Australian Letter Bill May Legalise Phone Tapping

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29178, 12 April 1960, Page 24

Australian Letter Bill May Legalise Phone Tapping

[From the Australian correspondent of “Ths Press’] SYDNEY, April 11. Federal legislation now being prepared will legalise telephone>tapping for top security purposes, say political correspondents in Canberra. The legislation is not expected to give police and customs a right to\ap telephones.

Police have for many years wanted the right to tap telephones to help them stamp out starting-price betting,* but the PosUnasterGeneral’s Department has always refused to give its Customs officers have also wanted this right to .help them counter smuggling activities in main Australian ports. The legislation to be introduced into the Federal Parliament by the Attorney-General, Sir Garfield Barwick, will provide that security officers will first have to obtain the approval of a Minister before they can tap telephones. Federal Opposition leaders are eagerly awaiting details of the legislation. They had repeatedly called on the Menzies Government to reveal the extent of tele-phone-tapping at present for security purposes. The deputy leader of the Labour Party, Mr E. G. Whitlam, said ha had been Informed that most- main- 1 exchangee in Australia were equipped with “observation unfl a.” The telephone supervisor In each exchange had a key which locked the control of the units.

The “Sydney Sun,” In an editorial dealing with the proposed legislation, said: “What the country seemed well able to do without through two world wars is now apparently thought necessary in peace-time. . “The right to tap will remain the exclusive preserve of what might be called the secret police. All such prying systems start in this modest fashion. Invariably they end by converting the country which tries them into an official listening gallery."

The Victorian Government having given the "all clear,” the Victorian Racing Club, the Trotting Control Board, country racing associations and sports bodies in city and country have arranged their first Anzac Day fixtures for 34 years. A Government bill makes Anzac Day sacred for marches and services only until 1 p.m. Hotels and theatres may open from 1 p.m. and one race meeting and one trotting fixture may be held from 2 p.m. Other sports bodies may arrange fixtures also from this hour.

Victoria’s observance of Anzac Day as a “close holiday” has been the subject of controversy ever since the legislation was passed on November 2, 1925. Every annual State conference of the Returned Services' League since 1928 has considered subbranch resolutions for modification of the decree. * • *

The morals of teenagers were being endangered at “so-called casual dances,” the secretary of the Council of Ballroom Dancing, Mr R. Gibbons, said in Melbourne. The council represents ballroom promoters in Melbourne and the majority of ballroom dance teachers.

Mr Gibbons said that to safeguard the standing of ballroom dancing, the council had decided to bar all teenagers dressed in sweaters, matador pants, or anything resembling beatnik attire. It would notify the Health Department that promoters of casual dances were deliberately overcrowding dance halls. “These promoters are not selling dancing," Mr Gibbons said. “There is no room for proper dancing. They turn out the lights and the whole thing is unwholesome. If the parents who think their kids have gone to a dance knew what was going on they would be shocked.”

He said 15,000 teenagers attended casual dances in nearly every suburb on Saturday nights. One hall, which should have no more than 200 people according to hetftth regulations, was usually packed with more than 800.

• ■■ ' ••». * All attempts to persuade the Federal Government to allow illegitimate Japanese children of Australian servicemen to be brought to Australia for adoption have failed. The Minister of Immigration, Mr A. R. Downer, told the Federal Parliament that he would not allow the illegitimate children or their mothers to enter Australia “as long as he was Minister.” To bring the children to Australia would be to bring the mothers, and "by the time the whole operation was carried out, quite a colony of Japanese migrants would be coming into this country.” lb & W. A. DutUq • «a»-

manian M.P. sponsoring a plan to aid the children, said the Prime Minister, Mr Menzies, announced last week that the Australian Government had made a grant of £lOO,OOO to aid Tibetan refugees in India. “Surely the plight of Japanese children fathered by Australian servicemen deserves a* similar kind of aid,” he said. Another sponsor of the aid plan, Mr R. Davies, said he had been informed that some of the Japanese children fathered by Australian servicemen in Kure were being “shockingly treated.’’ Mr V. Segal, treasurer of the New South Wales Benevolent Society, went to Japan last month to locate the waifs on- behalf of his society. Upon his return, he said he had found 52 Japanese children fathered by Australian servicemen living in Kure. The children, comprising 27 boys and 25 ffrU were living in almost destitute circumstances. “They are being gunned by other Ja>;l anese, who refer to them by unprintable names," said Mr Segal. He added that other inquiries made by him through the United Nations International Social Service suggested there were "several hundred” other children of Australian servicemen living in other big Japanese cities. * * » m T° r ® Australian organisations, and an unkndwn nu mj*r overseas are at present considering whether to submit proposals for the construction of N™,'s; d

The New South Wales Government has invited offers for this 100-mile super highway to be submitted by September 30. It WI L u -Vl? most expensive single road building project ever under* taken in Australia. The Department of Main Roads / four_1 J ane highway f f? r speeds of not tess than 50 miles an hour. It is expected that it will take at least three years, from the time a proposal is accepted, to complete the road.

.J" 195 ,8. when this “sunshine highway was first considered, it was roughly estimated" that it would cost £2O million. Experithf^ d +i.r oa f en ® , I nee « «ay now ♦i tSi? figu re ls too conserva2 ?° bends In • £Sflp teh °t the present Pacific highway, between Syd?£L an l Newcastle - Police record* t ? ere ar ® more than 400 2$S d mi? ' y S ar °. n thii stretch?h»t roa ? ad Y ocate ’ cl »i“ ? h ® Bavin «» In live* and -« ear «. and tear ™>uld Quickly repay the cost of a super highway. r