Fenton Darien: Immigration Amendment Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFenton Darien: Immigration Amendment Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 30 May 2013. Volume:690;Page:10614. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DARIEN FENTON (Labour): Thank you very much for the chance to speak on the Committee stage of the Immigration Amendment Bill. I think that in speaking to Part 1 it is worth reminding ourselves because it has been a little while since the second reading what this bill is about—well what gave rise to it—and why we have this bill in the Committee stage.Sue Moroney: Was there anything?DARIEN FENTON: What was that?Sue Moroney: Was there anything that gave rise to it?DARIEN FENTON: Well actually there was. There was something that gave rise to it actually. If we go back to around about a year ago when this bill was first introduced there were a couple of things that gave rise to this. The National Party was having a little bit of trouble. There was a little bit of trouble going on a little bit of controversy around Skycity.Sue Moroney: Oh!DARIEN FENTON: Yes so what happened was that this bill suddenly appeared from nowhere out of the blue a year after the Prime Minister had said that New Zealand is in a very very good situation in terms of the potential for a mass arrival of asylum seekers. He said that New Zealand is in a very good situation and we could copequite adequately with that there was nothing to worry about nothing to see nothing to fear—and here we go this bill arrived.If you go back to the reason behind this bill—in fact to the purpose of the bill—it was premised on the fact that we could at some stage in New Zealand expect to see a mass arrival of 500 people on a boat. That is one of the justifications for this bill that was put forward as the original reason why we needed to have this bill. Five hundred people—Dr Cam Calder: Are you saying that’s impossible?DARIEN FENTON: Well I am saying that that was the original reason but that has changed now because actually it is now 30 people Cam Calder so it has changed. It has changed during the year that we have actually been looking at it. Well actually a mass arrival originally under this bill was 10 people—10 people turning up on a rusty old boat on our shores was a mass arrival that New Zealand could not cope with. That is what this bill has come down to.Dr Cam Calder: And are you saying that’s impossible?DARIEN FENTON: I am saying that it is just about impossible. Yes I am saying that. It is just about impossible.I am also saying that this bill is premised on a completely false assumption. It was based on a Canadian ship that came from Sri Lanka. It arrived on Canadian shores chartered by Tamils who are a big population in Canada. It was a steel-hulled ship that for some reason sent our Government into a panic believing that a similar ship could arrive in New Zealand.There are two things about that. First of all a steel-hulled ship carrying 500 people could never be funded by any population in New Zealand. We do not have a sizable Tamil population or any other in New Zealand. Second of all there has never been an instance of any ship arriving in this way since we have had the issue of refugees going right back to the 1970s in fact when there was all this scare around boat people.So that was the first premise of the bill. It was premised on the fact that there would be 500 people involved in a mass arrival. This is in the regulatory impact statement. They would all be from the same country they would all claim asylum and 62 percent of these claims would be declined following assessments. So there was a big scare around 500 people. As we got further into this bill of course we found out that actually what the Government was talking about was 10 people. Ten people turning up on a boat was a mass arrival which our country could not cope with. Honestly that is so so pathetic.The second thing that this bill was premised on was that it was supposed to deter people-smugglers. I find this very interesting because of course none of us support people-smugglers. We all know that that is something at the heart of some of the problems we are seeing in Australia which have given rise to the appalling detention centres that they have. In fact that is the system that we are trying to copy with this bill. People-smugglers are crooks. They are the people who prey on vulnerable people who are looking for a better life who are struggling and who have families and children whom they are trying to get out of camps and so on. People-smugglers are evil so we support stopping people-smugglers.But what did we find in the last couple of weeks? We have actually let a people-smuggler into New Zealand. We have granted that person refugee status.Hon David Cunliffe: John Key?DARIEN FENTON: Well there is that one but there is another one. We have granted refugee status to someone who was responsible for being involved in people-smuggling whom the Australians are seeking—they want him extradited. He was responsible for being involved in people-smuggling where hundreds of familymembers—parents and children—were drowned when the boat sunk. That person is living in New Zealand as a refugee. He was granted refugee status. If we are so worried about people-smuggling surely the first thing we should be concentrating on rather than this rubbishy bill is making sure we protect our own refugee system from people like that who are involved in people-smuggling.We all know that this bill is punishing the victims of people-smugglers and they are the people who arrive in a rusty boat who are often in awful situations and they often end up drowning or end up in horrible camps somewhere. We all know that they are the victims of people-smugglers. What this bill does is it punishes the victims of people-smugglers. It does nothing—nothing—to deter people-smugglers.The Transport and Industrial Relations Committee heard the evidence and advice from I think 33 submitters—only one of whom actually supported this bill—who are very very involved in this issue like the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and refugee organisations that have got years of experience. All of their advice was that research shows that this kind of legislation locking up the victims for up to 6 months or more in mandatory detention without the rights of ordinary people without the rights of asylum seekers who come by plane does not deter people-smugglers.So the premise that this would be 500 people on a boat and the premise that this would deter people-smugglers are false—they are false. The underlying question that I have then for the Minister in the chair the Minister of Internal Affairs about Part 1 is this: what is really behind this bill? What is really behind this bill?Carol Beaumont: The Minister told us the answer to that.DARIEN FENTON: Well I think we know—I think we know. I think that the Minister of Immigration and John Key have got themselves in the big boys’ club along with Canada the UK Australia and so on they have gone off to the five-country conferences and they have been persuaded that we should join with them in their immigration policies which are wrong—which are wrong. They have been persuaded.In fact we know that John Key was persuaded by Julia Gillard from Australia that we should take 150 of Australia’s refugees. Julia Gillard is a smart woman. She got a great deal. She got a great deal out of that. [Interruption] Yes she is a very smart woman; that is why she is the Prime Minister of Australia. She got a great deal out of that. What did we get? We got nothing. John Key got done and John Key has not been able to justify that deal. He has not been able to justify that deal in any way shape or form. He is hiding behind national security. Nobody knew anything about the deal. It popped up and he got done by Julia Gillard down in Queenstown. She got a great deal; we got a terrible deal.And here we are now with a stupid bill a bill that does nothing except actually damage our international reputation which I treasure which we treasure as a country that has got a great human rights record when it comes to refugees and accepting refugees. This bill does damage. It is not necessary. The purpose of this bill is stupid. The purpose has been shown to be completely based on a false premise. We are debating the bill and I do not even know why we are wasting the Committee’s time on something like this where 10 people could be locked up for 6 months. It is supposed to be such a critical issue for New Zealand that 10 people might arrive on a boat one day. It possibly maybe could perhaps happen and we want to lock them up.