The federal opposition has ramped up its rhetoric about China, labelling the Chinese Communist Party as the “biggest national security threat to Australia”.

On ABC’s Q+A on Thursday night, both sides of politics raised concerns about China’s behaviour in the international community amid increasing alarm over Beijing’s tough stance on Taiwan.

Australia’s new Minister for the Pacific, Pat Conroy, said China’s recent actions such as building “illegal islands” in the East and South China Sea were challenging the world’s rules-based order.

His comments on the program came as Liberal senator James Paterson said China was continually “attacking” Australia.

“The reason why the Chinese Communist Party is labelled as the biggest national security threat to Australia is because they are,” Senator Paterson said.

“Right now, today, we are under near-constant attack in the cyber realm from the Chinese Communist Party, whether it is the government or our critical infrastructure.

“Over the past five years, we have suffered record levels of foreign interference and espionage and the Chinese government is the primary culprit of that.

“Right now, the Chinese government is acquiring military capability at the fastest pace of any nation in the world since World War II and, I think, the evidence shows they’re not just doing that for the fun of it.

“They have reclaimed islands in the South China Sea, illegally, although Xi Jinping promised that he wouldn’t.

“They have just fired ballistic missiles over Taiwan into Japan’s EEZ. If we are not going to take this threat very seriously, we are going to regret it.”

Why is China considered a major threat to global security, when the US and its allies have waged war on other nations? #QandA pic.twitter.com/H5OROb3R5Z

— QandA (@QandA) August 11, 2022

Mr Conroy took a softer stance but said the Australian government did not support China’s changes to the region’s status quo.

“As a middle power, it’s in Australia’s interest to pursue a rules-based order where every nation observes and follows international laws and normals,” he said.

“Illegal island-building in the East and South China Seas challenges that rules-based order.”

The program’s focus on China came as the superpower enforced a hardline position on Taiwan and undertaken military drills in the Taiwan Strait following US Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton said on Thursday Australia needed to be frank about the threat of China in the region.

In a speech to the National Press Club on Wednesday, China’s ambassador to Australia Xiao Qian defended acts of aggression in the region as self defence and said China would hope to return Taiwan under its rule by “all necessary means”.

“As to what do you mean by all necessary means? You can use your imagination,” he said.

China’s ambassador to Australia Xiao Qian at the National Press Club in Canberra. Photo: AAP

Treasurer Jim Chalmers said the ambassador’s comments were concerning.

“Our national interest in Australia are best served by peace, stability, and prosperity in the region,” he told ABC radio on Thursday.

“That means no unilateral change to the status quo. It means restraint and de-escalation. It means calm and consistent language.”

Mr Dutton compared the situation between China and Taiwan to the period before Russia invaded Ukraine earlier this year.

“There were plenty within Europe that didn’t believe that President Putin was going to go into Ukraine,” he said.

“What I don’t want to see is instability in our region and a situation unfold in Taiwan where innocent women and children are the main victims, similar to what we’ve seen in Ukraine.”

Mr Dutton urged the government to bolster Australia’s defences forces as quickly as possible, including looking into acquiring submarines off the production line.

The former defence minister said while the trilateral AUKUS partnership with Britain and the US would underpin Australia’s national security for the next five to six decades, submarines to fill the nation’s capability gap were needed as soon as possible.

“The reality is, we need those submarines and we need them quickly.

“The quickest way to acquire them is to take them off the production line out of the United States,” Mr Dutton said.

“If we can get to something in the interim, which is refuelled or jointly-crewed, again, I pushed very strongly for that.”

Such capability would ensure “any adversary understands that there would be a price to pay if there was an attack on our country”, Mr Dutton said.

But the Opposition Leader didn’t clarify whether “off the production line” referred to buying or leasing options with the US.

However, former prime minister Kevin Rudd has described Mr Dutton as “Australia’s megaphone diplomacy towards Beijing”.

“Mr Dutton has multiple cases to answer rather than just wallowing around in the continued rhetoric of hairy-chestedness. It doesn’t advance Australia’s core national security interests one bit,” he told ABC radio on Thursday.

“The Australian government has got the balance right into basically rejecting the notion of a list of demands, and its inherent legitimacy.”

-with AAP