Defence Signals Directorate (DSD)

Monitoring Activities

128. I continued to monitor the way in which the Defence Signals Directorate adheres to the rules relating to signals intelligence and Australian persons and companies. I did this by conducting spot checks at DSD headquarters in Canberra.

129. The rules are designed chiefly to protect the privacy of ordinary Australian citizens, and from what I saw during the year they do this admirably.

130. DSD has an extremely effective system for ensuring that breaches of the rules are kept to an absolute minimum and are promptly corrected when they occur. During the previous year, there were 28 breaches, a figure which I described in my 1992-93 report as infinitesimally small. This year there were 12 breaches or .01 of one percent of all of DSD’s published reports. Many of these were technical breaches: some involved the naming of large publicly known organisations and all were corrected quickly.

Complaints against DSD

131. I reported last year that 1 had received two complaints against DSD. Both are still under examination.

Did DSD discriminate against an applicant for a job?

132. My inquiry continues into this complaint from an unsuccessful applicant for a position in DSD that she had suffered discrimination on the basis of gender and marital status, and an invasion of her privacy, during a selection interview conducted on behalf of the Directorate by the Australian Army Psychology Corps.

Did DSD infringe the human rights of an employee by discriminating against her on the basis of her sexual preference?

133. In my last annual report I noted that I was investigating a complaint from an employee of DSD. The basis of the complaint, which was referred to me by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, was whether it was discriminatory for DSD to pay different transfer benefits to officers in homosexual relationships than are paid to officers in heterosexual relationships.

134. This case has progressed slowly, in part because of the chronic shortage of resources that has plagued my Office and, more recently, because of the pressures of the Commission of Inquiry into ASIS. Also, at one stage, I was obliged to discontinue my inquiry following legal advice which indicated that I lacked jurisdiction. That advice has since been reversed.