Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee, , 5:44:36 to 5:47:21
Discussion on the government's response to recommendations regarding coerced repatriation offences and the establishment of a community hub to support victims of foreign interference.
Topics: Human rights, Law reform
Speakers: Senator David Shoebridge, Ciara Spencer, Hamish Hansford, Unknown Speaker
And Ms. Spencer, yes.
Oh, that's nice. Um in July, the I think the insulum recommended a specific offence for coerced repatriation. Um have you seen that recommendation from the insulin? Yep. Um now, of course, we're in October. Has there been any activity from the government in response to the insulin's recommendation?
Senator, those offences would sit with the Attorney General's departments? Sorry. Those um offences would sit with the Attorney General's department?
All right. And do you notwithstanding this the transnational elements of it? Um you're not engaged in that. It's just simply handed over to the Attorney General's department?
No, Senator, we obviously work very closely with Attorney General.
Please tell me what's been happening then.
We have been working through the results of the insulum report and other work that we have been doing through the foreign interference issues. Um we are developing policy and looking at options.
Working through developing policy looking at options? Is that what the evidence is?
In terms of proposed defences, yes.
All right. Um has there been an in-principle acceptance of the insulums proposal? Is it is it being progressed positively? Because you know it's a it's a matter of very real concern to many members in the community. The fact that coerced repatriation is not actually currently unlawful and clearly unlawful?
Yes, Senator, that's a matter for the Attorney General's department, but we're working very closely with the community to talk about um what support we can provide them. We have recently launched a community hub which provides advice, including on transnational repression and our teams do a lot of engagement with the communities to broaden their understanding of the risk and build their resilience and outline the support that the government is able to provide them.
You can you remind me when the national security hotline was established? And I think is that referenced in the hub, the national security hotline as a potential response in the face of transnational repression?
Yes, so the community hub was um put in place at the end of last year. The national security hotline is obviously a very long-standing hotline, and there is reference to it on that, but the intention of the hub is to provide that broader community support and guidance.