A leading counter-terrorism and deradicalisation expert has slammed Prime Minister Tony Abbott for his "divisive" language and actions on terrorism issues, saying they have undermined the positive engagement work done in the community.
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Australian National University visiting fellow Dr Clarke Jones pointed to Mr Abbott's recent comment about the families of terrorists being treated like any other criminal families, his handling of the ABC Q&A controversy and the release of ASIO maps detailing suburban foreign fighter hotspots as excluding the Muslim community.
"The footage of the PM and [ASIO head] Duncan Lewis, it doesn't matter if it's classified or unclassified, that they showed the areas in Melbourne and Sydney where radical youth were meant to have come from targets the majority of people in those communities as some sort of aspect of terrorism," he said.
"Basically what it does is any connection between government and community groups is severed because of that type of language and that type of focus.
"A lot of people working in this area are struggling very hard, but a lot of it gets undone by the leader."
Dr Jones, who worked for 15 years on national security programs with several arms of the federal government, said the government's spending on counter-terrorism was also "a little bit out of whack", with more money warranted for community programs.
With a number of teenagers facing terrorism offences for threats earlier this year, Dr Jones said it was important the usual principles of the justice system were not subverted.
"Statistics say, for any type of offence, the greater exposure of young people to the criminal justice system, the greater the likelihood of reoffending," he said.
"We need to look at - whether it's home-based detention, reporting to police - but a program like that would look at psychological counselling, religious counselling, a mentoring program."
Dr Jones said Zaky Mallah, the Lebanese-Australian convicted for threatening to kill Commonwealth officers, had poorly expressed himself on Q&A last Monday but was sharing the views of many others who opposed new citizenship-stripping laws.
"You can't have this "tourist visa citizenship", it degrades the value of being Australian," he said. "We don't do it for other offences."
In September last year the government set aside $38.9 million for community programs and engagement as part of a $630 million counter-terrorism package. In February the Attorney General George Brandis announced $18 million in extra funding targeted at pulling down terrorist postings on social media and the internet, and funding civil society organisations to establish a counter narrative to contest terrorist writings online.
