OPENING REMARKS AT THE LAUNCH OF THE AUSTRALIAN ILLICIT DRUG DATA CENTRE IN SYDNEY

Thursday, 18 February 2010

[CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY]

I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of this area, the Cadigal people. We recognise their elders past and present, and their connection to this land.

Also here today:

Today marks a significant step forward in the fight against illicit drugs within our community. In opening the Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre, we are helping to close a gap in the intelligence picture. From today, we are able to combine the resources we need with an enhanced level of cooperation between agencies, to combat criminal operations seeking to exploit vulnerable members of our community.

This is a significant achievement, and I would like to take a moment to reflect on how we came to be here.

The process began in 2008, when in response to a report by the National Institute of Forensic Science, the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy directed the Australian Federal Police to develop a plan to expand forensic drug intelligence across Australian jurisdictions. Of particular concern was the discovery of a gap in the national intelligence picture on illicit drugs.

Until now only the Australian Federal Police have routinely used a process known as Illicit Drug Profiling to help to identify where drugs have come from and how they are manufactured. Drugs seized at the Australian border are regularly profiled, but seizures from within state jurisdictions are not. This gives authorities a fairly good idea about the origins of drug importations, but there is limited chemical or intelligence analysis available in relation to drugs and pre-cursors seized on the streets.

Today’s opening of the Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre means this will change.

The centre’s role is to collect, collate, analyse and disseminate forensic intelligence and information to relevant agencies about the threat of illicit drugs. This material will include analysis from samples of drugs and pre-cursor materials provided by the states and territories from seizures within their jurisdictions, as well as analysis of border seizures.

I would like to emphasise the importance of the state and territory police agencies in sharing this information with the data centre. Their support and advice about drug patterns within their jurisdictions is essential if we are to create an effective bank of information about illicit drugs across Australia and to that end, I thank the police commissioners for their support.

Fittingly, the Centre will be funded through the proceeds of crime – effectively using money seized from criminal enterprise to combat the very illicit business from which it came.

In December I approved more than seven and a half million dollars in Proceeds of Crime funding to be spent over four years on the intelligence analysis and risk assessment of illicit drugs.

When combined with existing AFP resources, the funding to provide a national picture of illicit drugs through profiling, and an assessment of the current vulnerabilities of pre-cursor chemicals being diverted into illicit drug manufacture, has been used to create the Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre.

The Centre is well placed to support efforts to crackdown on criminal syndicates, and will play a key role towards combating serious and organised crime. In fact, staff members now based at this centre provided forensic intelligence to AFP investigators in relation to Operation NOVO, which last week successfully targeted illicit drugs being trafficked through the parcel post network.

This is just one illustration of how intelligence and information gathered from the forensic and chemical analysis of illicit drugs can help police combat the activities of drug traffickers and producers, as well as reducing street-level supply.

While these are laudable outcomes as Commissioner Negus mentioned, we also need to consider other elements within the Australasian Drug Strategy, such as reducing the demand for illicit drugs and minimising the harm such substances cause.

The Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre will also investigate how it can support educators and health professionals as they implement harm and demand reduction strategies. We are already aware that law enforcement alone is not enough to combat the threat of illicit drugs, and today marks the start of a new era of cooperation between health, education and law enforcement agencies.

Having mentioned the importance of partnerships with other policing jurisdictions, health agencies and educators, I would also like to acknowledge role that the Customs and Border Protection Service plays in stopping the entry of illicit drugs into Australia in the first place.

The Australian Crime Commission will be another key partner of the Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre, through the provision of criminal intelligence that provides a broader context for the centre’s operations. Of course, the A-C-C will also have access to advice and assessment information.

The National Measurement Institute is also one of the AFP’s key partners. It provides detailed chemical analysis of drugs seized at the Australian border, which when added to AFP data is the basis of the technical information provided by the Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre. Now for the first time, State jurisdictions will also benefit from this specialist high end analysis of illicit drugs samples from within their own jurisdictions.

In recognition of this important role, Federal funding has been provided for the recruitment of additional chemists and the acquisition of specialist equipment. This will ensure there are resources available for the increase in drug samples requiring analysis.

So I would like to thank the National Measurement Institute for the contribution of their scientific expertise and I would like to acknowledge Dr Laurie Besley, the Chief Executive Officer of the National Measurement Institute and Dr Michael Collins, the Director of the Institute’s Australian Forensic Drug Laboratory who are also here today. I would also like to congratulate Dr Collins, who was recently recognised in the Australia Day Honours list and awarded the Public Service Medal.

Until this point I have focused on domestic issues and the seizure of drugs at the Australian border. But we should not forget that a significant proportion of illicit drugs in Australia are produced overseas and trafficked through other countries before they reach our shores. Therefore it should come as no surprise that our law enforcement agencies are also involved in an international effort to combat not only drug trafficking, but the crime types which surround it, such as organised criminal activity, money laundering and other illegal transnational activity.

Finally, I would like to acknowledge our international law enforcement partners. The United States’ Drug Enforcement Agency has been a key partner of the AFP in its drug profiling program. Indeed, without the support from the United States in this area, Australia would not be as advanced in its ability to profile illicit drugs, again underlining the importance of international cooperation.

Thankyou to Paul Smith, New Zealand’s Customs Councillor to Australia, for being here today. Despite our friendly trans-Tasman rivalry, the Kiwis are a valuable partner in the fight against drugs within the Australasian region, and I am sure we will continue to work closely together into the future.

Now, before I, along with the Commissioner, officially open the Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre, there is one other person who needs a special mention.

Doctor James Robertson is the head of the AFP’s Forensic and Data Centres portfolio. He has been instrumental in developing the concept of illicit drug signatures within this country, and one of the proponents of this project. It is fitting, therefore, that we are able to open this centre now, because in a few short weeks Doctor Robertson will be handing over the reins to Commander Julian Slater and taking on a new role as the Director of the National Centre for Forensic Studies.

Congratulations James on your 20 years of service to the AFP.

The Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre joins its sister centres the Australian Bomb Data Centre and the Australian Chemical Biological Radiological and Nuclear Data Centre as an essential part of the combined efforts of these centres to a analyse and advise law enforcement authorities on threats posed by materials that can either injure or harm Australians.

Today provides us with an excellent opportunity to recognise the work they do in protecting Australia’s national security.

So I would now like to call on the Australian Federal Police Commissioner Tony Negus and the Centre’s inaugural Director, Superintendent Ian Evans, to come forward and with me officially open the Australian Illicit Drug Data Centre.