Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee [Part 2], , 2:32:16 to 2:36:56
Questions regarding the AFP's participation in the Bondi attack Royal Commission, witness selection, and the implementation of interim recommendations.
Topics: Bondi attack, Royal commissions
Speakers: Hon Jonathon Duniam, Katherine Van Gurp, Krissy Barrett
>> very quickly and uh our best wishes to Deputy Commissioner McCartney as well on retirement. I'll be shortly out the door after you. [laughter] Um but I will indicate uh given time there is a likelihood that the opposition will need a spillover hearing for the agencies. We haven't yeah uh countered a previous advice. It's just now become unsustainable. So uh I do want to go to uh as best as can be dealt with at this point in time the Bondi Bondi uh Royal Commission and just uh the witnesses that were provided by the AFP to uh the commission. So commissioner yourself you you did not attend as a witness but I think one your deputy did is that rise?
>> Uh so senator there was uh a number of AFP members who attended as witnesses but I might pass to our chief operating officer.
>> Sure. Great. And and I guess the point of my question um to the chief operating officer is uh who determined which witnesses attended from the AFP. Was it something that the AFP had discretion over to say well we would like to send commissioner, deputy commissioner, etc. or was it entirely up to the Royal Commission?
>> Thanks Senator. Um we didn't receive specific summons in relation to um specific AFP witnesses. What we did receive from the Royal Commission was a range of questions and issues that they wanted covered which um flowed from the the material that we had provided um on notice. So we responded to 20 um notices to produce um on the basis of those questions we worked through with council assisting in terms of who was best placed to answer the questions that were put in front of us. Um and what what was obvious in the questions is that that the Royal Commission was after specificity. they're after direct evidence. So, we determined that um in terms of our contemporaneous counterterrorism expertise, um our assistant commissioner, Steven Nut, who was assistant commissioner of counterterrorism at the time, was nominated as our primary witness in that um aspect, but we did have a range of other witnesses um that went to the specific questions and the direct evidence that the Royal Commission sought. Some of those witnesses provided um witness statements. Some of them were called to appear in hearings. Some of those hearings were open hearings to the public that you would have seen um them appearing at. And some of them were closed confidential sessions that you wouldn't have seen.
>> No, definitely not. Um so I I guess Commissioner, obviously there was a high degree of interest in at previous hearings and in commentary as well about whether or not you would attend. I mean you have counterterror experience. Was it determined that um assistant deputy commissioner >> nuts assistant commissioner nut would attend instead because of his more relevant recent experience instead of you? What was the rationale to send assistant commissioner nut instead of the commissioner?
>> Yep. Um so senator it was because of the specific questions that the royal commission were asking. So they were after specificity, so an operational level expertise, not necessarily from a commissioner that was able to do or even a deputy commissioner. Um so the assistant commissioner was determined to be the best person who could provide that both a strategic but a reflective um input in terms of actual operational expertise in and around the the Bondi incident.
>> Okay. All right. Thank you for that. Uh just with regard to the recommendation interim report recommendations out of the Royal Commission um obviously there are some that are confidential and I don't want us to sort of breach any of those confidences um but uh in so far as the recommendations relate to the AFP have all steps been taken to implement respond and deal with those recommendations?
>> Yes, Senator. Um so the AFP isn't the lead on any of the recommendations but we certainly are um working with the department and our state and territory colleagues in relation to our input in relation to those invest in those recommendations. Um and my understanding is all recommendations from the interim report both the public and the confidential versions are on track to be completed pri um by the by the end of December.
>> Okay. All right. Thank you very much. If I can quickly move to uh FOIs and refusal rates uh as I understand it um that the rate of refusal has risen from 22% to 40% from 202122 to 2024 25. Is there a a driving reason for that increase in refusals to freedom of information requests?