Australian Border Force officials insist patrol numbers are back on track despite falling last year

Australian Border Force officials insist patrols of the northern waters are on track to increase despite falling in the last financial year.

Officials told Senate estimates the first three months of the new financial year showed an encouraging increase in both maritime and aerial surveillance hours and they expected this to be sustained.

Deputy Commissioner Nicole Spencer put this down to the fact that ABF was now holding its contractors to account for missing targets and the resolution of staffing issues.

“One of our suppliers, for example, for aerial surveillance, has had a new enterprise agreement settled, and that has affected crew attraction and retention,” she told senators.

“Further, we are driving harder contract management so that we are actually holding our contractors to account.

“Part of cleaning up our own systems, if you like, is actually having a good handle on our performance data, and instead of taking a long time to resolve performance issues with providers resolving those quickly.”

In 2023-24, ABF boats did 2086 patrol days, falling short of the target officials believed in March they could reach, as The West revealed earlier this year.

This was a 4.3 per cent decline in patrols from the year prior, continuing the slide of several years.

But Deputy Commissioner Tim Fitzgerald said between July and September, patrol days had lifted to 484 and aerial surveillance to 3635 hours.

“In terms of trends, they’re both trending upwards compared to the last financial year,” he said.

Shadow Home Affairs minister James Paterson said that was welcome news.

“I think that’s the first time in a long time you’ve been able to say that,” the senator said, before questioning whether the improvement could be sustained.

Ms Spencer said there were issues around the age of the boat and aircraft fleets meaning they required more maintenance.

“We have to factor that into our planning and we also have to factor it in in terms of the way we’re holding the contractors to account,” she said.

Planning for operations could also be affected by the weather, crew availability and aircraft downtime.

“What we have through our performance reporting now is the correct mechanisms to actually assess all of that comprehensively, which is why, in our next annual report, you will see much more comprehensive reporting around how we’re actually delivering against the outcomes, as opposed to … reporting on widgets,” she said.