The full catalogue of the new police state laws fills an entire page In addition to the banning power noted above, those laws allow:
* The Australian armed forces to shoot and kill Australian citizens, and declare martial law almost at will;
* Australia's FBI, the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO), to pick up people as young as 16, and hold them incommunicado for seven days (in some cases, indefinitely). Detainees will have no right to remain silent, or they may be sentenced to jail for 5 years. The onus is on those detained to prove that they are not guilty—a reversal of the most basic principle of law. Anyone may be picked up, not just those suspected of having committed, or planning to commit a terrorist act.
* an extraordinary range of wire-tapping and espionage against Australian citizens, unthinkable even three years ago.
* the arrest and fining of individuals for vaguely-defined "thought crimes" under the rubric of "racial vilification." This is already having a chilling effect on political debate.
These are only a few highlights, and they are only the beginning. With each new terror bombing anywhere in the world, Howard's government announces the urgent need for more legislation. After having passed what the media, and even a parliamentary committee led by Howard's own party, called "the most draconian laws in Australian history," Attorney General Ruddock used the March 11 Madrid train bombings as the pretext to propose still another law, to ban "consorting with terrorists," under which "Police would have greatly increased powers to arrest suspected terrorists," as reported in the Herald Sun the next day.
Further proposed laws followed in rapid succession. On March 17, Ruddock announced a draconian limitation of freedom of speech, under the guise of "uniform defamation laws." Among other things, these would allow families to sue on behalf of deceased relatives; its purpose is clearly to stop the sort of research the CEC has just released. On March 23, he announced plans to grant the police (in addition to ASIO) powers to bug and surveil people without warrants, and to detain people for 24 hours (up from the present four hours). On March 25, he proposed laws to intern "suspected foreign terrorists" indefinitely, without trial, Guantanamo Bay-style.
In an address to a Feb. 19, 2004 session of parliament, Ruddock proclaimed the new philosophy behind the Howard government's "war on terrorism": "The conventional criminal law/due process model [innocent until proven guilty, the right to a fair trial, etc.] is not only inadequate, but inappropriate." Echoing U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, Ruddock raved, "Dealing with terrorists and the terrorist threat requires pre-emption and deterrence; our approach must be preventative as well as punitive. This approach of course, flies in the face of a conventional law and order/prosecute and punish approach." (Emphasis added.)
In addition to the CEC, a few hardy souls have spoken out against the burgeoning police state. Australian Council of Civil Liberties president Terry O'Gorman told the New Zealand Herald of March 27, in an article entitled "Fear threatens freedom in Australia," that "Laws are being progressively extended in a quite radical way that no other country is doing. Civil liberties as a result are being taken away." State of New South Wales Council of Civil Liberties president Cameron Murphy told the Herald that the powers recently given to ASIO allowed it to operate "like the old Soviet KGB," with powers beyond those of the U.S. FBI and Britain's MI5; and that "These powers are absolutely the worst in Australia's history in terms of allowing the violation of people's basic rights and liberties." In fact, the Howard government's own Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission charged that ASIO's new powers were clearly in breach of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights. "In fact," a Commission submission to parliament charged, "the powers in the ASIO bill are considerably wider than one would consider were necessary and appropriate for the gathering of intelligence with respect to a terrorist attack that may occur in Australia."
Indeed, even elements of the major Australian media have voiced concern, both at the legislation, and at the alarming fact that almost no one (except the CEC, which the media usually chooses to black out) is fighting it. The Sydney Morning Herald of April 13 noted, "Since 2001 the Federal Government has introduced 17 pieces of legislation which have restricted civil freedoms. In each case the reason has been to enhance the state's powers in the cause of fighting terrorism. Much of this legislation has passed unhindered except for some temporary resistance from minor parties in the Senate.... But who within the two major Australian political parties is raising his or her voice about the importance of balancing the perceived need for more draconian measures with the equally important preservation of civil liberties?" The Liberal Party has been cowed into silence, the paper observed, and "The Labor Left, the traditional campaigner against too much police power, is also strangely quiet." Referring to the fear already spreading in the country, the paper concludes, "The present climate makes it harder for liberal voices to be raised ... but they must be."
