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representatives vote 2019-07-23#1
Edited by
mackay staff
on
2019-08-01 12:01:44
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Title
Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) Bill 2019, Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019 - Second Reading - Agree with the bills' main idea- Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) Bill 2019 and another - Second Reading - Agree with the bills' main idea
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representatives vote 2019-07-23#1
Edited by
mackay staff
on
2019-08-01 12:00:25
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Title
Bills — Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) Bill 2019, Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019; Second Reading- Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) Bill 2019, Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2019 - Second Reading - Agree with the bills' main idea
Description
<p class="speaker">Peter Dutton</p><p>The government will not be accepting the opposition's proposed amendment. The government accepted 17 of the committee's 19 recommendations and noted the remaining two. The two noted recommendations were not accepted in full because to do so would weaken and undermine the TEO scheme and increase risks of terrorism to the community. Of the two noted recommendations, recommendation 11 proposed that the threshold criminal liability for a breach of an offence provision in the bill should be knowledge of. This threshold is above the criminal law standard of recklessness and it would, in effect, make the prosecution of offences under the act almost impossible. Amending these offences to be based on knowledge rather than recklessness would therefore reduce the deterrent effect.</p><p>Likewise, recommendation 12 proposed that a TEO can only be made if the minister reasonably suspects that the person is or has been involved in terrorism-related activities outside Australia. Requiring the minister to suspect the person is or has been involved in terrorism-related activities is a high threshold to achieve. In many cases, the specific conduct of a person's interest in terrorism offshore is unclear. In other cases, agencies may simply not yet have undertaken an assessment of the person before they seek to travel to Australia. Given that the fundamental purpose of the TEO scheme is to ensure that agencies have sufficient time to assess the potential risk of a person of terrorism interest before that person returns to Australia, the bill facilitates this by providing that the minister may make a TEO in one of two circumstances. Firstly, the TEO can be made by the minister to assist in preventing terrorism-related acts from occurring. Secondly, the minister may make a TEO where the person has been assessed by ASIO to be a direct or indirect risk to security for reasons related to politically motivated violence. The government has carefully considered the committee's recommendations and believes it has achieved an appropriate balance. As I stated, for this reason the government will not be supporting the amendment.</p>- The majority voted in favour of the bills' main idea. In other words, they voted to read the bill [for a second time](https://www.peo.gov.au/learning/fact-sheets/making-a-law.html) so that they can now consider it in greater detail.
- ### What do the bills do?
- According to the [bills digest](https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Bills_Legislation/bd/bd1920a/20bd006):
- > *The [Counter-Terrorism (Temporary Exclusion Orders) Bill 2019](https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;query=Id:legislation/billhome/r6361) (the TEO Bill) will introduce two new orders, each of which could be made by the Minister for Home Affairs:*
- >
- > * *a temporary exclusion order (TEO), which may prevent an Australian citizen aged 14 years or older who is overseas from returning to Australia for up to two years at a time and*
- > * *a return permit, under which the Minister may impose conditions on the person’s entry into Australia, including conditions with which the person must comply for up to 12 months after re-entering the country.*
- >
- > *The orders are intended to enable authorities to plan for and manage the return of Australians of counter-terrorism interest (such as individuals who have fought with or otherwise supported a terrorist organisation overseas) and mitigate risks to the community posed by such individuals. Similar orders exist under United Kingdom law and have been made at least nine times since they were introduced in 2015.*
<p class="speaker">Kevin Andrews</p><p>The question is that the amendment be agreed to.</p><p>Question negatived.</p> <p class="speaker">Tony Smith</p><p>The question is that this bill be read a second time.</p><p></p>
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