Australia must provide a legislated guarantee quarantining basic research from new permit requirements in overhauled technology export laws, experts say.

Former chief scientist Ian Chubb warned against using ¡°regulations¡± to exempt fundamental research from requirements in the draft?Defence Trade Controls Amendment Bill, which could see researchers imprisoned for sharing details about sensitive technology with foreigners ¨C other than Britons or Americans ¨C without obtaining permits.

Professor Chubb, policy secretary of the Australian Academy of Science, said legislating the exemption would guard against its removal on political whim. ¡°We want it in the act because we don¡¯t want a minister to¡­be able to change it without any scrutiny by parliament,¡± he told a Senate committee.

Failure to legislate the exemption could leave it vulnerable to pressure from foreign leaders who wanted to limit Australian collaboration, he warned.

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¡°Science power has become multipolar¡­and we need to make sure that we don¡¯t cut ourselves off from it. Most knowledge is generated elsewhere. The only way we get to use it¡­is to participate in it. It would be unfortunate if we handed over our sovereignty in this particular area.¡±

In 2015, a steering group?led by the then chief scientist?negotiated changes to the original Defence Trade Controls Act. As a result, ¡°most Australian research was unencumbered by bureaucratic inertia¡±, he told the committee.

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He said the new amendments warranted similar care. While the proposed regime potentially lightened red tape around science conducted with the US and UK ¡°it also raises the bar for the rest of the world, including long-term collaborators in Europe, south-east Asia, Oceania and the Americas¡±.

John Byron, principal policy adviser at Queensland University of Technology, said foreign PhD students could be harmed by permit requirements. ¡°Assuming they¡¯ve not yet been awarded a permit, they would be asked to leave the room. There¡¯d be things that supervisors could not discuss with them and they would have limited access to certain equipment,¡± he said.

¡°It could result in them rejecting Australia as a destination. These are very talented people. A lot of countries¡­would like to have their contribution. They may go somewhere that¡¯s more welcoming.¡±

Dr Byron, who also advised former science and higher education minister Kim Carr, said all foreign doctoral students should be scrutinised at visa application stage to determine their suitability for sensitive research. ¡°But we should make those decisions on a case-by-case basis. Citizenship of a particular country is a very broad net,¡± he said.

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He said the proposals could also saddle defence officials with a huge administrative burden, just as the Department of Foreign Affairs had been inundated with work after it ¡°radically underestimated¡± the number of university agreements requiring approval under the?Foreign Relations Act.

¡°I don¡¯t think the Department of Defence really knows just how many permit applications they¡¯re going to get,¡± Dr Byron said. ¡°I don¡¯t think they¡¯ve got any idea what¡¯s coming.¡±

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute said such concerns were overblown. The institute¡¯s director of defence strategy and national security, Bec Shrimpton, said authorities needed to address the ¡°great levels of confusion¡± about the bill so that ¡°we don¡¯t have a conversation around concerns that don¡¯t exist¡±.

¡°There is a huge need for a communication push to clarify¡­what this means for academia,¡± Ms Shrimpton said. ¡°They need to test whether or not they¡¯re going to be subject to in the way that they think they are. In some cases, they are wrong.¡±

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john.ross@timeshighereducation.com