Minister announces $12 million Global Centre of Excellence in Transnational Crime Prevention

May 04, 2006

The Federal Minister for Education, Science and Training, the Hon. Julie Bishop, today announced $12 million in government funding to establish a Global Centre of Excellence for Transnational Crime Prevention to be based at the University of Wollongong’s new Innovation Campus.

University of Wollongong Vice-Chancellor, Professor Gerard Sutton, acknowledged the minister’s announcement as clear recognition of the progress made by the University’s current Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention (CTCP) towards becoming an important global resource in the fight against transnational crime.

“This new global centre of excellence will be a flagship for the University highlighting one of our special areas of research and teaching strengths,” the Vice-Chancellor said.

Professor Sutton paid tribute to the strong and positive support from Illawarra-based politician, Liberal Senator for NSW, Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, for her support for the new global centre of excellence.

Centre Director, Associate Professor Doug MacKinnon, said the new centre of excellence means the CTCP could be housed in its own building on the University’s Innovation Campus being developed to the north of the Wollongong CBD.

“It will also result in the expansion of the Centre’s research and Fellowship programs as well as teaching capability,” he said.

The University first established the CTCP in July 2000, recognising the need to establish an interdisciplinary research and teaching centre to address the problems of transnational crime.

The new headquarters at the Innovation Campus will involve the construction of a purpose-built facility providing about 3,500 square metres of space. It will include state-of-the-art audio visual facilities, a main lecture theatre and smaller theatres serving as break-out rooms.

It will be one of four buildings to be developed by 2007/2008 as the first new facilities on the University’s Innovation Campus. The other three buildings are the Central Facilities Building (iC Central), an Institute of Advanced Materials Building and a combined University/Institute of TAFE facility for courses and research on advanced digital media with another planned wing to house the Graduate Business School. The four buildings will involve expenditure of $70 million in total.

A Development Application for the Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention Building will be lodged with Wollongong City Council following the 4 May announcement by the Minister.

Media please note: Contact the Media Unit (Bernie Goldie via email bgoldie@uow.edu.au or (Renee Pearce via email rpearce@uow.edu.au) for an artist’s impression of the proposed Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention building. A background paper about the new centre of excellence is below this release.

For further information contact the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Gerard Sutton, on (02) 4221 3909 or the Director of the Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention, Associate Professor Doug MacKinnon on (02) 4221 4230 or 0407 674354 (m).

~ BACKGROUND PAPER ~

Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention:A Global Centre of Excellence

The Centre for Transnational Crime Prevention (CTCP) at the University of Wollongong will expand its global program and establish itself as a global centre of excellence in transnational crime prevention, and work with the Australian Government to help develop a cooperative and safe region in which to live and trade.

Following discussions with the Prime Minister’s office; the Minister for Foreign Affairs, the Attorney General, and the Minister for Justice and Customs, the University decided that it would establish a Global Centre of Excellence for Transnational Crime Prevention. While global in outlook, the CTCP will strategically focus on the Asia Pacific. The Centre will form the centre-piece of an intelligence hub at the University’s Wollongong Innovation Campus.

The University of Wollongong recognised the need to establish a research and teaching institute to address the problems of transnational crime in 2000. In July that year it established CTCP as an interdisciplinary research and teaching centre within the Faculty of Law. The Minister for Justice and Customs, The Hon Senator Chris Ellison, launched the CTCP on 29 June 2001.

The Centre was a global first, promoting academic excellence in preventing and investigating those organised criminal activities that have an impact on our region.

The CTCP focuses on the operation, prevention and responses to organised criminal activities that have an impact on regional and global security including narcotics production and trafficking, smuggling, fraud and money laundering, corruption, internet crime, paedophile activity, natural resources poaching, illegal shipment of hazardous waste, cybercrime and identity theft. The Centre presently offers three unique postgraduate degree programs relevant to the prevention of Transnational Crime and Good Governnance including a Master of Laws (Prosecutions), Master of Forensic Accounting and the Master of Transnational Crime Prevention.

The Centre has grown organically and has an excellent reputation in the Asia-Pacific region. It has developed appropriate national and international networks and works in collaboration with domestic government organisations, including the Australian Federal Police and commercial entities such as The Distillery. The Centre also works with international institutions such as AusAID, the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), Asian Development Bank (ADB), United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM).

Specialised postgraduate programs are offered both domestically and internationally. To date, students from 15 countries have participated in these programs.

The University of Wollongong Innovation Campus is a strategic development on a 33-hectare site close to the University and Wollongong CBD. This major $300 million initiative in partnership with Baulderstone Hornibrook will involve the development of a research and development facility offering high-tech companies an alternative to the traditional technology park model. It is envisaged the site will become home to some of Australia’s most innovative companies and organisations in the areas of health, smart materials, information technology, communications, finance, intelligence/security, film, television and multi media, with significant employment creation (3,000-5,000 new jobs) in the ‘knowledge industries’. This represents one of the most significant regional development opportunities in the Illawarra region over the past 25 years.

On an invitational basis, CTCP has delivered specialised programs in 14 countries in the Asia-Pacific region as well as undertaking activities for ASEAN and ASEM and a number of governments throughout the region. The Centre’s recent engagements include:

•the establishment of teaching programs in collaboration with the Malaysian Attorney-General’s Department;

•in association with the University’s commercial arm, ITC, winning a recent internationally competitive Asian Development Bank Project in Mongolia to establish an effective anti-money laundering regime;

•the delivery of a postgraduate course in intelligence policy to the New Zealand Government, with Victoria University of Wellington; and

•the joint establishment in November 2004 with a number of agencies within the Beijing Municipal Government, academic institutions and PRC National Government, of a Beijing Centre of Transnational Crime Prevention (BCTCP).

CTCP is evolving as an Asia-Pacific Regional focal point for the exchange of information and research on Transnational Crime. The Centre’s long-term goal has been to become a global resource in the fight against transnational crime, thereby enhancing Australia’s and the Region’s activities on such issues.

In addition, there are other major benefits flowing from the Federal Government’s funding of CTCP’s expansion. These include:

•increasing the capacity of both Australia’s and the Asia-Pacific’s public and private sectors to effectively deal with transnational crime through education, research and institutional linkages;

•establishing the Centre as a focal point for strategic advice to the Commonwealth on a whole-of-government approach to policy development concerning transnational crime prevention; and

•enhancing Australia’s reputation as a leader in transnational crime prevention.

The global centre will allow the delivery of programs that meet Australia’s long-term strategic goals of enhancing cooperation in transnational crime prevention in developing countries.