Tag Archive for: Australian Government

The problems with Australia’s social media youth law

Australia’s landmark attempt to restrict youth access to social media will bring unwelcome consequences. The government’s legislation, passed by parliament on 28 November, risks shifting online problems to social media platforms that it doesn’t cover. It also undermines parents’ rights and offers little clarity on enforcement or effectiveness.

Its limitations on social media access fail to acknowledge the nuanced nature of digital harms. What Australia needs is not a blunt instrument such as an age restriction, but a comprehensive, forward-thinking strategy that addresses the full range of digital harms that young people face.

The legislation is the Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Bill 2024. The world-first law will require social media platforms to withhold access from Australians under 16.

The Bill’s intent is clear—to safeguard young Australians from the perceived harms of social media, mainly related to mental health—but its approach is vague and misguided.

Mixed messages sent by Australian politicians about youth responsibility are stark. While the federal government is moving ahead with this legislation, in Queensland and the Northern Territory there’s a push to reduce the age of criminal responsibility; some suggest that children as young as 10 should be held accountable for serious crimes. At the same time, the Australian Greens are advocating for a reduction in the voting age, proposing that young people should have a say in the nation’s future despite being considered too immature to manage their own online presence. Those inconsistencies undermine the clarity and effectiveness of national policy on youth issues.

At its core, the Bill seeks to address a poorly understood issue with a solution that appears more reactionary than strategic. It fails to acknowledge the nuanced nature of digital harms—mental health issues, online radicalisation and misinformation—many of which are not confined to traditional social media.

Restricting access to platforms like Snapchat, TikTok and Instagram may seem like an obvious measure to protect youth, but it overlooks the dynamic, shifting nature of the online world. Rather than curbing digital harms, it could push young people towards less regulated spaces such as gaming platforms, forums or encrypted messaging apps. That could open up new, unforeseen risks.

Young people’s relationships and social interactions are increasingly digital. For them, online friendships are just as real, meaningful and complex as the ones forged in person by previous generations. By failing to understand that shift, the Bill risks misjudging young people’s digital lives and undermining their autonomy. Moreover, it risks socially isolating many young Australians from friends geographically dispersed across the world.

Enforcing the legislation will be challenging. It does not clearly define what constitutes a ‘social media platform’ or outline a concrete plan for implementing restrictions, even if that’s technically possible. For instance, Snapchat could easily circumvent restrictions by reducing its social media features, leaving its core messaging capabilities intact. The legislation also excludes messaging and gaming platforms. Youth radicalisation has often occurred in spaces outside conventional social media on platforms like Discord or through direct messaging. As we’ve seen in recent cases of violent extremism, those platforms can play just as pivotal a role in radicalisation as social media networks.

The Bill assumes that digital harm can be mitigated through restrictions alone, without considering the broader context of online engagement. While reducing young people’s exposure to certain platforms might protect them from some forms of harm, it does not address the root causes or provide lasting solutions.

The reality is that young Australians will continue to be exposed to harmful content online, regardless of which platform they use. The real issue lies not just in the platforms themselves but in a lack of digital literacy, inadequate online safety education and the broader societal factors that contribute to mental health struggles. With its focus on age-based restrictions, the Bill fails to provide a holistic, effective solution to the challenges young people face in today’s digital environment. Also, if social media organisations implement these measures, they’ll arguably be required to hold more of our data, bringing new risks.

Australia needs a comprehensive, forward-thinking strategy that addresses the full range of digital harms young people face. That includes improving digital literacy in schools, equipping parents with the tools to protect and guide their children and strengthening collaboration with tech companies to develop more effective content moderation.

Rather than simply banning access to certain platforms, the government must focus on promoting resilience, fostering safer online spaces and giving young people the skills they need to navigate the digital world responsibly. Importantly, any policy response must respect the rights of parents to make decisions about their children’s digital lives and avoid imposing top-down solutions that limit parental involvement.

The government’s approach to this Bill fails to recognise the complexity of digital harm and, by focusing solely on age-based restrictions, risks creating a false sense of security. The solution lies not in attempting to shut Pandora’s box but in ensuring that the next generation is equipped to handle its contents. Perhaps the starting point should be better engaging with Australia’s youth.

Getting Australia’s digital Trust Exchange right

To realise the potential of the Digital ID Act and the recently unveiled Trust Exchange (TEx), the government must move past political soundbites and develop a comprehensive identity and credentials strategy that includes building technical architecture and conducting an end-to-end security assessment.

The government is yet to publish the rules and standards in relation to the Digital ID Act, which was finally passed May. We’re also still waiting to hear details of TEx, a world-leading digital identity verification system, which Government Services Minister Bill Shorten unveiled in August.

The Digital ID Act was the government’s response to the 2022 data breaches at Optus and Medibank, which prompted a fundamental reassessment of what sensitive data should be collected and how long it should be stored. Businesses should still conduct checks on customers—for example, to prevent money-laundering or alcohol sales to minors—but a better solution is needed than simply storing digitised copies of paper identification documents.

A digital ID scheme had been proposed for many years in different guises, but the 2022 breaches finally led to a new draft legislation in September 2023, kicking off the process that led to the Digital ID Act.

This Act is a major step in the right direction. It provides a legislated basis for a federated trust system and avoids creating a unique identifier for every citizen or a centralised ‘honeypot’ of data about people and their transactions. The accreditation rules include strong privacy and security safeguards to build trust in the system and put individuals in control of what personal data is disclosed to whom and when. However, as I outline in a recent ASPI report, there are several policy issues which, if left unresolved, could jeopardise successful deployment and adoption of the digital ID system.

Based on the limited details released so far, TEx could be on the verge of repeating many of the same missteps.

TEx appears to be a system that securely shares specific identity attributes for in-person interactions through a digital identity app on a handheld device. One example is proof-of-age checks at licenced premises: in lieu of physical documentation that shows the customer’s date of birth, the app simply verifies whether they are over or under 18. This would prevent data breaches such as the Clubs NSW incident, in which hackers stole data from patrons’ drivers licences that had been routinely scanned and stored.

But the sparse details about TEx are contradictory and ambiguous, causing some to be sceptical of the scheme. Shorten has suggested that it will ‘build upon digital ID infrastructure’, using the existing identity exchange operated by Services Australia and the myGov app, supported by some sort of record of each identity verification transaction. But this contradicts accreditation rules for the identity exchange, which specifically prohibit it from keeping logs of user activity.

This sort of ambiguity leads some to assume the worst, such as Electronic Frontiers Australia who claim the system will create the ‘mother of all honeypots’ and enable centralised surveillance. It doesn’t help that a recent Ombudsman report suggested that the myGov app currently falls well short of expectations on security and fraud prevention.

The government is also setting unrealistic expectations about the benefits of TEx, with Shorten suggesting that it will achieve ‘some of the best aspects of the GDPR’. The introduction of GDPR—the European Union’s data privacy and security law—had a dramatic effect on companies’ security and privacy practices because it was backed by massive penalties for non-compliance and encompassed all aspects of data collection, storage and usage. In contrast, Australia’s TEx, a voluntary system that might allow some organisations to opt out of collecting some personal data, is never going to have the same level of impact.

The incentives for companies to opt-in are unclear. Big names such as CBA and Seek have apparently offered ‘in-principle’ support, but this may change when they hear more details, particularly about costs.

It is also unclear how these different IT systems, owned and operated by different departments, will fit together to provide end-to-end service, security and privacy. TEx will be built by Services Australia, ‘on top of’ Digital ID infrastructure set up by the Department of Finance. Meanwhile the Attorney-General’s Department is developing a mobile app that alerts users whenever their identity credentials are used.

To execute these systems successfully, the government must develop an overarching identity and credentials strategy across the Commonwealth and the states and territories. This should include technical architecture, based on sound system engineering principles, that outlines how the different systems will work together. There should also be an end-to-end security assessment to ensure data confidentiality and resilience in the system. To achieve this, the government must break down departmental silos and build public support through transparent information and debate.

These new digital ID systems have the potential to increase privacy standards, reduce data breaches and improve the public’s experience of government service delivery—but only if it is properly executed. This opportunity is too big to squander.

Editors’ picks for 2023: ‘AUKUS raises questions that go to the heart of Australian strategic policy’

Originally published on 2 November 2023.

The AUKUS program—sweeping in the intimacy and level of its proposed cooperation—has enjoyed a high level of bipartisan support among the Australian political elite. First agreed by the Coalition government in September 2021, it was reaffirmed by the Australian Labor Party—then in opposition—within 24 hours, subject to a small number of caveats. The Labor government under Anthony Albanese has taken more fulsome ownership of the program since its election in May 2022. The prime minister was in Washington last week, meeting with President Joe Biden and making the case for AUKUS with some recalcitrant members of the US Congress.

That bipartisanship is unsurprising, given the golden chalice that AUKUS holds out to Australia: namely, assistance in the acquisition of eight nuclear-powered submarines (Pillar 1), a capability exercised by few countries worldwide, and a seat at the top table in exploring the potential of a range of cutting-edge technologies (Pillar 2).

But it would be wrong to imagine that AUKUS is above political debate. Indeed, quite the opposite. The program has provoked the revival of some old areas of contention in Australian strategic policy and encouraged a few new ones. I intend to explore five: three that relate directly to AUKUS and two others that reflect older, wider divisions.

The two broader debates are about:

  • the near versus the far in Australian strategic policy priority-setting
  • the relative balance between Asia and the Anglosphere in Australian strategic linkages.

The three that touch directly on AUKUS are about whether the program will:

  • deliver the hoped-for blend of purchased US submarines and home-built Australian ones
  • have a distortionary effect on other defence and social spending (what we might call the ‘elephant on the waterbed’ effect)
  • provide the right outcomes—a debate spurred in part by a sotto voce concern about whether the advanced technologies of Pillar 2 will, in fact, help provide the means of tracking and sinking the submarines so expensively procured under Pillar 1.

Let’s start with the near–far debate. It’s an old debate in Australia that’s always close to the surface. It pits those who believe Australia should concentrate on fighting off existential threats close to home—‘border wars’— against those who would be prepared to fight for grander goals in more distant theatres—‘order wars’. The classic criticism that the border school throws at the order school is that they get sucked into ‘other people’s wars’. And the classic response of the order school is that order wars help prevent the emergence of border wars.

The nuclear-powered submarines are, unmistakably, vessels that would fit better as a contribution to order wars—the far rather than the near—and so stir once more that old polarisation.

Sam Roggeveen’s recent book, The echidna strategy, shows that we’re witnessing a revival of this debate. For Roggeveen, who is the director of the Lowy Institute’s international security program, Australia’s geographical location is a prized strategic asset—because distance complicates an aggressor’s calculations about use of force.

In normal years, Australians don’t think of their country as a spiky, indigestible monotreme. Echidnas spend most of their lives with their noses in the dirt. Their strategic horizon is low and short. By contrast, Australia is a strategic extrovert—not just because its closest strategic partners live far away, but because the global, regional and even neighbourhood order is set by the force balances along the Eurasian rimlands. When Albanese spoke in Washington of the AUKUS submarines as Australia’s contribution to ‘strategic equilibrium in the Indo-Pacific’, he was echoing that thought.

Existential threats to Australia aren’t merely those that unfold close to our borders, although the emphasis placed on deterrence by denial in the recent defence strategic review unhelpfully misleads on that point. Coercion can happen over longer ranges. And our strategic fate is entangled with the fates of our allies and partners: there is no world in which Australia bravely soldiers on as the last bastion of democracy when all others have fallen.

The second debate concerns the relative weighting of Asia and the Anglosphere in Australian policy settings. Some of the fiercest criticism of AUKUS has come from those who—in earlier years—invested heavily in Australia’s supposed ‘reorientation’ to Asia. Unsurprisingly, this debate is coloured by a wide range of factors that have almost nothing to do with submarines—such as the rise and fall of Asian-language tuition in Australian schools and universities, and the correlation between Anglophilia and being at the right of the Australian political spectrum.

In his National Press Club speech in March, former prime minister Paul Keating charged that ‘a contemporary Labor government [was] shunning security in Asia for security in and within the Anglosphere’. AUKUS tied Australia to the old, declining Anglospheric powers. In his book Engagement, published in 2000, Keating wrote of the US as ‘the big dog’ on the Asia–Pacific block. Clearly, he thinks that time has passed; he argues for the US to be a balancing power in the region, but believes that any attempt by Washington to cling to primacy would not have a happy ending.

This debate turns directly on the impact—real or imagined—of the AUKUS program on Australia’s relations with Asian countries. The opinions of the Southeast Asian states seem to be of particular concern, with Indonesian statements meriting exegetical analysis. Northeast Asian countries, such as Japan and South Korea—fellow US allies—are generally supportive.

And then there’s China itself, of course. What does AUKUS mean for Australia’s relations with China? Despite AUKUS, the bilateral relationship has stabilised. Former head of intelligence Peter Varghese says it’s not in Australia’s interest to thwart the rise of China. But that depends on what kind of China rises, doesn’t it?

Let’s move to the three debates over AUKUS itself. The debate over capacity has two foci—because AUKUS has both a purchase component and a build one. The purchase part of the program is scheduled to unfold during a time when America’s submarine-construction capacity has no spare headroom—US submarine yards are struggling to satisfy US domestic demand. There are questions too about the build component. Australia has never built a nuclear-powered submarine, or indeed anything of such complexity. And while the US has experience in different shipyards each producing parts of a submarine, the final assembly is usually done by the shipyard with the responsibility for installing the reactor unit.

These two difficulties are directly related: if we minimise the number of submarines purchased from the US, we increase our reliance on domestic production. Conversely, if we minimise the vessels built locally, we increase the disruptive effects on the US shipyards.

The fourth debate centres on the potential distortionary effect of AUKUS on other defence programs and on broader social spending. That concern is about more than simple opportunity costs. The sheer size of AUKUS means the program may prove to be a gravity well, sucking talented personnel and funding from other areas both within and beyond the defence portfolio. The defence budget will have to increase substantially for the country to be able to afford both the AUKUS submarine program and a viable surface fleet, air force and army. Former ministers differ on the degree of distortion. Kim Beazley still supports the program, arguing that the subs will be worth the wait and the cost. Alexander Downer supports getting nuclear-powered submarines but buying them all off the shelf.

Finally, the fifth debate touches on outcomes. Even the full eight submarines won’t be deployable simultaneously, so, really, we’d be looking at one or two at sea at any one time. That could still be a significant capability—provided submarines remain largely invisible and invulnerable during their deployments.

But there’s the rub: might the potency of the AUKUS submarines be compromised by the very technologies being explored in Pillar 2? Back in 2019, the US Defense Science Board observed that quantum sensing applications were ‘currently poised for mission use’. Such improvements, married to more capable artificial intelligence, might render the seas less opaque than they are now. There would be a degree of irony if the technologies of Pillar 2 ended up substantially negating the very submarines so expensively procured under Pillar 1.

Together, those five debates suggest the AUKUS program will be the subject of continuing controversy. Today’s bipartisanship is deceptive.

Benbrika case shows Australia in danger of complacency about violent extremism

The fact that convicted terrorist Abdul Nacer Benbrika is being released from jail should be of concern to all Australians. Alarmingly, it’s happening without the court system even being asked to consider a continuing detention order.

Just three years ago, the home affairs minister asked the Victorian Supreme Court for a continuing detention order, a vital last-resort measure that enables a convicted terrorist to be kept behind bars after they’ve finished their sentence, on the basis that they continue to pose ‘an unacceptable risk’ of committing further terrorist crimes.

The court agreed, deciding Benbrika posed an unacceptable risk. So what has changed in three years?

Is it possible that Benbrika has reformed such that any risk he poses is now acceptable? That seems highly unlikely, but if a new assessment has found that the risk has fallen, the government would at the very least need to explain that shift to ensure public confidence.

So what else has changed?

First, the governance arrangements, with the decision to seek a CDO shifting from the Home Affairs portfolio to the Attorney-General’s portfolio.

Second, the strategic and security environment. A few years ago, we were at the height of the Islamic State threat and there was enormous awareness of the risks of terrorism. The terror threat level in Australia was high, with terrorists planning attacks in and against Australia.

By 2022, the terror threat level was reduced from probable to possible. IS was degraded with its control over land in Syria and Iraq removed and capabilities severely reduced. The risk since last year, however, has been an increasing perception that the terror threat was not just temporarily reduced but had faded completely—even though the head of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, Mike Burgess, was at pains to say that wasn’t the case.

And we have made this mistake before.

The January 2013 national security statement effectively said the era of terrorism was behind us. Yet, within the year, IS had risen.

The terror threat level was raised and we reached the alarming realisation that the security law framework wasn’t adequate for this new era.

The control-order regime—allowing authorities to put special monitoring arrangements on people of concern—was updated multiple times and new laws were introduced, including the continuing detention regime.

Of course, CDOs are a measure of last resort. The basic principle of justice is that criminals who complete their sentences are released, having received their punishment and, hopefully, a chance at rehabilitation.

But the evidence shows that some offenders remain simply too much of an ongoing security threat. Benbrika was one of these.

He had a proven ability as a leader who could inspire others and coordinate a terrorism plot, including a plan to detonate a bomb at the Melbourne Cricket Ground during the 2005 AFL Grand Final. His failure to reform in prison, and his ongoing proselytisation of violent jihadism, meant he continued to pose a danger.

In the past couple of years, we have moved into an era in which other threats have risen and surpassed terrorism. Foreign interference and espionage were declared in 2021 to be Australia’s top security threats.

But Burgess has always been clear this doesn’t mean terrorism has disappeared. Yet we’re now at risk of repeating our mistakes. Because IS and al-Qaeda are no longer on the front pages, we’re in danger of complacency about violent extremism.

We saw this play out in March 2023 when the then Independent National Security Legislation Monitor, Grant Donaldson—arguably stepping beyond his remit—said that CDOs were not necessary to counter the threat of terrorism and recommended they be abolished.

In doing so, the watchdog was choosing a point in time and misunderstanding the nature of the terrorism threat, which ebbs and flows. The government is yet to make any response to the recommendation.

In fact, in recent weeks the parliament has introduced a new preventative detention regime based on the terror laws to deal with the fallout of the High Court ruling that meant more than 150 non-citizens were released from immigration detention, some despite having criminal convictions.

This shows the folly of the original recommendation and shows it’s unlikely the government will abolish CDOs altogether—all the more reason why someone as serious as Benbrika shouldn’t be released without a court even being given a chance to consider continuing detention.

In another significant development, the Hamas–Israel war has inflamed hatreds for which a firebrand like Benbrika could prove a combustible new accelerant.

Overall, Australia is proving to be a resilient nation, to the credit of our multicultural society. But there are extremists looking to incite hatred and violence.

Remember, just three years ago, a court found Benbrika to pose an unacceptable risk to society.

And yet the Commonwealth isn’t even asking the court to hold him further. What risk is there in asking the court the question it affirmed in 2020?

Surely less than the risk of releasing Australia’s most notorious terrorist into the community.

CDOs are a constitutionally valid measure that we’ve just seen used as the model for the immigration detainees. And yet we are choosing not to use it now.

If we don’t use it for someone like Benbrika, when would we use it?

Strengthening Australia’s relationships in Africa through education

Australia’s commitment to supporting education initiatives in Africa has long been a cornerstone of its diplomatic approach to the continent. Over the years, Australians have pioneered several programs and partnerships aimed at fostering education and developing skills in various African countries. This effort isn’t only a gesture of goodwill. It’s a strategic investment in the future of the continent, and from scholarships to collaborative research initiatives, Australian projects have long been providing educational opportunities that bridge knowledge gaps, empower individuals and promote sustainable development.

But in recent pandemic-affected years, the sector has shrunk by 50%. In response, Australia’s Minister for Trade and Tourism Don Farrell has instructed the Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade to initiate an inquiry into the tourism and international education sectors. The committee released an interim report in October, which argued for urgent market diversification, including for international education.

The provision of scholarships for African students to study in Australia has been a significant aspect of Australia’s engagement with the continent. While their numbers are a modest proportion of international students overall, the impact of over 45,000 African students in Australia between 2002 and 2021 can’t be understated. Scholarships offer invaluable educational and professional experiences that students use to contribute to the development of Africa when they return, whether they go on to work in agriculture, health, technology, governance or any other industry.

They also facilitate an exchange of ideas, cultures and experiences between Australian and African students that enriches the learning environment, promotes cross-cultural understanding and makes the teaching environment more vibrant and inclusive.

Australia’s interest in re-examining this reflects the federal government’s recognition of Africa’s strategic significance. Assistant Foreign Minister Tim Watts’s visits to Morocco, Ghana and South Africa in December last year and Ethiopia and Kenya in February this year show that. Australia’s diplomatic engagement can serve as a bridge to expand cooperation in education and economic growth in general.

Given its location between the Pacific and Indian Ocean regions, Australia has a strong interest in fostering stability, security and economic engagement in Africa. Recent trade tensions with China have shown Australia the importance of diversifying its export markets. Leveraging opportunities in Africa could create mutually beneficial partnerships in various sectors, easing reliance on any one market and broadening economic horizons.

Africa’s potential for economic growth and transformation is undeniable. With a burgeoning population, an expanding middle class and abundant natural resources, Africa has many attractive markets for Australian goods, services and investments. Strengthening economic ties won’t just mitigate trade dependencies—it will create jobs and make Australia more prosperous.

In the education sector, Australia’s work in Africa goes beyond scholarships. Initiatives such as the Australia Awards and the Australian Volunteers Program, and collaboration through networks such as the Australia Africa Universities Network, aim to develop skills and address shared educational challenges. These efforts encourage innovation and improve problem-solving across various disciplines.

The Australia Awards, the African Women in Agricultural Research and Development fellowships and other initiatives emphasise Australia’s commitment to building capacity while aligning with important Australian values like gender equality. The benefits of these programs aren’t limited to the students and professionals who engage in them; they have produced valuable research, policy recommendations and practical solutions for communities in Australia and across Africa.

But there’s massive potential to do more. It’s imperative for Australian policymakers to strategically consider diversification, identify interests and explore the possibilities for Australia in Africa. The Advisory Group on Australia–Africa Relations is one avenue that can be expanded to foster innovation and diplomatic exchange.

Sasha Hampson, a senior executive at the learning company Pearson Australia, has suggested that the potential scale of the student market in Africa is matched only by India and China, noting that Nigeria sends more students abroad than any other African country. While more than 100,000 Nigerian students studied abroad in 2022, less than 3% of them enrolled with an Australian institution.

At a recent gathering of Ugandans who studied in Australia held in Kampala, Australia’s high commissioner, Luke Williams, described educational exchange as the bedrock of Australia’s relations with the continent. The Australian government’s commitment to education and development in Africa is a long-term investment. It must go beyond episodic assistance and build sustainable ties for the long term that set Australia and African countries up for a more interconnected, prosperous future together. Some investments and partnerships are already laying the groundwork, but the government must consider every possible opportunity to deepen this collaboration.

Astute lessons for Australia’s AUKUS submarine workforce

Senior officials in Australia, the United States and the United Kingdom continue to sing the praises of the AUKUS agreement. The likely passage of the US National Defense Authorization Act and approval of billions of dollars in US support, along with announcements on joint development and progress on Pillar 2 initiatives, have raised hopes among the deal’s proponents that Pillar 1—the AUKUS-class nuclear-powered submarines—will deliver the capability it promises.

Yet if the Australian government wishes to deliver Pillar 1 on time and within the already-wide budget range it has previously outlined, it must learn lessons from the troubled history of the UK’s Astute class of nuclear-powered attack submarines (SSNs). BAE Systems, the primary contractor for the Astute program, was awarded a contract to develop the AUKUS submarines in October and is likely to face challenges in developing a nuclear-capable workforce in Australia, as it did in the past in the UK.

With the AUKUS boats slated to be modelled off the Astute design and Australia having to build a workforce from a low industrial base like the UK had, Australia is at risk of repeating the mistakes of the past unless concerted efforts are made to mitigate the problems that hampered the rollout of the Astute program.

As outlined in a new report from the United States Studies Centre, the Astute program was plagued by delays and cost overruns from its inception—primarily because of poor integration and mismanagement of the shipbuilding workforce. A 17-year ’valley of death’ in submarine development at Barrow-in-Furness resulted in significant attrition of its experienced workforce, with little investment in a new generation of young talent to replace retiring workers.

The Barrow shipbuilding workforce fell from 13,000 to 3,000 between the end of the Vanguard class and the beginning of the Astute program. It therefore had significant skills shortages due to its reliance on new staff hired at the outset of the Astute program.

In addition, a small-government philosophy among the leadership of the day slashed the Ministry of Defence’s staff at Barrow from 50 during Vanguard to fewer than half a dozen. Minimal governmental oversight and coordination exacerbated the Astute program’s problems and led to poor visibility within government of the challenges facing the shipbuilding workforce. The private sector then proved ill-prepared to deal with erroneous government assumptions about the design and construction risks of the program.

Following years of delays and cost increases, the workforce issues hampering the Astute rollout began to be mitigated by greater government oversight, stakeholder communication and thorough planning of future workforce requirements. The workforce at the Barrow shipyard now numbers around 10,000 and is poised to grow to 17,000 by the decade’s end. Increases to onsite Ministry of Defence staff, the establishment of a key suppliers forum to coordinate with industry, and external workforce expertise from the US significantly boosted workforce skills, planning and management.

Key to ongoing workforce resilience has been the establishment of a £25 million skills academy in Barrow in 2018. A focus on young workers has boosted retention rates, with hundreds of apprentices having now passed through the academy. Effective integration of funded apprenticeships is likely to also be needed for the development of Pillar 1.

If Australia is to avoid the same pitfalls faced by the UK in developing a nuclear-capable workforce, it must prioritise workforce management and development as crucial to the AUKUS enterprise. Announcements of initiatives such as a skills academy in South Australia and support for university science, technology and engineering places and overseas shipbuilding placements for Australian workers are signs that the government is taking these concerns seriously.

Yet for a multi-decade program such as AUKUS, relentless attention on workforce management will be essential. Strong government leadership will be required to coordinate private-sector efforts, along with effective project and workforce management. Given the significant lead time required to recruit, train and develop a specialised industrial workforce and the enormous complexity of the engineering task they face, efforts will have to be rapidly expanded in the short term but continued in the long term.

The Australian Submarine Agency should also take care not to fully separate the design, build and operational planning teams. That was the approach taken during the Astute program, which hampered its early development due to unwieldy workforce and project management.

Mimicking the model of vocational skills training successfully employed in the UK won’t be easy. British training institutions have benefited from close relationships with employers such as BAE, but structural hurdles in Australia’s tertiary education system and limited integration between industry and tertiary education will make that hard to replicate.

In the absence of proper planning and workforce development, the strategic argument for AUKUS is likely to unravel in the face of mounting costs and delays. The risks and challenges of the Astute program were underestimated by both industry and the UK government. If Australia wishes to see AUKUS through, it can’t afford to make the same mistakes.

Australia’s new cybersecurity strategy tackles the tough issues

The cybersecurity strategy released last week by the Albanese government is about collaboration and communication, not about conjuring our worst national-security nightmares. It’s focused on industry and consumers.

The government, industry and citizens must work together with trust for Australia to make real changes in our cybersecurity, and this strategy recognises that. One of Cyber Security Minister Clare O’Neil’s objectives seems to be humanising cyber and making it appealing and accessible to everyday Australians.

Of the six ‘cyber shields’ in the strategy, ‘strong businesses and citizens’ is number one. The first actions out of the gate are directly helping small and medium-sized businesses with free cyber health checks and establishing a small business cybersecurity resilience service to give advice. Arguably, these are things the Australian Cyber Security Centre should be doing already, but the $7.2 million health checks and $11 million advice program have been welcomed by industry groups.

The government is also inviting business to ‘co-design options’ for regulation or legislative changes that affect industry. These include a ransomware reporting obligation, a new cyber incident review board, a code of practice for cyber incident response providers, mandatory standards for smart devices, a voluntary labelling scheme for smart devices and a code of practice for software development.

It’s great that the government is including industry in the conversation, but open-ended ‘co-design’ risks delaying real action. These phases must be strictly controlled with defined end dates.

More broadly, the strategy isn’t revolutionary. On a generous assessment, perhaps eight of the 48 prescribed actions are new initiatives. The rest Australia has tried before, or has already introduced.

This shows that, even in a constantly moving cybersecurity landscape, there are enduring problems. It also shows that the government is willing to build on what has been done before rather than wipe the slate clean for the sake of politics.

The two most important enduring problems that frustrate Australia’s cybersecurity are information-sharing and cyber workforce shortages, and each has a ‘cyber shield’ dedicated to it.

Information asymmetries between consumers, companies and governments make stopping threats and responding to incidents slow, ineffective and expensive. The strategy seeks to improve information-sharing by creating better motivations and opportunities to share.

Share-price drops, reputation risks and legal ramifications are among the reasons companies avoid reporting cyber incidents to the government. Sometimes it’s honest confusion about when and how to report. The strategy proposes a range of actions to create the right environment to motivate information-sharing.

The ‘no fault, no liability’ ransomware reporting proposal and a proposed ‘limited use obligation’ that clarifies how the Australian Signals Directorate and the cybersecurity coordinator may use cyber incident reporting will give companies greater peace of mind. Clarifying the cybersecurity reporting obligations for owners and operators of critical infrastructure will remove ambiguity about how and when to report.

The strategy also creates opportunities and platforms to foster industry–government threat intelligence sharing through a cyber executive council, streamlining ASD’s reporting portal and establishing or scaling up Information Sharing and Analysis Centres—a model that has worked fairly effectively in the United States for 20 years.

The co-led Microsoft–ASD Cyber Shield, or MACS—although currently opaque—should also enhance national threat intelligence sharing and capabilities. It will focus on detecting, analysing and defending against sophisticated nation-state cyber threats.

Australia’s cyber workforce, however, is the fly in the ointment. Our workforce shortage has been around for decades and is only getting bigger. The problem is even more acute in government, where below-market salaries and onerous security requirements are additional barriers to an adequate cyber workforce.

The strategy refers to building the local cyber skills pipeline through better workforce analysis, vocational training, changes to the primary and secondary curriculum, and additional higher education Commonwealth-supported places. These are good but existing policies. The strategy’s only real new action is increasing skilled migration. In the same breath, questions of detail are shifted to the government’s upcoming migration strategy to answer.

Australia isn’t alone in the global struggle to attract talent, and skilled migration settings are difficult to get right. It also raises complex questions about other major policy areas, not least of which are housing, infrastructure and the cost of living.

There’s a sense that increasing migration is an easy answer to what should be a more expensive and difficult conversation on how to build on the existing policies. One moonshot would be to redirect some of the $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund into subsidising education to get tens of thousands of young Australians into cyber training and careers.

As with all strategies, implementation is essential. An action plan naming lead agencies offers welcome accountability. The strategy’s two-year ‘horizons’ also create a realistic runway with what should be built-in evaluation and pivot points.

And we should expect to pivot, given the degrading security environment and the rate of development of transformational technologies like artificial intelligence. On these, the strategy’s actions are unlikely to put Australia ahead of the curve, being limited to ‘embedding’ cybersecurity into ongoing work and updating the Information Security Manual.

In many ways, the Department of Home Affairs and the broader Australian government are well placed to move forward on cybersecurity. As the strategy itself states, we have robust regulation in the recent Security of Critical Infrastructure Act and strong offensive and defensive capabilities with ASD’s REDSPICE funding of $9.9 billion over 10 years. Australia is a trusted partner sitting within a powerful set of multilateral arrangements, including the Five Eyes, AUKUS, the Quad and the Pacific Islands Forum.

Home Affairs has also established the new cybersecurity coordinator’s office, a separate team to manage the strategy’s implementation, and a detailed action plan to execute. On the other hand, the department is still reeling from the departures of secretary Mike Pezzulo in September and cybersecurity coordinator Darren Goldie last week, after only four months in the job.

Dennis Richardson’s scathing review of Home Affairs’ handling of offshore detention was leaked around the same time Goldie’s recall was announced. One of the unspoken actions of this strategy’s first horizon out to 2025 will be navigating Home Affairs’ leadership uncertainty, fiscal constraint and external scrutiny.

Australia’s climate-security support for Tuvalu a leap in the right direction

The Falepili Union, a security treaty between Australia and Tuvalu announced at the conclusion of last week’s Pacific Islands Forum leaders’ meeting, is a huge leap forward for tackling climate change—the existential security threat for Pacific island countries—and a great example of Australian leadership in securing the region’s future. The message has been well received in the Pacific, which recognises that long-term security lies in working together and creating highly tailored agreements and support mechanisms that will build upon underlying regional processes and values.

The Falepili Union will establish special visa arrangements for Tuvaluan citizens to live, work and study in Australia; generate a commitment to collective security between the two countries; and greatly expand on Australian support to Tuvalu’s climate adaptation needs. In essence, these climate adaptation and special visa arrangements provide Tuvaluans with options, including the ability to move back and forth between Australia and Tuvalu, strengthening cultural ties and supporting further education and economic development.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called the treaty ‘the most significant agreement between Australia and a Pacific island nation ever’, and Foreign Minister Penny Wong said it was the most significant step since Papua New Guinea’s independence in 1975. One question following the treaty’s signing is whether it is a lone agreement or part of Australia’s strategic plan for addressing the broader Pacific’s climate security risks. If it leads to other agreements across the region that secure the Pacific’s future in the face of unrelenting, catastrophic climate change, there will be no denying its historical importance. Already it has made history in recognising through treaty Tuvalu’s ongoing statehood, regardless of what a changing climate may do the land.

The treaty is first and foremost a security initiative. It has extensive implications for Australian defence and demonstrates the value of maintaining Australia as the security partner of choice against China’s growing footprint. But here we will highlight why it is a great example of security-sensitive climate-adaptation policy and what needs to happen next.

There are ethical arguments to be made for high-emitting nations like Australia to invest in Pacific island nations and provide a human mobility pathway. Rightly, the agreement reflects former president of Kiribati Anote Tong’s vision of ‘migration with dignity’ in the face of rising sea-levels—a pathway where Tuvaluans can study, work and contribute rather than be treated as helpless refugees.

Nonetheless, at its core the treaty recognises the collective security implications of a climate-disrupted Pacific. Pacific nations need the mobility and disaster support offered by this kind of agreement as a source of hope and optimism for their futures—while Australia has secured its interests in a nation responsible for a significant exclusive economic zone in the South Pacific.

The United Nations now estimates the annual gap between adaptation needs and costs in developing countries to be 10 to 18 times higher than current financing (US$21.3 billion). Pacific needs alone will be high in the years ahead—particularly to invest in the kinds of infrastructure required to help Pacific islanders remain in their homes rather than relocate.

Tuvalu has embarked on a project to create a digital replica of its nation to maintain state function, culture and connection in the event the islands are lost or made uninhabitable—but the main goal remains saving the real Tuvalu. As a contribution to those needs, Albanese announced a $350 million investment in the Pacific Climate Infrastructure Financing Partnership, which includes a $16.9 million contribution to Tuvalu’s land reclamation efforts. The funding will also contribute to the new Pacific Resilience Facility.

This investment will help boost Tuvalu’s and the Pacific’s climate resilience, but as part of a strategy to sustain Australia’s role as partner of choice in the region it can’t be the end of the road. Future investments will need to proportionally match the Pacific’s rapidly intensifying climate impacts (including those that could significantly drive sea-level rise) and the Australian Defence Force will need to be adequately equipped to meet Tuvalu’s disaster-relief needs as well as the needs of Australia and the broader Pacific. Australia has left the door open to allow more than just 280 Tuvaluans in annually; otherwise, Tuvalu’s 11,000 people could still be waiting to migrate at around the same time that more than half the country is below the average high-tide mark.

Although this treaty will undoubtedly face some colonialist labelling, as well as criticism that Australia is still not doing enough to curb its fossil-fuel emissions, Albanese has rightly acknowledged that there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to the region. Tuvalu came to Australia with a problem and they worked together to forge a mutually beneficial path forward. While not all government decisions can be made with prior in-depth public consultation, there’s now an opportunity for Australia and Tuvalu to jointly engage, inform and listen to the Tuvaluan public in the coming months. There’s high confidence that the treaty will be ratified by Tuvalu’s next government after the country’s January 2024 election.

Other Pacific leaders have also so far been supportive of the agreement, and each Pacific country will find what works for its people, as noted by Kiribati President Taneti Maamau. Australia must be agile and adaptable in its support and look to include other Pacific countries in those discussions. Solution-focused sharing of stories, knowledge and experience drawing on the strengths of Pacific people will be essential across the region.

When it comes to tailoring its approach to climate security and migration for other countries, Australia will likely face some tougher decisions. Tuvalu’s struggle against rising sea levels is a glaring threat, but the other effects facing larger Pacific island countries, such as land salination, drought and coral reef destruction, while less noticeable than standing waist-deep in the Pacific Ocean are no less devastating. Through the Falepili Union, Australia has shown an ability to adjust to both the climate and security environments and, while bespoke, will likely set a precedent for being willing to support even broader migration and funding climate adaptation.

Known unknowns: cyber insecurity troubles Australian lawmakers

‘[I] want to know more about all of it, and about what we know and what we don’t know.’

— An Australian federal parliamentarian

Technology and the digital world are evolving at a blistering pace.

As tech users, information consumers and citizens we’re faced with an ever-growing list of new technologies and platforms that shape our daily lives.

Few fully understand them, or the ways in which they interact.

Cloud computing, big data, artificial intelligence and machine-learning models, and next-generation cyber technologies challenge even those individuals and entities that make digital literacy their business.

It should come as no surprise, then, that parliamentarians also struggle to keep pace. Nor is it a surprise that, faced with big decisions on cybersecurity and emerging technologies that will inform Australia’s future, they want accessible, practical and independent expert advice.

ASPI’s latest report, What do Australia’s parliamentarians think about cybersecurity and critical technology?, offers a non-partisan snapshot of the views of some of our nation’s policy shapers and policymakers, and what they think about cybersecurity and critical technologies.

What are they worried about? Where are their knowledge gaps and interests? What technologies do they think are important to Australia? What do they want and need to know?

In 2021–22, we approached every member of Australia’s 46th parliament for this multi-year study—24 took part.

Parliamentarians spoke on condition of strict anonymity, without any identifiers apart from their gender, chamber, electorate profile, and backbench or frontbench status. As a result, the conversations were candid, upfront and insightful.

First, parliamentarians have the same security concerns and uncertainties as any other tech consumer. More than a third say they never feel safe online against scams and cyber threats.

On top of this, some worry about vulnerabilities due to their position. ‘I treat my mobile phone as if it’s an open line of communication to the CCP [Chinese Communist Party], because that’s basically what it is,’ says one.

Parliamentarians admit to being struck by how little they know about the opportunities and threats in the cyber and technology domains, and how quickly those are evolving beyond their understanding.

As one puts it, Australian policymakers interested in deepening their understanding of cybersecurity ‘don’t know what they don’t know’ and rely almost completely on experts to provide digestible information and guidance.

There’s broad agreement on the biggest cybersecurity threats (see Figure 1). In the first rank are state‑backed cyber threats to critical infrastructure, long a focal point of Australian cybersecurity discussions and top of mind during last week’s Optus outage and this weekend’s DP World cyberattack, which shut down major ports.

Figure 1: On a scale of 1–3, please rank the top three threats you personally are most concerned about for Australia

At a big-picture level, parliamentarians understand that there are credible and increasing cyberattacks against Australia’s critical infrastructure sectors.

At the same time, they lack—and know they lack—a detailed understanding of how cyber resilient Australian government and industry sectors are right now, and how cyber threats might manifest (see Figure 2).

Although concerned about critical infrastructure attacks, half of the participants are ‘not sure’ of just how cyber resilient sectors like communications, energy, water and sewerage, or healthcare are. It should be noted that the study’s data collection concluded before recent and prominent data breaches, including those at Medibank, Optus and Latitude.

Almost 40% of respondents are uncertain about the cyber resilience of the defence industry sector. They perceive the risks but cannot evaluate them based on informed advice or integrate them with policy settings.

Such knowledge gaps likely extend from our sample group to a much higher proportion of parliamentarians, many of whom will be asked to make policy decisions that shape (or depend) on one or more of those sectors.

Figure 2: On a scale of 1–10, how ‘cyber resilient’ do you consider the following to be (1 being not at all cyber resilient and 10 being very cyber resilient)

Some of these policy decisions are playing out now.

Data security and storage is a live policy question—picked up in the government’s upcoming data and digital government strategy and in draft legislation on Australia’s digital identity system, which parliamentarians are expected to vote on next year. Yet 50% of parliamentarians in the study are ‘not sure’ about cyber resilience in the data storage and processing sector.

Equally, the majority view that classified government data and identifiable citizen-related data should be stored on servers located in Australia doesn’t reflect the evolution of secure cloud technologies or, possibly, an appreciation of other threats such as the trusted-insider risk.

Figure 3: What types of [federal government/state/territory government/local council] data should it be mandatory to store on Australian servers?

State-backed cyber‑enabled foreign interference is another common concern, well ahead of other types of state-backed activity such as cyber espionage and intellectual property theft. Parliamentarians worry about the potential of online information operations to undermine social cohesion and democratic processes (the CCP campaign against Canadian politicians is a good recent example).

Their instincts are good: as we’ve written before, this type of foreign interference is still falling between the cracks of policy, intelligence and policing agencies.

However, attempts to limit malign information operations also require carefully balancing freedom of speech. As the ongoing debate on draft legislation to expand the Australian Communications and Media Authority’s power in combatting misinformation and disinformation demonstrates, consensus on where that balance lies is tricky. Australia’s next cybersecurity strategy is unlikely to tackle state-backed information operations for just that reason, although, as we have also written, a solid policy foundation would be attributing state-based information operations whenever they are identified and requiring greater transparency from social media platforms on their efforts to label and moderate content.

So, what technologies do parliamentarians think are important for Australia, and where should we invest?

Unsurprisingly, cybersecurity technologies, quantum computing and AI all feature high on every list. There’s also a strong bent towards building sovereign capacity in these technologies or ensuring access to reliable supplies from other nations.

At the same time, most parliamentarians recognise that Australia is not a major technology provider. Squaring that circle means accepting the need for (limited) foreign investment in critical technologies—depending on both the technology type and the country investing. Here there is more accord than you might assume: most parliamentarians advocate limiting foreign investment to some degree, and economic considerations are nearly as strong a driver as national-security interests (see Figure 4).

Figure 4: Should there be limitations on foreign investment in Australian businesses that develop or manufacture critical technologies based on [national security/economic prosperity] concerns?

Finally, what do parliamentarians need to know?

Australians look to their elected representatives to make big decisions on cyber and technology investment and security. It follows that we should expect them to be both informed and actively engaged. As parliamentarians, they already know that Australia needs to keep pace with technological developments to ensure national security and prosperity.

The broad brushstrokes are there: the need for an integrated cybersecurity strategy, working with allies to set cyber and critical infrastructure standards, building sovereign capacity, adopting greater agility in legislative and regulatory approaches to cope with a rapidly changing environment, and improving digital literacy.

A fundamental missing piece is a whole-of-government focus on technology and the ways in which it cuts across every aspect of modern life. Another is access to clear, up-to-date and factual explanations that would allow time-poor parliamentarians and their advisers to engage on cybersecurity issues and technologies with confidence and to continually develop their understanding of this rapidly evolving landscape ‘through connecting with examples and showing how Australia is placed to handle it’.

A commitment to education will be key to Australia’s successful response to gamechangers like generative AI and a whole-of-economy commitment to advanced capabilities, as are intended to emerge under AUKUS Pillar 2. The Labor member for Fraser, Daniel Mulino, and the Liberal member for Casey, Aaron Violi, have already proposed establishing a non-partisan parliamentary technology assessment office to advise policymakers on the impact emerging technologies may have on proposed policy and how to ensure that regulations keep pace with technological change and development.

This would be a step in the right direction and would bring us into line with the UK’s Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology. Like our Parliamentary Budget Office, the technology assessment office could be independently staffed to ensure it offers objective advice.

We suggest going one step further and developing a briefing program that draws on civil society, think tanks, research institutes, peak associations, and federal departments and agencies, including agencies in the national intelligence community, to ensure a steady stream of much-needed policy and operationally relevant information.

We also recommend the briefing program not be confined to sitting weeks. Parliamentarians are crazy busy during sitting weeks, with myriad back-to-back chamber, committee, community and political party commitments. Accordingly, the program should include one-on-one briefings during non-sitting weeks, where parliamentarians would have the opportunity to probe and discuss cybersecurity and critical technology issues in private and in a less pressured environment.

Parliamentarians understand they ‘have a responsibility to lead the debate’ and are hungry for knowledge to help them do that.

It’s now up to experts and thought leaders to heed the call and equip our nation’s policy shapers and policymakers with the information they need to address the challenges of the future. Our parliamentarians are up for it. They understand these are globally significant issues and this is an important area for parliament.

‘Everyone kind of knows about technology, but they just accept it in the form that it comes to them,’ says a parliamentarian. ‘Policymakers need to know more about it … We have got to find ways to explain it better.’

Safe shipping: a forgotten aspect of maritime security in the Pacific

Maritime security is a broad concept that spans several domains. Traditionally it has focused on defence, state-based military threats, and the protection of national interests and sovereignty at sea.

Less attention has been paid to some of the wider aspects of maritime security that have less direct, but still significant, effects. Maritime safety is critical across all aspects of seafaring and includes regulation of shipping, port security, the safety of seafarers, search and rescue, and protection of the marine environment.

In the Pacific, maritime safety is arguably the most neglected aspect of maritime security. The region has experienced the highest per capita fatality rate in the world from maritime incidents in recent years. Ageing, poorly maintained ferries combined with overcrowding and ineffective safety and communications equipment have contributed to several serious maritime accidents. Small vessels used by coastal artisanal fishers for fishing and local transport are routinely swamped in rough weather.

Many of these tragedies could have been prevented with adequate investment in maritime safety in the Pacific, including domestic fleet and crew. Ensuring vessels are equipped with appropriate safety equipment, and that small-scale coastal fishers have access to information about weather conditions would have a significant impact on communities and improve safety for all.

Currently, Pacific island countries conduct monitoring, control and surveillance operations in offshore fisheries through their membership of the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency. The agency assists its members to protect their ocean resources by tracking all fishing boats in the region and linking them to enforcement operations, but there’s a gap in its ability to track vessels for safety purposes. There’s also a need to ensure that relevant shipping and maritime authorities have access to the right tools, particularly a maritime domain awareness (MDA) platform, to track vessels. Ship-based transceiver coverage—through the automatic identification system (AIS)—and satellite coverage are insufficient, which presents a significant challenge for maintaining MDA for safety purposes and hinders search and rescue efforts.

Australia has traditionally been a strong partner on maritime security for the Pacific region. There’s now a critical need for Australia to prioritise the maritime safety aspects of maritime security in the region and ensure they are included in programming decisions.

Australia can contribute to the development of common standards across the Pacific islands by expanding the use of MDA platforms for safety purposes. This could include working with Pacific partners to ensure the region has adequate access to satellite and AIS coverage for both MDA and weather detection and communication. Better AIS coverage, together with a satellite network and enough shore-based receivers, would significantly improve Pacific islands’ capacity to track vessels for safety purposes.

Pacific maritime safety is also impeded by the lack of appropriate legislation and enforcement capabilities. Even when a country has ratified international conventions on maritime safety, it may not have domestic legislation in place, leaving its government with no power to enforce maritime safety measures. This can lead to the continued operation of overcrowded vessels and vessels that don’t meet safety requirements.

Australia, bilaterally or through regional organisations such as the Pacific Community, can support Pacific island countries to implement the International Maritime Organization’s Model Regulations on Domestic Ferry Safety, which provide comprehensive guidelines for safety at sea, including crew safety, for Pacific countries involved in the domestic shipping sector.

Once legislation is in place, safety regimes can be improved with relatively simple measures, such as placing a maritime safety officer, supported by local police and enforcement agencies when required, to check vessels before they depart.

Australia can encourage other Pacific aid partners to have high maritime safety standards and ensure that all vessels provided through grants or other funding have safety equipment, such as AIS trackers and flotation devices, that marine safety training is conducted. This approach would greatly improve safety without burdening recipients with additional expenses.

Australia should also work to strengthen Pacific partner coordination on maritime safety issues through the existing regional architecture, including the Pacific Islands Forum and the Pacific Community, to ensure priorities are Pacific-led and contribute to strengthening regional programs under the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific and the Boe Declaration, which recognise the importance of human security and enhancing MDA to ensure safety. This could involve Australia collaborating with key regional and international agencies—including the International Maritime Organization and the United Nations’ Program for Sustainable Transport Development—to support regular training and workshops on maritime safety.

In addition, there’s scope for Australia to partner with New Zealand on the Pacific Maritime Safety Programme, established in 2011 with the overall goal of ‘Pacific maritime transport that is safe, environmentally friendly and meets international requirements’. For example, replicating it in countries that aren’t yet involved would bring greater consistency to maritime safety programs across the region while ensuring support is tailored to meet the variety of needs across Pacific islands.

Where regional approaches are unable to achieve impact, Australia should look to invest in country-driven programming. Opportunities to partner with Australian institutions and organisations such as the Australian Maritime Safety Authority can be explored to investigate training placements in Australia and provision of in-country training tailored to local contexts.

Pacific island countries have long raised safety at sea as a critical issue and there’s a clear, urgent need for Australia to acknowledge its importance as an integral part of regional maritime security. Australia is a strong and committed partner on maritime security, with a wealth of experience and success. It must now work to meet the critical need to improve maritime safety to the benefit of all Pacific peoples.