Tolley Anne: Urgent Debates — Government Communications Security Bureau—Review of ComplianceText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTolley Anne: Urgent Debates — Government Communications Security Bureau—Review of Compliance[Sitting date: 10 April 2013. Volume:689;Page:9228. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon ANNE TOLLEY (Minister of Police): It gives me pleasure to follow my colleague Tony Ryall who I think has laid out very clearly the real issues that we are facing here today. Firstly it is important that we understand that the New Zealand SIS is able to spy on New Zealanders if there is a warrant which means there is a court process and if in order to get that it has very good reasons to suspect that people are up to nefarious activities. So the New Zealand SIS is entitled to spy on New Zealanders. Under the Government Communications Security Bureau Act which has been in place now for 10 years—and we have heard my colleagues in this House explain that yes it was passed under Labour in 2003—there was a provision put in that said the bureau could not spy on New Zealanders. But the practice was continued. The bureau and organisations like the New Zealand SIS the New Zealand Police and the New Zealand Defence Force believed the practice was legal because of some legal technicalities and that the bureau could use the very expert technology skills and resources that it has to act as agents for those other organisations. Those other organisations would have the legal right to spy on or surveil or monitor individuals in New Zealand or organisations in New Zealand that they had evidence that a court had agreed was sufficient to enable that monitoring. So this was an attempt to act on behalf of and to use the surveillance mechanisms that they have in place. And everyone believed they were acting within the law—everyone. That has happened for the last 10 years under both the previous Labour Government and under this New Zealand National Government.The second issue that I think needs to be put in play here as we look at what the issues are and how we resolve them is that we are in a very different world technologically today and as a result of the increasing developments in technology we face from a cyber-security perspective much different threats than we faced even 10 years ago when the Government Communications Security Bureau Act was passed through this House. So we have agencies that are dealing with a whole range of different organisations and methods of committing cyber-crime that perhaps were not envisaged 10 years ago. I think those are the two issues: first of all that we have legislation that does allow interception monitoring of New Zealanders and that people believed that they were acting in good faith and within the bounds of the law.I think we in New Zealand are very lucky that we have a Prime Minister like John Key who when it was brought to his attention that there was some doubt as to whether these practices were legal and the risks that we ran if they were not legal took immediate action. He put in Rebecca Kitteridge to do an enormous review of the Government Communications Security Bureau in order to make sure that that organisation was well positioned both legally and capacity wise to deal with the real threats that the modern world poses to New Zealand. I think the Kitteridge review which is a very hard-hitting pull-no-punches review is excellent. I have no doubt that this House given the comments that have been made today wants to address the issues and I look forward to the support in this House for putting right the legislation that will enable those organisations that have the responsibility for ensuring the security of New Zealand to get on and do their jobs and be confident that they are acting within the law.