Mr CIOBO (11:59 AM) —When I gave my first speech in this chamber, I spoke about the difference between liberal democracy and social democracy. I spoke about my adherence to the liberal democracy philosophy and how it stood and I stood in revulsion of social democracy. The other side of the chamber takes the view that the collective stands above the individual; I take the view that the individual stands above the collective. In large part, the debate today on the Criminal Code Amendment (Hamas and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba) Bill 2003 and the debate in the broader context of how we as a liberal democratic nation face up to the threat of international terrorism is played out along those same lines.

We hear the sophistic arguments of the ALP—and their claim that they are the ones concerned about the individual. We just heard the member for Denison, who represents the hard Left of the ALP, talk about how he takes the view that it is all about providing protection for the individual and about what motivates the ALP when they put forward their argument that it should not be this parliament but rather a member of the judiciary that makes determinations about whether to proscribe an organisation.

To expand on this a little further and to put it into the context of the debate that this parliament and other parliaments of Western democracies around the world are currently grappling with, it comes down to this: on September 11—and it has almost become a cliche now—the face of modern liberal democracy as we know it changed, and on October 12 with the terrorist bombings in Bali it changed in our own backyard. The responsibility that we as a government must face up to now is how to respond to the changing paradigm—changing from the threat that previously existed against our country from rogue nation states to the modern-day threat. The modern-day threat is no longer, as it was in much of the last century, the scourge of nation states with rogue armies; rather, the modern day threat is cells of maybe five, 10, 50 or 100 individuals who are motivated to wreak havoc. How do we deal with those individuals that would like to make the most of the freedoms we have in liberal democracies like Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom and that exploit those liberties in a way that maximises their ability to rain havoc on the people of those countries?

In the main, history demonstrates that the people who live in Western democracies are peace loving, but we will always stand firm in the face of those nations or those individuals that would seek to threaten our existence and our way of life. We will also stand firm in the face of those nation states that support those individuals that would threaten our way of life. That, in essence, underscores in large part the reason I was proud to be part of a government that took a very principled and solid stand against the Taliban in Afghanistan and against Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq.

The great irony in this debate is the fact that we saw during the presidential addresses two weeks ago members of the Greens—of the hard Left—come into this chamber and wear on their lapels the faces of the two detained Australians. In this particular instance, I have some sympathy for the argument that these people should not be detained for two years without charge—I do have sympathy for that argument, and the Prime Minister has sympathy for that argument as well. Indeed, the Prime Minister raised the issue with the US President. But what a great shame that those on the left of the political spectrum do not have the same temerity when it comes to having lapel pins for the several hundred thousand Iraqis that have been murdered by Saddam Hussein's regime or, perhaps, for the hundreds of women in Iraq that were gang raped under Saddam Hussein's regime. I never ever hear the Greens make comments about those things. I never ever hear the hard Left of the ALP talk about some of the fundamental values that we on this side of the chamber are prepared to stand up for and about which we are prepared to say throughout the world, `We will not turn a blind eye to that kind of disgraceful behaviour by rogue nations and by totalitarian leaders.'

There were people that took the Left's point of view in World War II. There were the appeasers. Highlighted among them was Neville Chamberlain. But I say thank goodness for Winston Churchill, because were it not for Winston Churchill we might never have risen up to face the fight against the Nazis. And who can say whether, had we risen to the occasion earlier, the Nazis might not have been prevented from causing the kind of havoc they caused—havoc they had ample time to cause while the appeasers of the Centre Left stood around saying, `What we need is more time. What we need is to be more reasonable people. What we need is to sit down at the table and to talk these things through.' Sometimes decisions have to be made. That is the reason the Australian people elect governments and it is the whole reason that governments in liberal democracies across the world are elected: to make decisions.

We start to see again the philosophy of the ALP, the Greens and the Democrats and their inherent inability to ever make a decision. We see that played out in the argument that is before the chamber today. Principally we see it when the Leader of the Opposition comes into this chamber to speak about the way in which he believes executive proscription is the wrong thing and how, according to the opposition, the right thing is judicial proscription. The logic of this fails me. It absolutely fails me. Apparently, if you take the opposition's argument, it is being more responsible to the Australian people to have decisions about which terrorist organisations are proscribed made by an unaccountable, unreviewable judiciary than it is to have those decisions made by a member of the executive. A member of the executive is someone who comes into this chamber and is subject to question time in every sitting, a member of the executive must be re-elected by his constituency in order to come once again into this chamber and a member of the executive is subject to the full review and spotlight of the press gallery, which is full on a regular basis. Apparently, it is not enough that the people taking such decisions should be members of the executive, who are entirely accountable not only to this parliament but, through this parliament, to the Australian people. Apparently that is not enough.

The opposition's ridiculous argument is, `No. What is better for the Australian people and what provides for a greater degree of accountability is for a judge to make the decision about which organisation should be proscribed.' Apparently, it is the judiciary that provide accountability to the Australian people. The logic of that argument is completely and totally flawed. I would be very interested to hear the member for Griffith, who I suspect recognises the inherent flaw in the ALP's position, give a defence that explains how a member of the judiciary is more accountable than a member of the executive, who is accountable through this parliament to the Australian people. I issue that challenge to the member for Griffith, who is sitting in the chamber. I challenge him to explain that to the Australian people.

In terms of fearmongering and scare campaigns, we have heard the ALP mention, time and time again, that the Australian people are subjected to some kind of ruthless campaign of wedge politics by the Howard government on this issue. The only organisation engaged in a scare campaign, the only organisation I hear constantly telling the Australian people they ought to be afraid, is the Australian Labor Party. I heard that from numerous speakers on the opposition benches today. I heard the member for Denison talk about how we cannot trust our minister and how we have to question the motives of our minister. Shamefully, I heard the Leader of the Opposition stand up in this chamber and say to the Australian people that he had proved what great liars the Prime Minister and the Attorney-General were, and I heard him tell the Australian people that they ought to be suspicious of the government they elected.

It is absurd for the opposition to engage in such hypocrisy. It is hypocrisy for the opposition to sit there and say that it is the Howard government that is engaging in wedge politics when the whole time every single one of their arguments is predicated upon one fundamental proposition—and that is, `Don't believe what the government tells you. The government's up to no good. You can't believe its bona fides. You should be suspicious. You should question its motives.' I can give an actual quote from the Leader of the Opposition. He said, `We should question the motives of the Attorney-General.' If anyone is promoting a culture of fear or mistrust, it is my contention that it is very clearly the Labor Party. It is the Labor Party who would rather walk down the path of denying the responsibility that we as a government have to the Australian people to take decisions and to stand by those decisions. The Labor Party would rather take the soft option of saying, `This matter is too complicated. Let's get the judiciary to deal with it. That is a safer situation.'

I also want to consider for a moment the argument that the member for Denison put forward when he said that his primary concern about this bill was the constitutionality of executive prescription. It would seem to me that the ALP are carrying a lot of baggage on this issue. It would seem to me that ingrained in their psyche are decades of concern and outrage about the Communist Party case. We are seeing that bubble up now. We are seeing it rise to the top in this debate, as the ALP say, `No, we stand opposed to executive proscriptions of terrorist organisations,'—and when you ask why they hark back to the days of yore when the Communist Party case came before the High Court. This is not the same; this is not remotely the same. There is a great divide between the situation we have here today and the Communist Party case. But unfortunately in the ALP's mind there is a great link there; there is a bridge there. We see the opposition carrying all this baggage from the Communist Party case as they stand defiant in the face of executive proscription. I have to say that I do not really understand it. The Communist Party case is quite different.

I ask the member for Denison, the Leader of the Opposition and the members for Barton, Griffith and McMillan, who are in the chamber: if they are so concerned about the constitutionality of executive proscription, don't they realise that the Constitution still remains supreme? If there is so much concern that the government is going to misuse executive proscription, why would it exist, when we all know that the Constitution remains supreme? If this government tried to do something unconstitutional, you could expect that it would be ruled out of order by the High Court immediately. There is no need for great concern. There is no need to tell the Australian people that they have to mistrust their government. There is no need to incite concern in the Australian people on the pretence that it is all about individual liberties. Under our Constitution this government cannot do something unconstitutional, because our Constitution remains supreme. This is where the member for Denison pulled the rug out from underneath his own feet when he spoke about his concern about executive proscription. If the executive were to do something illegal under the Australian Constitution it would be ruled unconstitutional by the courts. The safeguard that the founding fathers of this nation set up on day one of federation is the required check and balance that the member for Denison claims that he does not see. It is right there; all he needs to do is open his eyes to see it.

I also want to cover the situation this bill is dealing with. It comes down to this: when we originally moved for proscription as a power for the government we did so on the basis that we believed certain terrorist organisations needed to be confronted head on. We believed that certain organisations were concerning themselves only with creating fear and spreading terrorism. We took the view that, in order for a government to deal in a sustainable and appropriate way with the threat that these organisations posed, we should allow for these organisations to be proscribed or listed. In doing so, we set in place a number of checks and balances in the legislation. The Australian people should know what those checks and balances are so that they can see through the misinformation that the Labor Party spreads when it talks about the great concerns that we all have and when the member for Denison talks about innocents being locked up for 20 years. Let us be clear about what the safeguards are as they already exist.

I want to outline to the House the process for executive proscription, because it is very clear. We are not seeking to change the process in this bill, except for one part—and I will explain that in a moment. The first step in the process is that the Director-General of Security provides material to the Attorney-General's Department regarding the background, training activities, terrorist activities and relevant statements of the organisation that proscription is being sought for. The second step is that the Australian Government Solicitor provides advice on whether the material provided by the director-general is sufficient to enable the Attorney-General to be satisfied on reasonable grounds that the relevant criteria for the listing of the organisation have been met.

The third step is that the Attorney-General's Department provides a submission for the Attorney-General, setting out the information and recommending that the organisation be listed as a terrorist organisation, based on the advice received from the Director-General of Security. The Attorney-General then considers that submission, and he must be satisfied on reasonable grounds—which is a legal test and subject to review—that the relevant organisation is engaged in preparing, planning, assisting in or fostering the carrying out of a terrorist act, whether or not that act will or will not occur. If the Attorney-General is satisfied that all of the criteria have been met, he signs a statement summarising the grounds upon which the organisation meets the requirements for listing as a terrorist organisation and approves the proposed regulation for the listing of the organisation and accompanying documentation.

They are all the steps. But the ALP insisted, through the Senate, that there be a step in there as well that says for the Australian government to list a terrorist organisation it must already be listed by the United Nations Security Council. This government is the only government in the world that faces that additional hurdle. The United States does not, New Zealand does not, the United Kingdom does not and Canada does not. None of those jurisdictions face the additional hurdle of the requirement that the organisation be listed with the United Nations Security Council as a terrorist organisation.

Let there be no confusion about what we are attempting to do today. It is simply to remove that requirement for the organisation to be listed by the UN Security Council. That is it. All the other safeguards stay. We heard the opposition talk about merits review. That is a merits review. It requires a merits review by the Attorney-General. That remains, but we want to remove just the requirement for it to be listed by the United Nations Security Council. Why? Firstly, because it is an unnecessary and burdensome requirement for the Australian government to comply with and, secondly, because the UN Security Council does not concern itself in large part with terrorist organisations. In fact, the listing process for the United Nations Security Council was principally concerned only with al-Qaeda. That is where it all commenced. Many organisations are not listed, and I highlight one for example. Jemaah Islamiah, an organisation that has proved to be a direct threat to the Australian people and indeed successfully murdered 88 Australians in Bali, was not listed by the UN Security Council. So we had to take the cumbersome path of seeking to have it listed.

What is the response that we hear from the Labor Party when we say, `That's not good enough. We want to be able to expedite the process so that we can respond in a timely fashion'? We heard the response today. We heard it from the mouth of the Leader of the Opposition. His response was: `You haven't tried hard enough to get it listed with the UN Security Council.' That is absolutely pathetic. For a party which claims to be an alternative Australian government to say: `Sorry, you haven't tried hard enough to have it listed with the UN Security Council,' to me underscores their whole attitude on this issue. It can be summarised as an incapability to make a decision in the first instance. They want to tender it all out: `Let's contract it out to the UN Security Council. Let's contract it out to the judiciary.' That is not good enough. The Australian people demand of their government a willingness to make decisions. The listing process has adequate safeguards as it is. The removal of the UN Security Council listing requirement is very reasonable. I know the Australian people see the falseness of the Labor Party's position of seeking to tender it out to the judiciary. That is a completely unaccountable way of governing and a completely unacceptable way for the Australian people to exist.