The government’s new chair of the intelligence and security committee, Peter Khalil, says he is “absolutely concerned” about what appear to be leaks from the national security committee of cabinet contained in a recently published book.
Plagued, which was written by Simon Benson and Geoff Chambers and revealed how Scott Morrison appointed himself to multiple ministries in his government, also contained details of previously secret deliberations of Australia’s national security committee (NSC) of cabinet.
These include discussions about the government’s approach to dealing with China, the decision-making process behind closing Australia’s borders in early 2020, and discussions around Australia’s defence posture.
The book details comments made by Morrison at a meeting of the NSC in April 2020, in which tensions with China were discussed. “Don’t doubt China’s capacity and will to exploit Covid-19,” Morrison told the meeting, according to the book.
In a later meeting of the NSC on 20 April 2020, “Morrison took a decision to up the ante with Beijing”, telling the meeting “the time had come to be more strident in its language about China’s conduct”.
“‘We need multiple points of pushback on this increasing aggression,’ he told them.”
Khalil, who was appointed as chair of the parliamentary joint committee on intelligence and security (PJCIS) this week, said he had not read the book but “absolutely” was concerned at what appeared to be “a leak” from NSC.
“People say ‘oh why the secretive nature around some of these deliberations?’ I think one of the main reasons is that in order to effectively make decisions … you have to have a degree of confidentiality so you can actually work through the options.
“So, look, that is of a concern because those deliberations can be taken out of context as well, people are trying to work out in an iterative process the best way forward.”
Morrison has previously said he provided the authors with interviews as the pandemic unfolded, saying he cooperated with interviews “that were done contemporaneously”.
“That book was written based on interviews that were conducted at the time, in the middle of the tempest,” Morrison said.
The authors also spoke with many other senior Coalition ministers at the time. The authors do not disclose who was the source of the information.
Leaks from the NSC are rare and may constitute a criminal offence if they are “inherently harmful”, a category which includes disclosure of “security classified information”.
Despite the election of a record number of independents and minor parties to parliament, Labor and the Coalition again used their superior numbers this week to ensure only their MPs and senators were appointed to the PJCIS.
The Greens’ justice spokesman, David Shoebridge, said the public “expects parliament to deal with sensitive security and intelligence matters with integrity, not just have the two major parties play footsie on them”.
Legislation requires the prime minister and opposition leader to consider “the desirability of ensuring that the composition of the committee reflects the representation of recognised political parties in parliament”.
Khalil told Guardian Australia the composition was a “matter for the parliament and for the leaders” to determine.
He said minor parties had been consulted – which Shoebridge claimed consisted only of notifying them of proposed Liberal and Labor members in advance.
We raised this with Labor directly because politicising this is not good for democracy & integrity and this membership does NOT comply with the Intelligence Act. Their ‘consultation’ involves sending us a list of the Labor and Liberal members they will appoint!
— David Shoebridge (@DavidShoebridge) September 6, 2022
The committee’s first inquiries were into orders that temporarily exclude terrorist suspects from Australia and the foreign influence transparency scheme, which received submissions in the previous term of parliament but were yet to hold public hearings.
The PJCIS was also reviewing security agencies’ budgets, which Khalil said could develop an “evidence base” for ministers to consider “whether there needs to be more investment in cyber or there needs to be more investment in one element of intelligence”.
Khalil said it was “really important” to consider legislation through the prism of a “balance between individuals’ rights – such as right to privacy and civil liberties – versus the state having powers with respect to public security and safety”.
Khalil said the committee had a “long tradition of bipartisanship” and “responsible attempts to get the best possible laws”.
“I would like to think that tradition could continue,” he said.
