Logie Jan: General DebateText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLogie Jan: General Debate[Sitting date: 26 June 2013. Volume:691;Page:11288. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JAN LOGIE (Green):It is a bleak time in the history of this country a time when our constitution and the rule of law are being flippantly—albeit sometimes elegantly—undermined. We are being spun the lie that it is for our own good that there was no other choice that the people who are dissenting on this issue are just wrong and that the Government is always right. Yet the rule of law human rights and our constitution are fundamental to our society. They guarantee that everyone should get their day in court that people should be equal before the law that the courts and the Government should be blind to the size of our wallets and to any of our many other differences and that there should be an even playing field on which that contest of ideas should take place.As a country we have long signed up to these understandings. These agreements are at the very foundation of our democracy and I think that most New Zealanders are very proud of that and understand that we are lucky to have that at the foundation of our country. In a speech earlier this month though Russel Norman signalled that something seemed a bit rotten in the Beehive and he noted: “Our democracy is being eaten away by a Government that persistently undermines our basic democratic rights and institutions …”. There was a strong reaction to that speech and a lot of disagreement yet his view was vindicated last week I believe by the New Zealand Law Society.Last week the New Zealand Law Society a body created by statute with the role of providing submissions on legislation on behalf of the law fraternity reported to the UN periodic review of human rights that 14 separate pieces of legislation 11 in the last 2 years have undermined the rule of law and our fundamental human rights. Of these five laws remove the court’s constitutional role of judicial review three laws give unjustifiable power to the executive five laws breach the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act four laws were passed amidst very serious human rights concerns and this Government and this House are currently considering another three bills with further serious human rights concerns. Six of these bills removed rights from New Zealanders in what I would kind of characterise as an effort to appeal to the “get tough on crime’ crowd in New Zealand—in the face of all the evidence that that approach does not work. It seems symbolic of this Government’s view that actually we cannot do things to create safety in our society without removing somebody’s fundamental rights and the role of the courts.The Government has also introduced two laws to this House in a similar vein—the Government Communications Security Bureau and Related Legislation Amendment Bill and the Telecommunications (Interception Capability and Security) Bill which remove rights while increasing surveillance—all under the sense of creating threat the idea that we need to be protecting New Zealanders from some unnamed and unsubstantiated danger that this Government will not disclose. Other bills have removeddemocracy from Christchurch and removed environmental protections as well as democracy from the wider Canterbury area.The Government has entrenched discrimination against women on the DPB. It has removed the rights of judicial review and it has entrenched discrimination against some of the most vulnerable people in New Zealand—people with disabilities who want to be cared for by family members. It has removed rights and entrenched discrimination against some of the world’s most vulnerable people—asylum seekers who need to seek asylum in this country.Also there are numerous examples of the Government favouring its mates. It has introduced what we call the Anadarko law to make protests on the sea illegal. It has been indulging in dodgy Skycity deals. What it is all about when it comes down to it is a misuse of power and this country deserves more.