Mapp Wayne: Terrorism Suppression Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Mapp Wayne: Terrorism Suppression Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
[Sitting date: 24 October 2007. Volume:643;Page:12673. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) 
: 
 I guess many people in the country will be asking why we have this bill and why we are debating it now. 
Rodney Hide 
: Yeah I am. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: Those are perfectly reasonable questions to ask. 
Rodney Hide 
: I want to know why National is supporting it. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: I have to say given the circumstances those are proper questions to ask. But this bill is not actually related to current events. It is in fact all about designating international terrorist organisations. 
I will explain to the member why I say that. The current designations of groups by the UN mostly around al-Qaeda and associated groups expire later this year and if we did nothing at all those designations would all have to go through the High Court. The only way they could be renewed under the Terrorism Suppression Act 2002 would be to go through the High Court. We could have had a normal High Court hearing with the prospect of al-Qaeda members or some other international terrorists coming along seeking a hearing saying they are not terrorists and so forth. Frankly that is an untenable proposition and I think even members of the New Zealand Maori Party would recognise that reality. Designating international entities as terrorists particularly when nominated by the United Nations is par excellence a function of the Government not a function of the judiciary. That is why this bill is before the House because those entities do need to be redesignated. 
There was a lot of discussion in the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee about who should do the redesignation. The initial designation was done by the Prime Minister and that is what is being proposed now. But we have added an additional requirement: the Prime Minister must inform the Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee. That committee is made up of the Prime Minister the Deputy Prime Minister Mr Anderton and two members of the Opposition those members being Mr Key and indeed Mr Hide. The committee does have an important oversight role. 
We recognise that there is a great deal of public interest in the terrorism laws at the moment. That is to be expected given that the police have used the surveillance and tracking powers of the legislation from 2002 which actually came out of the counter-terrorism bill of that time. In fact those provisions were added to the Crimes Act. So when the police used those powers they raised the question of whether there are terrorists in our country. 
Terrorism strikes at the stability of the nation because terrorism is no ordinary crime. Terrorists intend to overthrow the Government. They intend to create disorder. They intend to threaten the lives and indeed the infrastructure of the entire nation. So when the authorities raise the spectre of terrorism those are the fears they convey into society. It should be rightfully a very high threshold that the police have to meet before they can invoke the powers of the legislation. Clearly the actions of the police will be judged in the courts of this land and by the public and by this Parliament. We acknowledge that and we say as well that there is no prejudging of those actions. But I would say that the police need to be right on this issue because of the very implications of what terrorism raises in society. 
Parliament has dealt with the issue of terrorism on a number of occasions and the powers that we have conferred give the authorities more powers than is conventionally the case. They now have much greater power to track individuals. They now have much greater power to surveil bank accounts and the like. Those powers are contained in the legislation and approval for their use has to be granted by warrants issued through the District Court and the High Court. 
I say also that those powers need to be carefully controlled. The New Zealand Parliament has not gone as far as other countries have gone—in particular the United Kingdom the United States and Australia. We have not allowed the police to detain suspects without a charge; we have not given the police any power to question people without a charge. Those fundamental rights of New Zealanders are protected. The police can detain a New Zealander only if they arrest the person. The police can arrest someone only if they charge the person with an offence. When the police charge a person with an offence that person has certain rights under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act which are given automatically. Anyone who is arrested must be brought before a court within 24 hours and a charge has to be laid or indeed withdrawn. It is the courts not the police that decide who gets bail. It was the High Court in Auckland that refused bail to one of the people charged last week; it was the District Court in Rotorua that also refused bail for Mr Iti. The courts have done that not the police. That is an important protection that all citizens have. 
Tariana Turia 
: The police opposed bail. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: I know that they opposed it but the courts refused it. That is an important point. The defendants are able to put their cases before the courts and they are making appeals on the issue of bail. 
I want to make it absolutely clear that those fundamental rights of New Zealanders have been embedded in our law for literally centuries and at no stage has our terrorism legislation overridden any of those fundamental rights. New Zealanders need that assurance because there have been misstatements about that. It is easy to be alarmist it is easy to raise concerns—and I do understand why those concerns are raised—but I say that we should wait to see the evidence. 
I want to turn my attention to a particular offence. This bill creates a new offence and I know that that will be the subject of discussion. It creates the new offence of terrorism: carrying out a terrorist act. That offence carries a sentence of life imprisonment. I will point out what a terrorism act is. It is defined in the Terrorism Suppression Act 2002 by a threefold test and it is a cumulative test. Firstly the terrorist act itself must have an ideological political or religious motivation. It is not an ordinary crime; it must have a very particular motivation. Second the act must induce terror in the civilian population or be designed to compel a Government to do something. Third the act must be intended to result in death to threaten the health and safety of the population—anthrax for instance—or to threaten major economic systems. The intentional release of foot-and-mouth disease for instance would be a case in point. All three tests must be satisfied and that is the important issue that I want to bring to the public point of view. In order to convict someone of committing a terrorist act a jury would have to be satisfied that all three tests were met. That is a high threshold. 
In conclusion I say this bill is necessary at this stage. It is simply coincidental that it comes at this particular time. The bill is primarily aimed at international terrorists. But when issues of terrorism are raised domestically the public are right to be concerned. They have a right to be satisfied that the threat is real because terrorism strikes at the core of society. We must wait to see the evidence that the police have but that evidence will have to be compelling or else there will be an accounting.