Bishop Chris; Mallard TrevorCHRIS BISHOP (National): I want to thank all members of the House for their well reasonably positive comments in support of the bill. It is good to have I think my second member's bill in the last year—Hon Louise Upston: Yeah yeah yeah.CHRIS BISHOP: Ha ha! My colleague next to me is yeah yeah yeah"-ing me but it is good to have a member's bill supported unanimously—certainly at least at first reading. I take the comments from Tracey Martin that they will want to have a good look at the bill at the Justice and Electoral Committee.I thought it was a strange speech from Gareth Hughes in response to the bill essentially running the argument that there are much bigger things that Parliament should focus on. I have made this point before in this House that not everything we consider in Parliament is a matter of momentous significance to the country. Actually the business of lawmaking in New Zealand is about changing laws that are sometimes technical sometimes boring but really important and sometimes really important for particular subsets of people.This bill deals with one of the most fundamental rights in our constitution and that is the freedom of expression. So yes it is technical; yes it is small; and yes it arises out of a peculiar set of circumstances but it actually touches in quite a real way upon a fundamental right in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and the broader New Zealand constitution.What we saw with the case of Into the River was the revealing of a strange anomaly in the law that needs fixing and this bill sets out to do it. What we had with Into the River was a strange situation where a book which was an award-winning children's book was published and was essentially taken off the shelves and made illegal to possess or to display for 6 weeks because of a strange quirk of the interface between the appeal functions of the Film and Literature Board of Review and the classification office. Actually it is incumbent upon Parliament to do something about that and that is what this bill sets out to do.The other point I made during my speech which I think rebuts some of the points that Gareth Hughes and latterly Barry Coates made is that it is not just one case. Gareth Hughes talked about the Into the River case. That was the genesis for this bill that is the origin of it because it is the first time an interim restriction order has been imposed on a book but as I said in my first speech on this bill interim restriction orders have been applied to films.Actually generalising slightly the Green Party should be the most in favour of at least reforming the power of interim restrictions because it is things like the incredible film festival which I strongly suspect a lot of Green Party supporters in Aro Valley go to in Wellington to watch the weird and wacky films that often get brought over—and it is the weird and wacky films that groups like the Society for Promotion of Community Standards and Family First try to stop being shown in New Zealand. So it is all very well for Gareth Hughes and Barry Coates to say "Oh well this bill's a waste of time." but actually it deals with a very real concern for their core constituency which is the wealthy urban liberals in Wellington Central.I talked in my first reading speech about the case of Bully and Visitor Q which had interim restriction orders applied to them by the Film and Literature Board of Review—but were applied for by the Society for Promotion of Community Standards—and that were basically banned for the period before which the appeal was heard. Of course the film festival happened for a couple of weeks and by the time the appeal was heard the film festival was over. So the Society for Promotion of Community Standards got its way essentially by using this law. I said in my first reading speech that we need to have a look at that.There are real free speech problems with interim restrictions generally. They can be abused. Actually the board of review very rarely alters the classification office's decisions in the first place which makes you wonder why we need this power. Third of all they interfere unjustifiably I believe—or at least there is a case to be made—with freedom of expression. New Zealand courts have viewed with distaste the idea of prior restraint on speech—the idea that the courts should before anything is even allowed into the public domain restrain speech from being made. In this case we are not just talking about speech even being restrained in an a priori way; we are talking about restraint on speech after it is made. We are talking about a restraint on a publication after it is actually available in the public domain. So we should be even more wary I believe—or society should be even more wary—about placing wholesale restrictions on speech through interim restriction orders.So those are the things that the select committee is going to examine but the bill deals with a specific set of circumstances arising out of the Into the River case. It was wrong that Into the River was not available for 6 weeks because of the misuse of the interim restriction power. I commend this bill to the House.Bill read a first time.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): The question is that the Films Videos and Publications Classification (Interim Restriction Order Classification) Amendment Bill be considered by the Justice and Electoral Committee. Those of that opinion will say Aye; to the contrary No—no one voted. [Interruption] Did you? Very quietly? The Ayes have it.Bill referred to the Justice and Electoral Committee."