Foster-Bell PaulPAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): I rise also as other members on this side of the House have done to speak against the International Transparent Treaties Bill. I think—I know in fact—that it has long been the case in New Zealand since the 1800s that the power to enter into or to withdraw from a treaty sits properly with the executive; that is with Her Excellency the Governor-General acting on advice from Ministers. So in the time that New Zealand has been an independent Realm and even as a dominion in so far as we treated internationally at that point in time agreements arrangements conventions and covenants—treaties" if you will—have been quite properly and as is the practice of all other Westminster democracies akin to our own concluded by the Crown by Ministers advising the Governor-General and these are then considered by this House in the treaty examination process particularly in those areas that then need to see measures implemented under New Zealand law.I did want to pick up on a couple of terminological issues with the bill that the member puts forward. It may surprise the member to learn that of the 1600 agreements that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade keeps the texts of in its archive the vast majority of them are in fact not called treaties; they are agreements and arrangements which often pertain to trade and conventions and covenants pertaining to multilateral issues such as disarmament or human rights. The word "treaty" in the New Zealand system is almost universally reserved for significant international agreements particularly pertaining to defence.So whilst the member talks a lot about secret trade deals—in fact it is mentioned in the explanatory note in the general policy statement of this bill—I think a very real risk of the system he proposes is to international agreements that we are party to that deal with defence. This is an incredibly important topic in this era of fundamentalist terrorism in some parts of the world and with the need for the global community to act in a decisive and timely manner in addressing the risks and threats to our societies—those of us who live in the Western liberal democratic world—I would not want to see any defence arrangement that New Zealand enters into held hostage by a lengthy process when in fact the measures that would implement the process can be properly scrutinised by this House after it has been concluded in a timely fashion by the Ministers of the day who let us not forget are democratically elected and are universally members of this House.I also think there is an issue with the definition of "treaty" as supplied by the member in the interpretation section of his bill. I think he draws from the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties 1969 but I would refer the member to chapter 29 of the very excellent A guide to Diplomatic Practice by Sir Ernest Satow. If he would like I have the fifth edition. It is a little bit dated now—it is about 30 years out of date—but I would be happy to supply him with a copy where a far superior definition at a much higher level of generality is given for what constitutes an international treaty. Part of the problem with the member's definition is that it does exclude oral instruments which are acknowledged as being a very real form of international agreement and I would point the member to the legal status of the Eastern Greenland case from 1933 as a particularly interesting one. I think a superior definition as Reuter proposes is that a treaty is: "une manifestation de volontés concordantes imputable à deux ou plusieurs sujets de droit international et destinée à produire des effets de droit selon les règles de droit international". So I think the member should have done a little bit more homework and not relied on definitions drawn from a quick google search which is clearly what he has done in this case. That might have made for a better bill.One last point—and I think Dr Reti rehearsed this argument very well in his contribution—in 2000 the same measure was considered by this House and then the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee which was dominated by Labour members refuted this measure and in fact consigned it to the dust bin. That was of course a far more competent Labour administration than the party that sits across the House today. I would hope that some residual level of competence remains and that they will oppose this measure. Thank you."