Reti Shane; Mallard TrevorDr SHANE RETI (National—Whangarei): I want to focus on the defence component to the annual review. Regularly during the review the Defence White Paper 2016 was noted as being central to our strategic imperatives and indeed the member opposite has raised the question of the white paper as well so I would like to address some points around that.The Defence White Paper 2016 is the Government's regular consultation with the public around how they perceive New Zealand's defence needs. The last white paper was in 2010 and clearly there is a need to stay relevant in a changing international environment. Back then in 2010 Time magazine's top 10 news stories included US/China tensions and the war in Afghanistan. Our defence paper at that time also noted these international issues.Five years later in 2015 which was when we actually went out to consult on the paper the top 10 news stories as reported by USA Today was led by the Paris terrorist attacks and then multiple stateside domestic shootings—that is 5 years later terrorism was moving further from offshore into our domestic environment and our international defence needed to adjust as well. The paper was published in 2016 and it received 294 written submissions and 31 oral submissions from the public.Several themes emerged and I think these can be grouped into several areas. What the public told us was that their first concern for defence was looking after our own sovereignty and our exclusive economic zone—that was their first issue. The next area was collaborating with Australia and our Pacific neighbours. They saw that as being very important also. The third area of interest to New Zealanders was in maintaining our international responsibilities. So we got this clear guidance and the annual review noticed this and I want to describe some of the actions that came from it.The very first question that was asked in the paper was: what are the major threats or challenges to New Zealand's security now and in the future? The greatest number of responses indicated terrorism as their main concern followed a little bit later by climate change. Now in the past few months the Government has responded to this specifically—for example by enacting the Maritime Crimes Amendment Bill which specifically talks to terrorism on the sea.Historically attacks on a sovereign nation can occur by land air and sea. But we find that nowadays a fourth event is added—that is an attack by cyber. The defence white paper addresses this concern and specifically identifies the issue by saying that … cyberspace and the threat to New Zealand civilian and Defence Force networks from cyber attacks is growing in importance." So we recognise the issue. The annual review noted that this is where we are going to apply ourselves. But having identified the issue what is the action? Well the action stated that "In the face of an increasing cyberspace threat the Defence Force will develop a new cyber support capability to improve the protection of its networks." Finally there is some urgency to doing all of this: "For the Defence Force to remain effective and deployable it must be able to protect its computer networks against increasing cyber attacks. Defence will therefore begin work immediately to embed the appropriate organisational and personnel arrangements it needs to support the development of this new capability."The Government has also identified issues and stated areas that will support New Zealand's strategic defence direction over the next few decades. These include—and they were commented to us—(1) by strengthening the third offshore patrol vessel (2) increasing our air surveillance capacity and (3) as I have mentioned cyber security support. That is $20 billion over the next 15 years. Clearly then the Government is protecting our local interests and our international reputation as we seek and support a stable rules-based international environment. Thank you.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Stuart Smith—sorry. I had forgotten the member's first name. Stuart Smith."