Senator LUDWIG (12:40 PM) —I thank Senator Hogg for his contribution in relation to the Telecommunications (Interception) Amendment Bill 2004. It is a very important bill. I am sure he is very familiar with the topic. I was a member of the Senate Legal and Constitutional Legislation Committee, which examined this bill and reported to the Senate only this week. The Senate has a very full program to get through, and I might be able to finish before quarter to one, but I wish to make a number of points about the bill. There has been a little bit of toing-and-froing this week about the problem relating to incorporation of speeches, so I would rather put my remarks on the record. I will not take the full 20 minutes. It will mean, though, that we will deal with the bill later this afternoon. In any event, we should be able to go through it quite quickly.

In summary, the bill does a number of things: it broadens the range of offences in relation to which telecommunications interception warrants can be sought; it broadens the definition of interception to encompass written words and images and addresses delayed access communications, such as SMS, MMS, voicemail and email; it enables ASIO to record telephone calls to its publicly listed numbers; it removes the requirement on ASIO to provide a warrant to a telecommunications carrier in emergency situations; and, it enables certifying officers in an agency to terminate an interception while a warrant remains current.

The majority of the committee agreed with the need for most of these measures. The committee was satisfied that the new terrorism, cybercrime and firearms offences were sufficiently serious to justify their inclusion in the telecommunications interception regime. The committee also acknowledged that there could be serious matters of national security which might require ASIO to perform interceptions under a telecommunications interception warrant without notifying a carrier.

The committee was not overly persuaded by the need to enable ASIO to record incoming calls to publicly -listed numbers without a warning, but noted the limited privacy impact of such a measure and the current practice of recording 000 emergency calls. The committee did not recommend any change to this provision. The key concern of the committee was the provisions governing delayed access communications. The committee had previously examined equivalent provisions in the 2002 package of antiterrorism legislation and concluded that they were unclear and needed redrafting. In fact, I was on the committee at that time. It seems that, after something short of two years, we are still in the same position, which is a little bit unfortunate.

After hearing evidence from several organisations, including the Australian Federal Police, the committee found that the redrafted provisions still leave some important questions unanswered. These concerns include access by law enforcement agencies to copies of read emails on an ISP server, the interaction between the bill and the powers of law enforcement agencies under section 3L of the Crimes Act, and the access by an organisation to emails passing through its firewall for the purpose of internal integrity measures.

We welcome the government's agreement to split the bill so that they can rectify these problems over the recess and that parliament can consider the remainder of the bill before it rises today. Effectively, they have agreed not to proceed with the issues on which the committee asked for greater clarity from the government. It is encouraging and I think it is helpful for the government to do that. In 2002 we did not think that the government got it right and the bill required redrafting. Unfortunately, we still think they have not got it right and it still needs a little more redrafting. It is helpful to find that they are going to rise to the challenge, especially after the evidence given by the AFP at the committee hearing. On a personal note it did leave me a little bit confused about what the position was in relation to the legislation, let alone our understanding of it. But I can indicate that, apart from the measures that will be split from the bill and held over until the next sittings, the opposition will be supporting the remainder of the bill.

Debate interrupted.