August 12, 2024
GARY ADSHEAD: My next guest, I don't think he is any closer to retirement, James Paterson is a Liberal Senator and Home Affairs spokesperson, G'day James.
JAMES PATERSON: That's right Gary, a few years of work to go for me.
ADSHEAD: Just out of interest. I know you only heard that bit of it. But I was having a debate or a discussion with, the head of Brightwater Age Care here in WA, who'd written a piece for the paper talking about, you know, how we just go. This is the age 65 or 67 or whatever it might be. This is when you can get the concession and she's sort of saying, we need to sort of re-evaluate that in terms of eligibility. I mean, for federally, from a financial point of view. It would be good for the country if people said, no, no, I'm not ready yet. I don't need it.
PATERSON: Well, I was really impressed with your last caller. You know, what an admirable person who has a contribution to make, has the energy to do it, and wants to do it, good on her. Obviously, that's not going to suit everyone's circumstances. Some people, as you say are kind of, you know, flat out by that point of their lives. Peter Dutton actually, one of his first announcements as Opposition Leader right at the start of the term was that we should allow pensioners to work more and keep more of their pension before they start losing it. Because actually we have real workforce challenges, we've got shortages of skills. And the people who want to work and receive a part pension, as you were saying, it's a great option for them. So we do want to expand that availability, recognising it's not for everyone, but for those who are keen and have the energy, good on them.
ADSHEAD: All right. Okay. Now I am going to speak to you though, about some of the comments that the head of ASIO, the Director-General, Mike Burgess, made on the weekend. He talks about how there are 3 or 4 nations that he talks about being caught out spying on Australia or certainly trying to interfere with Australian internal policies, etc.. He says that some of them are our friends. What do you make of that?
PATERSON: Yeah, look, I wasn't surprised by the Director-General's comment because I personally chaired the intelligence committee, I am currently on the intelligence committee, so I have been briefed about this, but I understand why it would come as a surprise to some Australians. They think well, why would our friends spy on us? I think it's important to be really clear up front. This is not our closest allies and partners like the Five Eyes. That behaviour does not occur from those partners. But it is countries that we can be on friendly terms with, we have good diplomatic relationships with. But they either have a strong interest in managing their diaspora communities internationally, or they just have a rapacious appetite for intelligence, and secrets around the world. And they ruthlessly pursue their national interest and, we have to be sophisticated about that. We can't be naive about that and we have to protect our interests.
ADSHEAD: So would that be India, one of them? Because we know that he's already, revealed that there were several people that had to be kicked out of Australia who worked for an Indian sort of diplomacy, etc.
PATERSON: It's not appropriate or even lawful for me to publicly identify these countries, because of the circumstances under which I've been briefed, so I can't comment on that. What I can say, though, is that I think it's important that governments lead a process of being transparent with the Australian people as often as possible about these things. In every instance, it's not always appropriate, but I think more often we should be candid. And actually, the former Minister for Home Affairs, Clare O'Neil, about a year ago, said that she was going to develop and announce a public attribution framework for disclosing foreign interference and espionage in our country. And a year later, nothing has happened on that front. So I think this is really in the inbox of the new Home Affairs Minister, Tony Burke and I think he should get on with it.
ADSHEAD: So why? Why can't we? I often think maybe things are getting a bit better, but I certainly remember the time when we would be having this discussion about foreign actors, etc., and everything pointed to China, but no one wanted to say it.
PATERSON: Yeah, look, I'm very comfortable saying that China is the number one source of foreign interference and espionage in Australia, and it's not even close who is in second place,. They’re overwhelmingly that challenge that we face. I think Australians have a better understanding of that now, because intelligence agencies have led that debate, but also because there's been some great investigative journalism that has informed the public about those things. And so that's been really important. But we should be also candid about the other challenges we face about the other countries that are active in this space and why that threatens either the freedom of our diaspora communities, why it damages our democracy, or is a threat to the military and intelligence secrets that we're trying to keep.
ADSHEAD: Yeah, well, Iran certainly do appear to be if I'm just going in between the lines of what's being said. But Iran, seem to have been up to no good here for a while.
PATERSON: That is one country that has been publicly disclosed by the former Minister for Home Affairs and I think that was a very appropriate example of why this should be done and how it can be done. The Iranian government was targeting the diaspora community here in Australia, activists who were critical of the regime and sought to intimidate and surveil them. And that's completely and utterly unacceptable. It's called transnational repression. And there are a number of countries like Iran which engage in that, and it's a really serious threat to our freedoms as Australians, and we should be absolutely rock solid in preventing it from occurring.
ADSHEAD: Now, just something if I could ask you. The Opposition has been very strong on this. It feels that the action that's been taken by the federal government so far in relation to the CFMEU has not been enough. In that sort of scenario, here in WA, the Master Builders Association initially said that they didn't have any issue with the CFMEU here, and they sort of come out lately and said that there's been some allegations, but it's a long way from going any further. Can I ask you why you think that nationally the CFMEU should be all under the same basket when it comes to cracking down?
PATERSON: I think the CFMEU has got an endemic cultural problem, and I would be absolutely astonished if it is just limited to the Victorian, South Australia, Tasmanian, New South Wales, Queensland branches, that it isn't prevalent in WA. Because it's part of their business model. It's how they operate. They deliberately engage in lawless behaviour to intimidate employers, so they give in and go along with what the CFMEU demands of them. And that's been demonstrated in royal commissions and in dozens and dozens of cases led by the former Australian Building and Construction Commission in our court. We have federal court judges around the country on the record saying this is a recidivist union that breaks the law wantonly and just treats it as part of its business model and is happy to pay the fines when that happens. Now, we don't have the ABCC on the beat anymore because Tony Burke, as Industrial Relations Minister, abolished them. For the Albanese government, that was one of their early priorities. And so it's no wonder that they're running free. But why would we think that that's limited to the eastern seaboard, why wouldn't it be happening in WA as well?
ADSHEAD: Well, I will be speaking a bit later on to the WA branch of the CFMEU, but they have already written a piece that says that they have zero criminal allegations against them in WA, and that they have a zero tolerance policy for any criminal behaviour in the day to day operations of the union. And if there's no evidence to counter that, then why shouldn't they be just left alone from this storm that's happening, of course, on the eastern seaboard.
PATERSON: Well, I encourage you to ask them whether that includes industrial laws, whether they break industrial laws. Because this is a union which routinely breaks industrial laws, deliberately and proudly. And in fact, Sally McManus as head of the ACTU, a few years ago was defending their practice of knowingly breaking industrial laws. Sometimes the CFMEU carves that out and says criminal behaviour in industrial law different to bikie gangs and organised crime and in one sense there is a difference. But if you have a culture of breaking the law I would be very surprised if you can quarantine it to any one part of the law.
ADSHEAD: All right, James, thanks very much for joining us today.
PATERSON: Great to be with you.
ENDS
