Penk ChrisCHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you Mr Speaker. Thank you for the opportunity to speak on this Human Rights (Incitement on Ground of Religious Belief) Amendment Bill. It's an important proposal that's been made by the Government and we should place it in the context of the work that they say they're doing in relation to the matter more generally. I do want to comment on the way that this particular piece of legislation interacts with the Human Rights Act as a whole and other aspects of our statutory regime. So within my time share I'd like to concentrate on that under the heading of regime"; also another "R" "religious belief" and the particular reasons that it's actually quite dangerous I think for us as a Parliament to seek to legislate certainly in a criminal way against freedom of expression in relation to religious beliefs; and the other "R" is "response" the response that we should instinctively look towards in answering the question: how do we as a Parliament and as a society and as a democracy want to respond to language that we might regard as untrue unfair or unreasonable?So first of all in relation to the regime—actually I should start in case it's not been obvious from my introductory remarks by stating National's position on this. We have made it clear through public comments but I state for the record now clearly that we don't support this bill. We think that while it may be well motivated in the sense of looking to protect certain sections of society we don't think it will be effective to do that and at the same time it will also risk major unintended consequences in terms of the chilling effects on free speech and all that that implies for our democratic and largely free society.So taking the first of those "Rs": the regime. I want to talk about the fact that the Human Rights Act already prohibits discrimination on certain grounds—essentially protecting therefore certain groups under section 21. Of those some but not all are currently protected against what has loosely been described as an incitement provision. With all due respect we need to examine what the provision actually says because it's quite loose merely to talk about incitement as though that were something along the lines of inciting violence. But if we look at those various groups in section 21 and we say "Well it's anomalist that they're not all included."—at the moment we've got I think colour race and ethnic or national origins. So that's not the full list. So why don't we have the full list? Well that's a good question. We could add as has been proposed here religious belief. But why then will we not add the other grounds in section 21? Why don't we add other basis for communities forming together having a shared identity? These are questions being asked by those who would say that the Government should go further. So they're pleasing no one. I don't think it's one of those situations in which political analysts can say "Well there's dissatisfaction in one direction and also the other."—let's say right left or liberal or conservative or whatever and say "Well they've probably got it about right in the middle." In fact they will please no one because this is an incoherent approach to lawmaking. They haven't added all the rest of the section 21 grounds. They haven't even said in more general terms—as probably they should if they've determined to restrict speech in this way—that any group defined by its identity should be captured by whatever we decide the offence is and whatever those elements are. So that's the first thing is to say "Well who's actually going to be protected or captured by this kind of a law?"Then we ask where the line is drawn. So we can say on the one hand inciting violence against such people should be illegal—the good news: it already is—on the other hand we could say that merely speaking ill of a group or offending their sensibilities would be the other option. Somewhere in between you could have for example doing or saying a thing that could lead another person to discriminate against or harm or whatever. So we have a choice on where we draw the line.Where the line is currently drawn in section 131 which the Government is looking to introduce in relation to religious belief as well is the publication or distribution of words that are threatening abusive or insulting. There's a huge range there. I mean to threaten someone is a very serious thing but merely to insult them I would say is very much different. Then we have the result being either to excite hostility or ill will against or bring into contempt or ridicule. Well again these are quite different things. So while those who proposed this bill might say that it's important that we don't allow the incitement of violence—again to which we say "We agree." and which is already on the statute book—but if you take the low watermark of those elements and we say that it should be a criminal offence merely to insult in a way that would incite ill will or bring into ridicule we have a very dangerous position in which we have not only an incoherent law but one that is taking us down a very dangerous path in restricting freedom of expression particularly when we then ask the question of who gets to decide this and how this thing is decided. Of course it's the lack of clarity in such laws that we should always be very wary of because the person or persons whether it's the judges or the Attorney-General who's asked to provide consent to prosecution naturally have their own prejudices their own perspectives—and I say that not to cast any dispersions on any such decision makers or any of those who would aspire to those roles; it is human nature and the fact of the matter that we all have either a religious belief or a lack of a religious belief or in many cases people have some sort of combination of ethical or moral or religious perspective. These things are complicated and they can't be distilled easily into a provision in a piece of law in a way that would be proposed or suggested to be black and white and provide protection. So so much for the regime.My next "R" was "religious belief". It's my submission that in the 21st century it's inappropriate for this Parliament to be making laws that protect merely the sensibilities of those who have a religious belief or again a lack of religious belief. It wasn't that long ago—in fact it was the previous term of Parliament—in which this institution repealed the crime—yes the crime—of blasphemous liable. We said at that time collectively and I think unanimously that it wasn't appropriate merely to protect the feelings in essence of those who have particular views or beliefs given that we live in a pluralistic society and also I would say at least as importantly because the free exchange of expression of ideas is such that when a thing is proposed a thing can be opposed and it's of course in that market place of ideas that to and fro that we have the best opportunity as a society as a democracy of arriving at the truth.It's also the case that when it comes to political or policy debates and discussions among us more generally as human beings those who have a religious belief might put forward a certain perspective—that's their right even their responsibility. Well that's fine and that's good and that's as it should be but to allow such people the protection against criticism back the other way—or a counter-proposal in policy terms—would seem to privilege one group against another. Therefore I don't think it would be helpful to them or the cause of democracy freedom and the pursuit of truth more generally.Of course it's in the nature of faith or belief of a religious nature that these things can't be proved or disproved—that's almost by definition. So if we say that certain beliefs are beyond challenge in a way that might risk bringing into contempt or ridicule then we are in a very dangerous situation again as I would suggest.The third and final "R" having covered the regime and the nature of religious belief is the response. So what is our response more generally to the idea that things can be said that might be untrue or unfair or unreasonable? The answer of course should be that things that are true fair and reasonable respectively are the best counters to those. This is obviously not a new idea—it's certainly not original to me or this discussion or this debate—but I think it's an idea that's worth recanvasing.If we consider ourselves an enlightened society—and I use that term in the context of having gone through an enlightenment and believing that there is such a thing as an ideal of a pursuit of truth that can be gained in a democratic—as opposed to a theocratic or an autocratic—way then we should be very careful indeed about the possibility of restricting that flow that exchange of information and ideas.The New Zealand Bill of Rights Act discussion on the matter which was provided by the advisers as opposed to the Attorney-General himself concluded actually after a really good discussion about the importance of freedom of expression the breadth of that right and the possibility of chilling effect of such legislation we heard ultimately that this was a justifiable limitation. I respectively cannot come close to agreeing with that.So for all these reasons National says with all due respect and understanding the good motivations that might underlie the introduction of such legislation we cannot support it. It is a dangerous place for our democracy to head to."