The Australian ducks the issue

The Australian newspaper has declared war on the civil liberties of its readers. It has allowed its opinion pages and editorial to become the mouthpiece of laws which could enable its own readers to be subject to control orders, to be detained, to have limited recourse to lawyers and courts, and to even be killed.

The most recent editorial, entitled “Critics duck debate”, seeks to re-focus debate away from specific police powers and onto the bogeyman of terrorism.

And yes, terrorism is a bogeyman. Terrorists hate our liberal democracy, our freedom and our prosperity. Terrorists would do anything to rid us of these freedoms, even if it means attacking civilians. Terrorists (or at least those of the al-Qaida variety) are interested in imposing a legal system which will rid us of the civil liberties we take for granted.

In short, laws which circumscribe civil liberties are exactly what terrorists want. Yes, terrorism is the issue. The police powers, the “shoot to kill” and the lack of access to legal representation and courts is exactly what terrorists would like to see imposed in Iraq, Southern Philippines, Indonesia and everywhere else their bombs and guns kill and maim.

The Australian also seems to want this. The Australian appears to be effectively in league with terrorists. Why? Because of its support for proposed laws which are a win for terrorists.

But that doesn’t stop this (often) most feral of broadsheets from printing misleading and misguided nonsense in the name of supporting an allegedly conservative government.

One wonders whether the editor has bothered to read the draft Bill so bravely and boldly released by the ACT Chief Minister. But who needs knowledge when jingoistic partisan rhetoric is available? After all, it takes up brain cells to read draft Bills. It means having to read other legislation which the Bill seeks to vary. It means having to compare proposals with existing law.

The editorial writer of the Australian is clearly not interested in the use of brain cells. Instead, they make vague references to “Howard haters”, all the while displaying a pathological hatred for the national broadcaster which we are so accustomed to from this American newspaper.

The editorial addresses a few small issues, largely limiting itself to the controversial “shoot to kill” proposal. In doing so, the paper claims that police already have these powers in dealing with serious criminals, and that “it is hard to see what the fuss is about.”

Yes, it is hard when you are sitting in your pseudo-conservative ivory towers in Strawberry Hills and have rarely stepped out into the real world. It is easy when you need not think about the issues but are happy to parrot whatever the official line is that you receive from outside Australia.

The editorial describes the objections to the “shoot to kill” policy as “idiotic”. Perhaps the editorial’s author should actually read the Bill before passing blank-cheque fatwas against a host of legal academics, eminent barristers and at least one former conservative Prime Minister, all of whom have expressed concerns about the proposed changes.

For a start, the new Bill enables police to exercise this power against someone who has a control order made out against them. On what basis is the control order made? And how is this comparable to any other existing situation in criminal law?

In normal criminal procedure, when a person is detained and charged, they are provided with a charge sheet. They are also provided with a summary of the police evidence. Eventually, they or their lawyer may be provided with a full police brief containing statements and exhibits. They can be granted bail with or without conditions. There are no limitations on who can act as their lawyer, and they are almost always offered legal aid.

But under the new legislation, this is not the case. Under the new law, essential liberties are sacrificed for the sake of secret evidence which the defendant may never see. Indeed, the person subject to a control order may not even be a defendant or a suspect. Further, their access to lawyers and courts is restricted.

This essential difference can only be appreciated when the Bill is actually read. You can be subject to a control order if a judge believes on the balance of probabilities that your detention could “assist” in preventing a terrorist act.

And what must be the degree of separation between you and a possible terrorist act? How long is a piece of string?

And what is a terrorist act anyway? According to the Australian Muslim Civil Rights & Advocacy Network (AMCRAN), the vague criteria for obtaining and enforcing control orders makes racial and ethno-religious profiling so much easier.

AMCRAN are obviously basing their assessment not only on reading the act with a fine tooth comb. They are also relying on the thus-far unrefuted (and we suggest irrefutable) contention made by the President of the Police Federation of Australia that the new proposals can only be enforced using racial profiling.

The author of the Australian’s editorial must agree. After all, they state that “[i]n reality, Australia faces the risk that terrorists, who believe Australia is an enemy of Islam, will kill as many of us as they can.”

In other words, to be a terrorist, you have to be a Muslim. After all, I doubt many Buddhists or Callithumpians would be concerned about defending Islam from Australia (whatever that means).

Yet again, for the sake of partisan politics, we see an American-owned newspaper behaving like a very uninformed Australian.

(The author is a Sydney lawyer and occasional lecturer at the School of Politics & International Relations at Macquarie University. He was the Liberal candidate for Reid in the 2001 election, and could hardly be described as a “Howard hater”.)