Reports of plan to give Signals Directorate access to emails and bank records hands minister too much power, says Labor

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

Peter Dutton’s new super ministry should not be given the power to spy on Australians at home, Labor has warned, after reports that it could be handed a wider espionage role.

The head of the Dutton’s home affairs department and the head of the defence department have reportedly discussed new espionage powers that could see Australian citizens monitored by the country’s cyber spy agency.

Talks have been going on since February to allow Australia’s electronic spy agency – the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) – to access emails, bank records and text messages of citizens without their knowledge, according to the Daily Telegraph.



At the moment, the ASD is not allowed to produce intelligence on Australians. That job falls to the domestic spy agency, Asio, and the Australian federal police, who require a warrant, and who can ask the ASD for technical help. Asio needs a warrant signed by the attorney general, Christian Porter.

Asio says threat to Australia greater now than in cold war Read more

The proposal to grant new espionage powers to the ASD represents a further potential power shift away from the attorney general’s department towards Peter Dutton’s new super-ministry of home affairs.

Under the plan, Dutton and the defence minister, Marise Payne, would have the joint responsibility of formally allowing the ASD to spy on “onshore threats” in Australia without the knowledge of the attorney-general.

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The idea has been discussed by the head of home affairs department, Mike Pezzullo, and the head of defence, Greg Moriarty, but no formal request has been made to the government, according to reports. They say the increased powers would help the ASD have a stronger role within the home affairs department, helping it to battle transnational crime syndicates and terror networks that have an onshore and offshore presence.



Peter Dutton’s office declined to comment.

Richard Marles, the shadow defence minister, said the report raised “a whole lot of deeply concerning questions,” including the accumulation of power by Dutton’s home affairs ministry.

“The Australian Signals Directorate, it does do some wider things beyond defence, but it is principally a defence asset,” Marles said on Sunday.

“Our nation’s security and an accumulation of Peter Dutton’s power are two very different things, and it concerns me at times that the government confuses them.

“This needs to be seen as an asset of defence, and that’s where it remains.

“When you are talking about the surveillance of Australians, which occurs right now through the police, through Asio, there’s a whole legal apparatus around that providing safeguards, the requirement of warrants. There’s no indication here about how those safeguards are going to be put in place in relation to ASD.”

Mark Dreyfus, the shadow attorney general, has written to the prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, asking him to investigate how such highly sensitive national security information was leaked to the media.

“The documents described in the media appear to be extremely sensitive and divulge information about one of Australia’s key security agencies,” the letter says.

“It is therefore incumbent on you to establish an investigation into how such sensitive information held by members of your government was able to find its way into the public domain.

“There is no greater responsibility of a government than keeping Australians safe, and safeguarding the integrity of those agencies which perform that duty every day.

“I am deeply concerned that this national security leak is potentially a result of political tensions and divisions inside your government over portfolio responsibilities – the nature of which was widely known.”

On Sunday, Moriarty, Pezzullo, and ASD director, Mike Burgess, issued a joint statement saying there is “no proposal” to increase the ASD’s powers to collect intelligence on Australians or to covertly access their private data.

“We would never provide advice to government suggesting that ASD be allowed to have unchecked data collection on Australians – this can only ever occur within the law, and under very limited and controlled circumstances,” the statement says.

“ASD’s cyber security function is being enhanced under reforms agreed by the government last year in response to the 2017 Independent Intelligence Review.

“The parliament has already passed legislation establishing ASD as an independent statutory agency within the defence portfolio on 28 March 2018 in response to this recommendation.

“The cyber security function entails protecting Australians from cyber-enabled crime and cyber-attacks, and not collecting intelligence on Australians. These are two distinct functions, technically and operationally.

“In the ever-changing world of cyber security as officials we should explore all options to protect Australians and the Australian economy.”

When the home affairs super-portfolio was announced in July last year, intelligence and security experts were split over the need for such a change.

It meant Asio and the Australian federal police would hereafter answer to Dutton as home affairs minister, although the attorney general – at the time, George Brandis – would remain responsible for the approval of warrants.

The overhaul was resisted by Brandis, the foreign affairs minister Julie Bishop, and the justice minister, Michael Keenan, on the basis it would upset arrangements that were working well and strip ministers of their current functions.