Penk ChrisCHRIS PENK (National—Helensville): Thank you Madam Chair. In my contribution I'd like to focus on the meaning of engagement in terrorism … activities". That's a particular phrase used in clause 7. The significance of that in the context of our debate on Part 1 is that what we have is a number of criteria a number of items in a checklist any one of which needs to be satisfied in order for a terrorism-related activity to be deemed to exist by our appropriate authorities. I'll just go through each of those and then my intention is to link it to clause 6 which talks about the meaning of a "relevant person".So the first thing to note is that the definition or the checklist of potential terrorism-related activities is defined in terms of the purposes of the Act. We've talked about those already. So that's the background and so it is that we see it in clause 7(2) any of the following: "planning or other preparations to carry out the terrorism whether it is actually carried out or not:"—and that's a sensible way of formulating the fact that something might be planned and not yet executed but nevertheless represent a threat by the potential that is inherent in that type of planning and preparation. The next is "a credible threat to carry out the terrorism"—again—"whether it is actually carried out or not:" and then "an attempt to carry out the terrorism:" or of course "the carrying out of the terrorism." So all these different activities are relevant in the context of what we think about as terrorism.So it is that we then look across to the meaning of "relevant person". I would just challenge the committee to consider whether or not a person should be defined as relevant in relation to their age as opposed to their capacity to carry out the particular activities that define terrorism as we've already just heard. My submission to the committee to the nation and most particularly to the Minister is that if a person is capable of carrying out those particular things that we define as terrorism then they are capable of being thought of as a terrorist for the purpose of the Act for the provisions then to apply that they should be detained for four hours—or we would say longer. We would give them a three-day stay or up to a three-day stay if that amount of time was necessary. And so given that intention that we carry out the purpose of the Act to protect the New Zealand public from terrorism and those particular acts that constitute it it should be that alone that is the basis for us considering what a relevant person is.Accordingly we shouldn't look at clause 6(1) and see that the relevant person is first of all a person who is 18 years old or older who may be coming to New Zealand and so forth. The age of the person is irrelevant in the context of their ability to carry out the acts we are talking about. Now I appreciate that it might be that it's less likely that someone who is very young will carry out a credible threat but that much is already contained. That's inherent in the definition of the fact that it must be a credible threat to carry out the terrorism.So that aspect that we would say "Well it would be absurd to say for example that a five-year-old should be subject to the Act because a five-year-old is not going to have a credible threat."—well that's fine because they're not going to meet the definition of a terrorist activity or terrorism-related activity by the black and white letter of the law as we see later in the Act.It might be as well that the Minister would consider an amendment to the Act that says "Well instead of having a brightline cut off on one's 18th birthday it might be that prior to that a person would still be applicable to the Act but for their age to be taken into account in the way that the Act is administered."I'm not certain that I feel that that would necessarily be the strongest or most robust way of handling the matter but I would say that at least it would take into account the fact that a person is young and that the justice system does recognise such a thing as a youth offender or some other description of a person who is not yet 18. So by doing that we wouldn't exclude them from the whole jurisdiction of the Act but we could say that their age is somehow irrelevant still in the way that they're treated but they're not excluded entirely by that. That's really the point that I wanted to make. With it goes the related question really of whether the Minister would contemplate an amendment whether it's a Supplementary Order Paper that's already been tabled or something along similar lines that allows those who are younger than 18 but nevertheless can carry out a credible threat to be treated at least in some way under this law."