September 11, 2023
PETER STEFANOVIC: An alleged Chinese spy posing as a parliamentary aide in the UK has been arrested by British police. There are fears he had been ordered to return to Britain as a spy to infiltrate political circles after living and working in China. British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak raised the concern of Chinese interference in the UK with China's premier Li Keqiang at the G20. And there are now calls for Australian MP's on defence and intelligence committees to be careful of all of this. Joining us live now, Shadow Home Affairs and Cyber Security Minister James Paterson. James, good to see you, as always. Spy novel stuff, this kind of stuff, isn't it? But much more serious.
JAMES PATERSON: Good morning. Yes, it's very real. And the allegations coming out of the United Kingdom are profoundly disturbing. This is a person who allegedly got very close to some very senior members of parliament who hired him completely innocently, not knowing his connections to the Chinese Communist Party and his alleged work on their behalf. And it's possible that he not only undermined the work of those groups and those MPs, but also passed intelligence back to the Chinese government. Unfortunately, I think we're a very grave risk of exactly the same thing happening here in Australia, because it might surprise your viewers to know that the vast majority of staff who work for parliamentarians are not security cleared. They undergo no vetting to work here. It's only ministerial staff who are vetted. But if you're working for a government backbencher or opposition shadow minister or indeed an opposition backbencher, you are not typically vetted, even if your boss is a member of the Intelligence and Security Committee or indeed the new Statutory Defence Committee which we established to oversee things like AUKUS which are highly sensitive.
STEFANOVIC: So do you think that kind of infiltration could already be happening here?
PATERSON: I don't want to publicly speculate. All I can say is that we are very vulnerable to that sort of thing. And we know that it is a top priority for foreign intelligence services to place people close to people of influence and people have access to information and members of parliament fit both of those categories. Every time myself or my colleagues put up a job advertisement on the internet seeking a researcher, you can bet there's a foreign intelligence agency looking at that job, wondering how they can place someone in that office and close to that MP. ASIO assesses that foreign interference and espionage are our number one security threat. And we know, particularly in the context of AUKUS, that the secrets and other sensitive information that MPs will be privy to is of very high demand to foreign intelligence agencies, and they'll be absolutely trying to get whatever they can out of us
STEFANOVIC: Pretty basic question here. What goes into vetting?
PATERSON: There's a range of different vetting levels, there's baseline and negative vetting and there's top secret vetting and you have an appropriate level of vetting, which is based on the level of information you have access to. But some of the questions involve personal questions about your finances and about your personal history and what you're looking for there is people who are potentially exploitable or vulnerable to extortion or compromise. And also things like your travel history. How long have you spent overseas? Which countries have you visited? Who have you dealt with when you're over there in case it was possible that you were recruited or cultivated while you're overseas, as allegedly happened in this instance.
STEFANOVIC: Would you not get suspicious, though? I'm not an MP I would know. But wouldn't you get suspicious if you know an aide or someone like that was kind of piling in with this information?
PATERSON: You should be, and I encourage all my parliamentary colleagues to be alert for the signs of unusual or suspicious behaviour from their staff or any other close associates, people who ask them persistent questions, unusual questions, questions about their work that isn't routine or normal. But the truth is that our adversaries are very sophisticated. It's a bit of a rumour sometimes or innuendo sometimes that in the case of the Chinese Communist Party, that the main threat that they pose is only through signals intelligence. And their cyber capabilities are very sophisticated. But this case is a wake up call that their human intelligence capabilities are equally sophisticated. And no one should make the false assumption that it is only people who are of Chinese heritage or ethnicity who are potential spies. In this instance, it is someone of Anglo ethnicity and background who was a UK citizen. So really it can be anyone at any time and MPs should not be left to fend for themselves, guessing whether or not the person who's applied to work for them might be a security risk. We need a much more robust process, at least for people serving on these sensitive committees, to comprehensively vet them like we do a public servant or ministerial staff.
STEFANOVIC: Okay. Just so we spoke at length on Qatar last week, James, but the questions still remain this week, and no doubt that'll be red meat for the Coalition today. But despite all the protestations to the contrary from the government, what question, in your view, still remains unanswered?
PATERSON: Well, this has gone from bad to worse to catastrophic for the Albanese government and particularly for Catherine King. I think we have the eighth possible explanation from Richard Marles on your colleague’s program yesterday here. I mean this government is absolutely dissembling on this issue and really, we just have one question. What's the real reason that you turned Qatar down? What is it? Is it protecting Qantas profits? Is it protecting human rights or national security? Is it because of the Yes campaign and the support that Qantas is providing to that in the form of free flights for yes campaigners and endorsements? What is the real reason? That's what the Australian people deserve to know.
STEFANOVIC: Okay. James Paterson, as always, good to you. We'll talk to you soon.
ENDS
