Goudie Sandra: Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Goudie Sandra: Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:647;Page:16120] 
SANDRA GOUDIE (National—Coromandel) 
: 
 I rise to respond to the Minister’s assertions about the confusion that has arisen over the Births Deaths Marriages and Relationships Registration Amendment Bill. Essentially John Hayes is right. There are two parts to it. One part is about the New Zealand public having the freedom of access to the information that is currently within the births deaths and marriages register. That has been a time-honoured tradition for many many years and that is as it should be. The public should not be shut out from access to that information—I think it is over 100 years for births and 50 years for deaths. Why do we not leave their access to that information as it was? That is where the sledgehammer came in because all that was needed was to say that if one wants a birth certificate instead of just paying $26 and getting an authorised document which at the moment anybody can do about anyone then one has to show some form of identification. I know this because I tested the system myself. I gave someone $26 and sent them off for a copy of a document to see what that person would get. What the person got was a properly authenticated document—no identification was necessary and no documentation was necessary. 
Why is a whole raft of legislation necessary just to require that some form of identification is shown before an authorised document is issued? It is as simple as that—it is very very simple. Any amount of information could be given out on a photocopied bit of paper or on a printout. It did not matter; that was all OK. The fact is that properly authorised documents were being given out. How dumb is that? It is simple. It is so dumb to do that and it is so simple to fix. When one goes for a driver’s licence one needs some form of ID. When one goes for a gun licence one needs some form of ID. There is a whole raft of things for which one needs some form of ID. That is all that is absolutely necessary—people just have to wander along with some form of ID and say they need a properly authorised document. Otherwise people just say they want the information and the information is handed over. They pay a few dollars and they get the information which is just a computer printout or a photocopy or whatever. But no the registry office is handing out authorised documents. That should have been stamped out long ago. And what do we get? We get this monstrous legislation cutting off everybody’s access to information without jumping through a whole lot of hoops and hurdles then denying them access to information—some aspects of it for 100 years and some aspects of it for 50 years. 
When the media said it is all about using a sledgehammer to crack a nut the media was absolutely right. This issue should have been able to be addressed without having to deal with legislation because there are legislative guidelines there. The first question asked is “What is the problem that you’re trying to fix?”. I do not think that that question is ever asked of any legislation by this current Government. The second question asked is “Is there another way of addressing the problem?”. Well I am sure that the Government does not ask that either. So what do we get? We get this ridiculous legislation where people’s rights are trampled all over for no just cause. 
One of the wonderful things about people having open access to this information is that over a period of a number of years 86000 corrections were made to the registry. It is only because people have access to that information that the information is actually corrected. A lot of the financial and banking institutions that do background checks are in a classic position to provide that very good information to the registry to make sure that all those corrections take place. There is no way that the registry office would ever be able to do any work around correcting and substantiating the information on that register to make sure it is correct. It is actually the very nature of its openness and transparency that keeps it honest and I for one applaud that openness and transparency and the honesty that goes with that. I am a huge supporter of that and I am saddened by the fact that this legislation cuts across the bows of that. I think that is a tragedy when all that we had to do was to say that next time a person wants an authorised document he or she will be required to come in with a couple of pieces of documentation. It is as simple as that—no problem. We just need to go through the process and see what needs to be fixed. Let us not bring out the sledgehammer. But that is exactly what has happened and that is exactly why we are in this position today. We could not get them to see sense.