Mapp Wayne: Armed Forces Law Reform Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMapp Wayne: Armed Forces Law Reform Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 10 October 2007. Volume:642;Page:12268. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore): This closing debate in the Committee stage of the Armed Forces Law Reform Bill is an opportunity to reflect upon not only the military justice system but also broader issues. This legislation is intended to endure for let us say 30 years—one generation. That is why the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee knowing that fact took the time and trouble to do a detailed and thorough job in developing the legislation. We realised that thelegislation was unlikely to be revisited any time soon except perhaps by way of technical amendments through statutes amendment legislation.I will reflect on that point about this being a once-in-a-generation opportunity. We do not get many opportunities in the House to talk about foreign and defence policy.Darren Hughes: Lucky for National.Dr WAYNE MAPP: My colleague Tim Groser has been expanding a bit as to why we have arrived at a more bipartisan approach. I say to the junior Labour whip that that has involved a degree of convergence by both the major parties. I know that from experience having been involved in theInquiry into Defence Beyond 2000 process. The select committee members including Major Mark worked very hard on that report and I think we laid the groundwork to get us to the current position. There have been a few jigs and jags if you will to get to that position but that report laid the groundwork. I can say to members on the other side that various members of the National Party took an extremely active role in developing that paper including the sense of priorities within it.I should note that I was on that select committee with Derek Quigley. We discussed these things at length and we discussed with the Minister at the time Paul East why we were doing the project. We needed his support for the project. Things perhaps got slightly more fractious thereafter.September 11 was a little bit of a wake-up call for everyone in this Parliament. As Mr Anderton noted at the RSA conference he actually lost his party on the issue. He took a realistic view as a senior Minister at the time as to what New Zealand’s interests actually were. That was a very important point of principle. It is extremely important not only for our own country but also for our partners to know where we stand as a nation what kinds of relationships we believe in and where we can add our best value.We make it very clear in our report—which builds on work done by a number of others including most recently Mr JimRolfe for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute—that in essence New Zealand has two prime interests. The first is built around the South Pacific and extends essentially out to East Timor. With Australia we are the two most capable nations in the region economically militarily and diplomatically.We always want to act in a way whereby the other nations in the region that have deep contacts with us trust us. They should trust us to provide the right set of skills the right development assistance and the right support when they are in difficulties as some of those nations have been. The Solomons Bougainville and Tonga are cases in point. They should trust us that our interventions will be beneficial and to their advantage. That has taken a lot of skill.It may be of interest to some members that in the paper we make specific reference to New Zealand’sMāori and Polynesian heritage to the particular insights that that gives us in the South Pacific region and to the way it helps us to build trust with other cultures. The New Zealand defence forces are particularly good I might add at interacting with other cultures. Because we are small in part and because we cannot rely on firepower or anything like that we actually have to rely on human skills in order to build trust with the people whom we are dealing with. The era of great power conflict I think for the foreseeable future is past but there is still a great deal of conflict in the world. New Zealand has a challenging role to play in that respect.The second component of our paper talks about New Zealand’s role outside of our immediate region which I might add is an immense region. It covers one-fifth of the globe. We sometimes forget just how big the Pacific Ocean is and what a tremendous demand that that places on the shape and nature of the defence forces. Of course I understand the value of Project Protector in that respect.We are a country of 4.5 million people. We are not a large country but we bring certain types of expertise which are well respected. It is also true and it is self-evident I think to every member certainly every major party—all parties actually—in the House that we have a particular set of relationships with nations which have been built up over many many decades. To a very large extent they still flavour the way we do things. For instance we are in Afghanistan essentially on a multiparty basis I guess. I think everyone accepts the importance of the work we are doing in theBagram province and people understand also the vital importance of the work of the special forces. We have only to reflect on the courage and heroism of Corporal WillyApiata VC to know the value we bring.These demands are not placed on a country like Uruguay or Chile because countries like that do not have our history and traditions. We are an internationally engaged country. We have international interests. We have had a long tradition of being active in bringing peacekeeping and stability to the world’s trouble spots. We are increasingly recognising—and this is the point about bipartisanship—that we need to be a little bit selective about that. We are a country of 4.5 million people so there is no point offering a complete smorgasbord of skills; that is better left to larger countries. But in the things that we are going to do—and they need to be selective—we must do them well and we must do them with excellence. Only in that way can we get respect and appreciation from other members of the international community.I suppose one of the reasons why there has been a bit of a shift by National is a recognition that continuing on the traditional path was not going to build that level of expertise and quality that frankly we expect of ourselves and that other countries expect of us. There is no point going in internationally if we end up being a burden. We must add value and skill to an international deployment for it to be worthwhile.I conclude on this point: the bill is a long-term project. The development of defence policy and foreign policy is a long-term project. It should not swing sharply and abruptly on a 3-year cycle. I note that there has been an important point of convergence of both the major parties and indeed some of the other parties in Parliament in bringing us—Ron Mark: Yes.Dr WAYNE MAPP: —yes the other parties in Parliament—to a more sensible approach to defence and foreign policy.