosion, a massive explosion at 33,000 feet and then you have wreckage falling to the ground, the explosion, the deceleration, the decent and the impact does terrible things to bodies. So, we are talking – and I regret to speak this way – we are talking about body parts here and what we need to do is gather all of the human remains and then go through the very painstaking process of matching DNA to work out whose remains we have recovered.
Now, what we’re engaged on at the moment is as thorough and as complete a professional search as we can manage given that this is happening in the middle of a warzone, and I want to commend the professionalism and the courage of the AFP, ADF and DFAT staff involved in this. It is difficult, painstaking work under very, very harsh circumstances, but they’re doing it. We will do it as well as we can. Operation Bring Them Home will be pursued to the best conclusion we can manage under these circumstances because we owe it to the dead to give them the dignity they deserve.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
I mean, the circumstances are very difficult as we’ve been hearing the last couple of days. The fighting continues there. Are you still confident that the mission can be completed?
PRIME MINISTER:
Look, if the place erupts in all-out war, obviously it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to complete our mission, but so far, both sides, particularly the Ukrainians, are observing a ceasefire in and around the site. There is nearby artillery, there was very close fire mortaring over the last couple of days, but our people have been able to continue their work largely unhindered. We will do the best job we can under the difficult circumstances we face.
MICHAEL BRISSENDEN:
Prime Minister, we’ll leave it there. Thank you very much for joining us.
PRIME MINISTER:
Thank you, Michael.
[ends]