ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: ANTHONY ALBANESE, PRIME MINISTER: Well, thanks for joining us.
And it gives me enormous pleasure to welcome you to the first Executive Cyber Council, an initiative of our Cyber Security Strategy that we've put in place between now and 2030.
Clare and I attended a meeting here, would have been six months or so ago, I think, at the beginning of the year, with members of the business community where we discussed this process, which is the end period.
So, I want to welcome the business leaders, the people from ASD and other institutions as well who are here and thank you for your participation on it.
We need to be very positive, I think, about the future.
But we need to be pragmatic about it as well.
We know that in today's world with fast moving technology, it provides enormous opportunities for productivity benefits, the growth of AI, all the things that have transformed our lives and made it easier, but in other ways have left us far more vulnerable, as well, which is why we need to be very clear-eyed about the challenges, but also the opportunities that lie ahead of us.
In February was the roundtable here with industry peaks. And we spoke about the importance of government working with business and civil society to tackle the immense challenge that we face and to build up cyber resilience.
Since then, there have been events that are well-known to all of you. But more importantly, I think, with respect to all of us, well-known to people out there who are customers and who've been impacted directly.
So, there's a much greater consciousness about where we're at now and what we need to do going forward.
And it's very clear that there's no room for complacency when it comes to this.
And the Government's vision is certainly that what we want is not just for us to keep up, we want us to be ahead of the rest of the world in this response. Because the other thing is, is that there'll be business opportunities from new products and from new developments as well if we get this right in our region.
And given the natural advantages that we have, with the workforce that we have, the skills that we have, the secure, legal framework that we have as well and a political system that is stable, we have, I think, a great deal of advantages.
Cyber security, of course, isn't just about privacy violations.
We know that can be devastating for people. We saw that with the health sector at one stage. We saw last week the disruption that can occur with our infrastructure as well going forward, which is why we had the heads of our security agencies as part of this process.
So, we must maintain, adapt and evolve our cyber security.
And as in so many other areas of national life, business has a vital role in this.
But we want to also be showing Government leadership, which is why our Ministers here are going to lead this.
As I said, acting to meet the challenges will also create opportunities.
Opportunities for new products to emerge from innovations which create jobs and economic benefit.
And this is whenever we discuss these issues more and more, it is at the forefront.
There's a G20 Leaders Meeting tonight, virtually commencing at 11pm. There are some disadvantages in being located where we are in the world. Anyone who wants to pop along to that are welcome to come where I'll be online into the early hours of the morning.
But it is something that's really recognised.
When we talk about our national security and our national interest, we increasingly talk about defence and military assets in the traditional sense.
But increasingly, we're talking about cyber as well because of the economic impact that it can have.
So, thank you, to everyone here for the skills and knowledge and experience that you're bringing here.
This is a very serious group of people. And I thank you for your participation.
I thank Clare for her leadership in this.
And I thank the agencies who are here as well for the work that they do. You will have seen a significant increase in funding for the security agencies, particularly ASD, but also other agencies as well who are represented here.
And that's because we regard this as an absolute priority.
So, thank you very much.