Counter-terrorism experts have criticised as “ludicrous” and “retrograde” a government decision to allow some regional Australian airports to remove all passenger and baggage screening to cut costs, warning there are now no measures in place to prevent extremists hijacking planes flying into cities.
Guardian Australia can reveal more than 50 regional airports have no passenger or baggage screening processes in place for regular services that fly into capital cities, after a gradual reduction of security requirements imposed after the September 11 attacks.
The most recent changes, to take effect from next month, mean at least eight regional airports, including Longreach, Blackall, Barcaldine and Cloncurry in Queensland, have been allowed to remove their security screening equipment and associated staff, meaning passengers will no longer be subject to body scans or have their luggage searched.
The Department of Home Affairs refused to reveal which airports would no longer screen passengers, citing a security risk, and the home affairs minister, Peter Dutton, did not respond to a request for comment. However, multiple sources familiar with the new aviation security framework said as many as 13 airports had been deemed exempt from screening under the framework.
Geoff Askew, a former director of security and emergency planning for Qantas, who is now principal of the risk consulting group Askew and Associates, told Guardian Australia removing security screening at airports was “absolutely ludicrous”.
“For any regular public transport aircraft, every passenger should be screened. They should be screened at the same standard in Longreach as they are in Sydney. Why is the risk any less if they’re on a 36-seater or a jumbo? It makes no sense.
“If you say only 30 or so people will die if a smaller plane is hijacked, as opposed to 350 on an international flight, that’s besides the point. The global publicity for their cause, which is what terrorists want, would be exactly the same.”
Screening of flights into Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth has previously been deemed unnecessary at other regional airports, including Orange and Bathurst in New South Wales, Albany and Esperance in Western Australia, and Mount Gambier and Port Lincoln in South Australia.
A Department of Home Affairs spokeswoman said the government was spending $50.1m to help some airports that were required to increase security under the framework, but other “small, regional and remote airports have been identified as no longer meeting the threshold to be security controlled”.
The new security hierarchy sorts regional airports into three tiers. Tier three airports, regularly serviced by planes carrying fewer than 40 passengers and with fewer than 30,000 people departing each year, can remove security equipment that was previously required when screening was contingent on plane weight.
Askew, who also served as chair of the International Air Transport Association’s security executive in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, says passengers on flights between capital cities should pay a small levy to subsidise security on all flights, as regional flights are already more expensive.
Prof Clive Williams, a former director of security intelligence at the Department of Defence who now works at the Australia National University’s centre for military and security law, told Guardian Australia the new framework was “a retrograde step”.
Williams pointed to the attempt to blow up a Sydney flight to Abu Dhabi in 2017 with explosives hidden in a meat grinder in luggage, and the attempted hijacking of a Qantas plane by a mentally ill man in 2003.
“By downgrading the security, it just makes planes vulnerable to these kind of takeovers. I think the risk is more with rightwing extremists and mentally disturbed people at regional airports, but it could come from jihadists.”
Williams noted regional aviation was heavily subsidised, and said the removal of screening at some airports was the result of “the government trying to save money”.
Williams was also critical of the department’s refusal to list which airports no longer required screening because of security concerns.
“Where there is a security vulnerability we should do something about it,” he said.
Dr Terry Goldsworthy, a Bond University criminologist and former detective inspector with Queensland police, said even though regional planes were smaller, “terrorists pick a target that has the highest chance of success”.
“If this was being announced after 9/11, there’s no way in the world we’d even consider removing security.
“If you’re a dedicated terrorist, it would not take too much to find out.” He said a “lack of guardianship” was a key factor in most terrorist attacks.
He said the department’s decision not to announce which airports had removed screening was “ridiculous”.
“The solution can’t be to not talk about an obvious flaw because you’re afraid of people knowing. You’ve got to fix the flaw,” he said.
The chairman of the Regional Aviation Association of Australia, Malcolm Sharp, told Guardian Australia security screening was a considerable cost for regional airports, and that the risk regional flights posed was low.
“If we all wanted the safest drive into work each day, we’d drive a Mercedes-Benz, wouldn’t we? But we can’t all afford it,” Sharp said.
The regional airline Rex does not fly any planes that can carry more than 40 passengers. Ben Worsley, the airline’s director of media, investor and government relations, told Guardian Australia that “Rex trusts its decisions”.
He said that as screening requirements had changed for regional airports over years, “more than 85% of our 60 destinations are without screening”.
“Rex aircraft have ballistic cockpit doors so hijackers will not have access to the cockpit,” Worsley said. Screening could add as much as $100 to the one-way fare of some regional routes, he said.
In May, the government had a change of heart on measures that might have passed on the cost of screening at regional airports to passengers, after pressure from the National party.
The National party leader and minister for infrastructure, transport and regional development, Michael McCormack, did not directly answer when asked whether he was concerned about security on regional flights, saying only his department and that of home affairs “work closely to ensure the continued safety and security of regional airports and travellers”.
The mayor of Longreach, Tony Rayner said he was not concerned about the safety of flights after his local airport ended security screening on regular flights into Brisbane earlier this month.
Rayner told Guardian Australia ending security screening would save the airport about $30,000 on employing security staff and operating scanners.
“It’s a real financial burden,” Rayner said.
Andrew Martin, the mayor of Blackall-Tambo, said security screening had been “a huge cost” for his council, which operates the Blackall airport, and that the ability to remove screening would be welcome.
He noted that on quiet days, the Qantas Link service from Blackall to Brisbane could have as few as seven passengers.
“If we see a terrorist we’re not going to let them get on the plane anyway, don’t you worry,” Martin said.