Senator Anning's use of 'final solution' underlines the national security risk politicians can impose. Editor's Desk

“This is dangerous territory. When politicians resort to using race in advancing their agendas, they inevitably excite racial anxiety and stir up social division. They end up damaging our racial tolerance and multicultural harmony.” Departing race discrimination commissioner Tim Soutphommasane in his speech, delivered at the University of Western Sydney’s Whitlam Institute, Monday 6 August 2018.

We had the opportunity to facilitate a security consultant’s roundtable at the Security Expo 25 July in Melbourne, courtesy of HID Global. Amongst the discussion on smart buildings and mobility, the group also focused on the trends being seen when it comes to physical access control and the priorities for adding value to end-users, in the realm of physical access.

Underlying the importance of physical access control, some recent research data highlights that the workplace is not just subject to nuisance or targeted crime, but also the phenomenon of domestic violence. In 2014–15, on average, almost 8 women and 2 men were hospitalised each day after being assaulted by their spouse or partner. Between 1 July 2010 and 30 June 2014 there were 152 intimate partner homicides in Australia. Almost half of the males who killed a former female partner killed that partner within three months of the relationship ending, almost a quarter were named as respondents in Domestic Violence Orders, half were using alcohol at the time of the homicide and over a third stalked the victim either during the relationship or after it had ended. And this is where the workplace comes in.

Stalking behaviours can include the abuser following the victim, loitering near the victim’s home or work, and breaking into the victim’s house. Stalking also includes acts of technology facilitated abuse such as persistent text messaging; maintaining surveillance over the victim’s phone or email; covertly recording the victim’s activities; and engaging with the victim on social media/dating sites under a false identity. Of the 121 male offenders, 13 per cent of homicides occurred in public/open places and two male homicide offenders killed their female intimate partners at a workplace.

The importance of workplace access control is underlined by wider societal behaviours. Security systems are there not to just protect business assets but also personnel and visitors. The risk of domestic violence occurring in a workplace is a lot more so than any terrorist attack or violence caused by a Sudanese African gang.

Worthy of note also is the release of Handbook 15 - Safe and Healthy Crowded Places as part of the Australian Disaster Resilience Handbook Collection. Unlike the previous silo focus on terrorism in crowded places, this handbook can be more widely used to prepare plans before an incident or emergency in a crowded place arises, and to maximise the efficiency and effectiveness of any responsive and recovery action. It appropriately incorporates principles and guidelines for developing crowded place and site plans against a range of potential hazards that may have an impact on attendees, not solely a terrorist incident. We have to get out the silo approach often enforced on us by agenda driven government agencies and politicians.

With this in mind, we continue to cover all aspects of the security domain. Interestingly, Dr. Keith Suter has raised the issue of aging and societal security implications. With increased life expectancy, increased health expectancy and the growth in human enhancement technology, society is heading for some major challenges which few policymakers are brave enough to address – much like Sudanese gangs are a convenient distraction to the more prevalent issue of domestic violence, so is race based immigration a distraction to that of an aging population and lack of action being taken.

Shannon Sedgwick argues that a lack of budget allocation may be to blame for the slow progress of increasing cyber security maturity, with $230 million earmarked for Australia’s Cyber Security Strategy over four years. The US Government budget for cyber security is approximately A$26 billion, and the UK Government has alotted A$800 million to their cyber security efforts. When you consider the likelihood of cyber attacks and the possible damage caused by breaches to critical infrastructure and national security, one could argue that spending on cyber is a long way from being sufficient.

Finally, Nigel Hedges, a 20-year veteran provides an excellent and always timely article on the importance of ‘soft skills’ in the security domain, and this applies to both physical and cyber security. “Some security professionals feel that they have lost a fight when the business will not agree to a security recommendation,” writes Nigel Hedges, but “ultimately, the business gets to decide and own any risk that they accept.” I suppose we can push this out to the general public to determine how much risk they are willing to accept from their preferred politicians. As we have seen in Australia in recent times, the quality of the political class could be perceived as a national security threat in themselves. My view is we should expect and get better! Our security may well depend on it.

And on that note, as always, we provide plenty of thought provoking material and there is so much more to touch on. Stay tuned with us as we continue to explore, educate, entertain and most importantly, engage.

Chris Cubbage, Executive Editor