During the recent Senate Estimates, I questioned the AFP about whether they were under orders not to intervene during protests when offenses, such as the flying of illegal Hezbollah and Hamas flags, were observed.
The AFP clarified that they were under no such orders and explained that maintaining peace at rallies and protests is primarily the responsibility of State and Territory police as frontline officers. They also noted that decisions on whether to intervene may depend on tactical considerations and safety concerns.
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS:On to another topic, are Australian Federal Police officers under any orders at certain demonstrations to not intervene when they see an offence being committed?
Ms Barrett: No.
Senator ROBERTS: We see the issue of illegal flags being raised at some demonstrations—illegal Hezbollah flags and Hamas flags. Why wasn’t action taken?
Ms Barrett: There are a few things I would say to that. Primarily, it’s our state and territory colleagues that are policing public order in protest activity. The AFP doesn’t generally have a frontline presence at protest activity.
Senator ROBERTS: You haven’t got jurisdiction, say, in Sydney at a big protest—only in Canberra?
Ms Barrett: It’s not our primary role. It’s primarily the role of the states and territories. They are better equipped and trained to deal with large public order matters. We obviously provide support to them and some specialist capability where it’s required, but they are primarily the ones on the front line at the protest activity. They also have access to utilising this legislation and, in fact, there have been other state and territory colleagues and counterparts that have used this legislation in relation to the prohibited hate symbols. The other point I would make is that there are a lot of tactics that go into policing protests and into maintaining law and order and public order, particularly in mass protest activity. It is quite a simplified expectation that police officers would be immediately arresting on the spot. There is a lot of consideration that would go into tactical decision-making around whether it would be the right decision to immediately intervene and arrest in a mass protest activity, and that is where our state and territory colleagues have the specialist skills and training.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. I have two questions. Do you have jurisdiction in Sydney, for example, or in the state, apart from airports?
Ms Barrett: We have jurisdiction for Commonwealth offences, so under Commonwealth legislation. Our state and territory colleagues have state legislation that allows them to enforce public order in those situations. As I’ve already said, they also have access to Commonwealth legislation around some of these applicable offences.
Senator ROBERTS: Last question: is one of the considerations as to whether or not to take action to arrest someone who’s demonstrating with a hate flag or hate symbol the need to be seen to be enforcing the law? People are just shocked that these people are getting away with breaking the law willy nilly in front of the police’s eyes.
Ms Barrett: There are a number of grounds that have to be satisfied before a police officer can arrest someone under the Commonwealth legislation. There are six or seven grounds for arrest, so it’s not as simple as just making a decision to arrest somebody. It has to be either to prevent the continuation of offence, prevent a loss or destruction of evidence, ensure a person’s appearance before court—there are a number of elements that you have to satisfy yourself of before you make a decision to deprive someone of their liberty. I can tell you that every police officer takes the decision to make an arrest very seriously because, as I said, you are depriving someone of their liberty. The other thing I will just make the point of is that every police officer has the independent office of constable. I can’t direct someone to make an arrest in any situation. It is an individual decision made by the individual police officer, and they themselves have to be satisfied that they’ve met the grounds for arrest under the Commonwealth legislation.
Senator ROBERTS: One of those grounds was the continuation of an offence. Isn’t letting people continue to march with a hate symbol a continuation of an offence?
Ms Barrett: Yes, in most circumstances it could be. But I will take you back to my earlier point—that there are a lot of other factors, particularly in mass protest situations where you’ve got big crowds, high emotions, a lot of passion and a propensity for violence or disorderly behaviour. There are a lot of tactics that go around policing large demonstrations like that, not least in terms of officer safety as well.
During my session with ASIO, I asked why they did not intervene when terrorist flags were flown, which is an offence, at demonstrations. Mr. Burgess explained that he was actually pleased when such incidents like this occurred because it made it easier to identify persons of interest and monitor them more closely in the future. He stated that it’s not ASIO’s role to enforce the law, as that responsibility falls to the Australian Federal Police (AFP).
He clarified that ASIO functions as a security service. From a security perspective, Mr. Burgess noted that they would assess whether a visa applicant was a Hamas or Hezbollah sympathiser. He also confirmed that ASIO collaborates closely with the AFP and international partners.
Transcript
CHAIR: Senator Roberts, you have the last five minutes. We’re finishing on 10.30.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you, Mr Burgess and others, for attending. At recent pro-Palestinian rallies in Australia, the Hamas and Hezbollah flags and symbols have been highly visible and displayed by participants. This is an offence. Why did ASIO not step in with the AFP and arrest the offenders?
Mr Burgess: Firstly, and again, ASIO is not a law enforcement agency. We don’t arrest anyone. What I can say on this matter is that, as the head of a security service, I welcome when individuals fly the flag, so to speak, and indicate that they’re someone we should have an interest in. If people are silly enough to do that—whether it’s unlawful or not is a matter for law enforcement—I personally welcome people declaring their hand, which allows ASIO to conduct lines of inquiry and investigation into those individuals should they be a threat to security.
Senator ROBERTS: Are you sending two messages there? One is to encourage people to fly their flags even though it’s illegal. Or are you encouraging people to do that and be identified?
Mr Burgess: No; I’m just making the comment that if people are silly enough to do that, then it actually is something that we can use as a point of interest. Of course, if people are actually flying symbols which are unlawful, then they’re breaking the law. But I’ll leave that to our Federal Police colleagues to talk about when they’re up at estimates.
Senator ROBERTS: I didn’t think you had the power to arrest people, but what are your responsibilities? What avenues do you have?
Mr Burgess: We’re a security service. We get to investigate threats to security, including politically motivated violence, promotion of criminal violence, sabotage, foreign interference, espionage and anything that jeopardises the integrity of Australia’s border or attacks Australia’s defence systems.
Senator ROBERTS: The flying of a flag would be seen as flagging someone of suspicion to you, but it’s up to the police to prosecute.
Mr Burgess: It’s an indicator that there may be a violent ideology behind that. It might just be the actions of a misdirected individual who doesn’t really know what they’re doing.
Senator ROBERTS: By the way, I’ve read your opening statement, and I won’t be asking questions about the Gaza visas. Is it true that many Palestinian and Lebanese visa applicants are sympathisers of Hamas and Hezbollah?
Mr Burgess: Let’s get into a conversation about what a sympathiser is. Are you asking whether there are people who actually support listed terrorist organisations?
Senator ROBERTS: Yes.
Mr Burgess: Yes. Are they all supporting listed terrorist organisations? No. The nature of that support is actually—when we get involved in a process of looking at someone, a visa holder, if it’s referred to us or intelligence indicates that we should look at someone, we’ll look at everything that’s before us and available to us through our international partnerships to make an assessment of whether someone in that case represents a direct or indirect threat to security.
Senator ROBERTS: You look at individuals.
Mr Burgess: We’ll look at individuals when they’re referred to us or intelligence indicates that we need to look at someone, and we’ll investigate them with rigour.
Senator ROBERTS: Is it true that many Palestinian and Lebanese visa applicants are sympathisers of Hamas and Hezbollah. I’m told you do the screening in terms of security.
Mr Burgess: We’re looking at security, yes. A very small number of them turn out to be an indirect or direct threat to security, based on our current work.
Senator ROBERTS: At mosques in Sydney and Melbourne, there have recently been speakers preaching hate and violence to their followers in relation to antisemitic themes. Why have ASIO and the AFP not intervened and arrested these pedlars of death and destruction? I know that you can’t arrest someone.
Mr Burgess: I obviously won’t talk about specific cases, but if we’re looking at individuals who are actually very cleverly staying on the right side of the law but could be interpreted by someone as actually still giving permission for violence, of course we would be interested, and our investigative efforts would be applied with rigour. How much effort they get depends on what we find as we make our inquiries and up through our levels of investigation, including the use of special powers if warranted.
Senator ROBERTS: What do those special powers involve?
Mr Burgess: A range of interception, computer access warrants, enter and search operations. We get highly intrusive under a warrant authorised by the Attorney-General, if we have the grounds that warrant that.
Senator ROBERTS: If it involves a breach of the law, will you report it to the police?
Mr Burgess: We pass that straight to our partners in the law enforcement joint counterterrorism teams.
Senator ROBERTS: You work together with the AFP and the state police forces, presumably.
Mr Burgess: In every state and territory, there is a thing called a joint counterterrorism team, which includes the state or territory police forces, the Australian Federal Police and ASIO officers.
Senator ROBERTS: Coming back to Senator Rennick’s questions, what do you see as your responsibility once exposing a foreign agent?
Mr Burgess: If we’ve got a threat to security, someone’s engaged in foreign interference or espionage, we will deal with it through either an intelligence-led disruption or pass that matter over to our mates in the Counter Foreign Interference Taskforce, and the Australian Federal Police will take it from there, as was the case with the two Russian-born Australian citizens this year.
Senator ROBERTS: You and Senator Rennick may not have agreed on the words and not understood each other’s words, but do you need any laws passed to enable you to do your job better?
Last week, Opposition Leader Dutton replied to an interviewer, calling for the public to dob in loved ones, friends, or workmates who have changed their opinion of the Government for the worse to ASIO. After facing backlash on social media, I expected the Opposition Leader to clarify his remarks, but he has yet to do so.
His advocacy for Australians to report their fellow Australians to ASIO for expressing concerns about government COVID measures—which destroyed lives, health and families—is deeply troubling.
We are witnessing police actions in Canada and the UK where merely attending a protest rally, without any violent actions, is grounds for arrest and imprisonment. Is this a glimpse into the future under the Liberal Party?
Transcript
Last week, Opposition Leader Dutton, in a media interview, made a comment we expected he would clarify but he hasn’t. In the interview, the interviewer said:
“We saw the terror threat raised to Probable yesterday. But there are multiple fronts now.
One of those fronts that I found most interesting has come out of Covid. There’s the conspiracy theorists, the anti-vaxxers … what does it say to you about government overreach, and government, essentially, controlling people’s lives and the effects that that can have?”
Peter Dutton’s answer:
“None of that, though, should give rise to the sort of conduct that you’re referring to. I would say to anybody in our community, whether it’s within your friendship group, your family group, the work group, whatever it might be, where you see somebody’s behaviour changing, regardless of their motivation, or if they’ve changed radically their thoughts about society and government … you need to report that information to ASIO, or to the Australian Federal Police as a matter of urgency”.
In 1997, in the legal case Lange v the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the High Court found:
Under a legal system based on the common law, everybody is free to do anything, subject only to the provisions of the law, so that one proceeds upon an assumption of freedom of speech and turns to the law to discover the established exceptions to it.
To protect human life, free speech stops at incitement to violence against others and at incitement to break the law.
Free speech does not stop, as Peter Dutton suggests, merely at criticisms of others. Advocating that Australians be dobbed into ASIO for venting about government COVID measures, destroying their lives, health and families is a tone-deaf disgrace. In Canada and the UK right now, police response to criticism of the government is underway. Mere attendance at a protest rally without any violent words or actions is now enough to be arrested and imprisoned. Is this a glimpse of the future everyday Australians will endure under the supposedly honourable men and women of the Liberal Party, under an opposition leader who has come to bury Menzies, not to praise Menzies. I call on the Opposition Leader to clarify his remarks immediately.
There has been many attempts to paint anti-mandate protesters as extremists. It’s not true and even the Federal Police have said so. At the protest some people were concerned about the appearance of possible Long Range Acoustic Devices (LRAD) and whether they were used or not. We didn’t get an answer back straight away but the police will have to give me an answer on notice.
Transcript
[Senator Keneally] Yeah, at this point.
[Speaker] Thanks Senator Keneally. I ask Senator Roberts, who’s just got a couple of minutes of questions.
Thank you. And Mr Kershaw is it?
[Kershaw] Kershaw, yeah.
Thank you all for appearing today, and before I ask my questions, I just want to thank you for the work you do and your AFP and work. And also the liaison with the State Police in Queensland and the ACT. I was at the protest; very proud of the behaviour of the people and so pleased that, and I agree with you, those groups were infiltrated by a couple of people, and that’s very small, so I appreciate that. Quickly, these questions are coming from a constituent: In relation to the Convoy to Canberra protest activity at Parliament House just last weekend, pictures of the day appear to show some types of devices at the front of Parliament House in between the entry to Parliament and Parliament lawns where the protest was in fact occurring. Can you confirm whether the AFP had long-range acoustic devices at Parliament House on Saturday?
That would be something that is our police methodology, which we would have to look at some sort of public interest immunity claim, Senator.
Is there any, surely it’s in the public interest to know whether or not they were there, without delving too much into it?
If I could take that on notice, I’d have to get advice.
Okay. I’d be happy. I understand. I’d be happy for that. And also, if you could tell us what type they were, please.
Sure.
And can you confirm whether or not they were used at any point?
https://img.youtube.com/vi/_5HXjnV7s7w/hqdefault.jpg360480Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2022-02-15 11:08:142022-02-15 11:08:19Did the police use Long Range Acoustic Devices at the Convoy to Canberra?
I attended the truckies blockade on the Gold Coast this week, protesting against mandatory vaccines in workers who want to cross the border. Them and many others are asking why you need to implement a vaccine passport for a vaccine if it’s so good?
Transcript
[Marcus Paul] One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts. Good morning to you, Malcolm.
[Malcolm Roberts] Good morning, Marcus, how are you doing?
[Marcus Paul] Yeah, not bad, mate. Whereabouts are you?
[Malcolm Roberts] I’m in Brisbane, Brisbane city.
[Marcus Paul] Ah, half your luck!
[Malcolm Roberts] Doing remote parliament from my electorate office.
[Marcus Paul] Yes, of course, remotely.
[Malcolm Roberts] It’s so frustrating.
[Marcus Paul] Yeah, I bet it is, I bet it’s frustrating, because of course, you can’t leave there because if you go to the ACT, what happens?
[Malcolm Roberts] I have to lock down. I have to quarantine for two weeks when I come back. But first, Marcus, I want to express my condolences for your recent loss of your dad.
[Malcolm Roberts] What do you appreciate most about him?
[Marcus Paul] Ooh, what do I appreciate most? Mate, have you got all day? Everything.
[Malcolm Roberts] Yeah, I have.
[Marcus Paul] I wish I did. Look, my father was a compassionate man. He was very, very kind to everybody. I can’t recall a time where he had a bad word really to say about- And he went through some difficult times in his life, but he was always optimistic. But more importantly I think, Dad taught me to respect people and that’s hopefully what I do. I mean, obviously, you know, I do a radio show, so quite often I go off the rails with some of my criticism, but I never try to make it personal. So look, that’s the main thing. My dad was a truly decent man and I hope that I’m also, you know, as decent as he is. There we go.
[Malcolm Roberts] That’s a wonderful compliment and what do they say? “The fruit doesn’t fall far from the tree”?
[Marcus Paul] Hope not. That’s it, mate, that’s it. All right, what are we discussing this morning with you? Vaccine passports. Here in New South Wales, the Premier yesterday basically said that, look, if you are fully vaccinated, you can return to a normal life as of October 17, 18. So she’s well and truly dangling that vaccine passport carrot.
[Malcolm Roberts] You know, Marcus, that really undermines people’s faith in the vaccine, because if you have to be coerced into getting a vaccine, because you might miss out on going to the supermarket, you can’t eat, you lose your livelihood, you lose basic services that you’ve paid for in your form of taxation, then it really raises people’s questions about this vaccine and so they should. Because I’ve checked with the Chief Medical Officer in Federal Parliament, and they won’t say that the vaccine’s 100% safe. They admit that they don’t know the dosage, they don’t know the frequency of injections, they admit that it won’t stop people getting the virus, they admit that it won’t stop the spread of virus, and the efficacy is plummeting. It’s down around 17% of what it should be, so why would you get one of these things? Plus, this is the first time in history that our government has injected something into healthy people that can possibly kill them and we know there are deaths. So I mean, it just doesn’t make sense. And the governments themselves are undermining any faith in the vaccines by the actions they are doing to try and force people to get it. And that’s what the truckies were on about. You know, I appreciated your call on Monday.
[Marcus Paul] Yeah.
[Malcolm Roberts] We were just leaving the truckies’ blockade in Southern Queensland and the truckies just have very simple needs. They just wanted three things. They want a choice on vaccine, whether or not you get it, that’s your choice.
[Marcus Paul] Sure.
[Malcolm Roberts] They wanted to end these capricious lockdowns, which are destroying their livelihoods. These truckies have got to pay off trucks you know. They don’t just get JobKeeper. And then the third thing they want is their kids back at school. I mean, this is just disgraceful what’s going on.
[Marcus Paul] All right, well, look, everybody has a right to free speech and to protest in this country. And look, I’m glad though, that once, obviously, the point was made, I’m glad that you and Pauline moved them on, the way you did and cleared the roadway for other drivers. Because obviously the point had been made, there was some traffic delays, but I’m not a truck driver. I’ve been very lucky. That’s why I try and have a bit of an open mind here. I’ve been extremely lucky. I’ve been able to work and earn, obviously, an income throughout this whole pandemic. So it’s a little unfair on me to jump up and down about people concerned about their rights, and their right to earn an income, et cetera. I’d be a hypocrite to be perfectly honest. I don’t agree with some of the silly protests that have gone on, but I kind of understand it.
[Malcolm Roberts] Well you know, these truckies- just first two points. Firstly, Pauline and I didn’t move them on.
[Marcus Paul] Oh okay.
[Malcolm Roberts] Pauline, she’s a very, very strong supporters of the truckies. Come back to that in a minute. But what Pauline said to the truckies was there are horses stuck in traffic and this was kilometres long, you know.
[Marcus Paul] Yes.
[Malcolm Roberts] You’re not just going to move it by moving aside a truck, you’ve got to end the blockade. So Pauline just said, we know that you’ve made your point. You’ve shown that trucks are essential. You’ve made your point. You’ve got the media in terms of not being forced to get these jabs, injections. There are horses stuck in this traffic. So it’s up to you. You know, she didn’t say-
[Marcus Paul] Yeah.
[Malcolm Roberts] She has got no power to move anyone on, but she just interceded like that. And the truckies being highly responsible just said, yeah, okay, we’ve made our point. And then they opened up.
[Marcus Paul] All right.
[Malcolm Roberts] The other thing is that truckies- a very good friend of mine reminded me of something. Trucks touch every single thing in our lives.
[Marcus Paul] Oh, of course.
[Malcolm Roberts] You know, they transport food to processing. They transport the processed food, the manufactured goods and mate, truckies are so down to earth, they’re responsible for what they’re doing. They’re responsible for other people’s lives. They’ve also, generally, many of them are small business owners. So they have that responsibility as well. Some of them employ people. But truckies are down to earth and they were asking basic questions about freedoms, basic questions. Do they have the right to determine what comes into their body? You know, I’ll make a statement. Parliaments are meant serve Australians and not control Australians. We’ve lost the fact that Parliament serve Australians. Parliaments look after the two major parties. And that’s it. I would far rather have truckies in parliament.
[Marcus Paul] All right.
[Malcolm Roberts] Because they are salt of the earth people. They can represent the people. These guys are salt of the earth and I highly respect them.
[Marcus Paul] The Queensland Premier is copping it again in the press and understandably so. I mean, I have my personal story on this and I won’t, you know, I’ve already said what I have to say.
[Malcolm Roberts] Yeah, I heard that.
[Marcus Paul] But, little Memphis. There’s a little boy, who’s aged three. He’s stuck in New South Wales at his grandparents’ home near Griffith. Due to the border blockade of the Premier of Queensland, Anastasia Palaszczuk, this little three year old has not seen his mum and dad, going on now more than two months. The Queensland Government has refused a reunion exemption. Look, if that’s not compassionate grounds to reunite a three-year-old child with his parents, then I don’t know what the hell is.
[Malcolm Roberts] Marcus, you are absolutely correct. It’s not the Premier. She’s a dope, it’s the Labour state machine. What they have done is instilled fear up here and abused powers. And they’ve done it to keep control of people and done it for their own electoral benefit. And they rely on emotion. There are many, many stories like little Memphis.
[Marcus Paul] Of course.
[Malcolm Roberts] But listen to some of these figures. In Victoria- these are just some of the figures, I’ll go through NSW as well. Every week, more than 340 teenagers suffering mental health emergencies admitted to hospitals in Victoria – 162% increase. Every week, 156 teenagers rushed to hospital for attempting suicide or self-harm. 37 every week needing emergency treatment or surgery. An 88 percent increase – almost doubled. A 90% increase in children with eating disorders.
[Marcus Paul] Okay.
[Malcolm Roberts] New South Wales, daily, more than 40 children and teenagers rushed to hospital for self-harm. That’s up 31%. Acute mental health admissions for children and young people, up almost half, almost 50%. Gold Coast Hospital here in Queensland, a 212% spike in eating disorders from 2019 compared to 2020.
[Marcus Paul] All right.
[Malcolm Roberts] And Queensland’s Butterfly Foundation says, calls for help increased 34% for eating disorders from January 2020 to January 2021. 85% were first time callers to the helpline. In August, the Lifeline Suicide Prevention Line had his busiest days in its 50 year history.
[Marcus Paul] Yeah, we spoke to John Brogden about that.
[Malcolm Roberts] This is disgraceful. Because Marcus, kids are going through the formative period of their mind. Their mind is actually forming and they need the love and nurturing around. Now we’ve got the Premier in Victoria saying they can’t go to their grandparents and get the kiss and a hug. I mean, this is insane. These kids are vulnerable and underdeveloped. Their brains are vulnerable and underdeveloped, and it’s inhuman to expect children to process and cope with the restrictions that adults impose.
[Marcus Paul] All right.
[Malcolm Roberts] Even many adults themselves are now appearing to be on the edge of insanity. And we’re depriving kids of the greatest deprivations, deprivation of liberty, deprivation of education, deprivation of normal development, deprivation of swings, slippery slides and rides on the bike, swims at the beach and local sport, deprivation of crucial friendship support and separated parents, depravation of loving grandparents.
[Marcus Paul] The answer to all of this, is they damn well should have been Olympians or NRL players. Malcolm, I’ve got to go.
[Malcolm Roberts] Good on you mate.
[Marcus Paul] Bye mate. See you later. Malcolm Roberts. There he is. Always passionate, isn’t he?
https://i0.wp.com/www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/truckieplate.00_02_10_22.Still001.png?fit=1920%2C1920&ssl=119201920Senator Malcolm Robertshttps://www.malcolmrobertsqld.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/One-Nation-Logo1-300x150.pngSenator Malcolm Roberts2021-09-02 14:13:392021-09-02 14:20:23Truckies and Protests – 2SM with Marcus Paul
