Prime minister foreshadows national security address on Monday saying many Australians now suspected of fighting for Islamic State had been on welfare

This article is more than 5 years old

This article is more than 5 years old

The prime minister, Tony Abbott, has foreshadowed a crackdown on abuse of welfare by suspected supporters of terrorist groups.

He said up to November, 55 of 57 Australians who had travelled to the Middle East to join Islamic State had been on welfare.

“If you are fit enough to go overseas to fight for a terrorist organisation, surely you should not be abusing the welfare system back in Australia,” he told reporters in Darwin on Saturday.

Abbott will deliver a national security statement on Monday, that he said would detail what the government was doing to ensure Australians were safe abroad and at home. He said he would address many issues.

“One of them ... is the fact that for too long we have given people who don’t have this country’s interests at heart the benefit of the doubt,” he said.

One of those would appear to be Man Haron Monis, the Iranian-born asylum seeker and gunman in the Sydney Martin Place siege.

Monis, who had taken 18 people hostage, was shot dead when police stormed the cafe, ending the crisis that shocked Australia and made headlines worldwide. Two hostages died.

Previously, Abbott has said, Monis had taken advantage of the Australian system and at every step of the way he was given the benefit of the doubt.

A joint New South Wales and commonwealth report on dealings with Monis before the siege is tipped to be released on Sunday, the day before Abbott’s security statement.

A media report says that’s likely to result in a tougher stance on immigration requirements.

Also in the spotlight is Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir which Attorney-General George Brandis said had for a long time been “close to the edge”.

“We are concerned that Hizb ut-Tahrir is feeding a climate which makes it easier for terrorist recruiters to do their work,” he told ABC television on Friday.

Hizb ut-Tahrir insists it rejects violence following Abbott's 'desperate' accusation Read more

Hizb ut-Tahrir is an international Muslim organisation founded in 1953 with about 300 adherents in Australia. It advocates a single Islamic state, or caliphate, in the Middle East under Islamic law.

The group is banned in many Middle East countries and also in Russia, Turkey, Pakistan and Germany but not in Australia, the US or Britain.

It’s never explicitly advocated violence but it rejects democracy and is equivocal on condemning terrorist violence.

Brandis said the government would do what needed to be done. “In some circumstances monitoring and surveillance is the most efficacious tool, in some circumstances, prohibition,” he said.