Tisch Lindsay: Identity (Citizenship and Travel Documents) Bill — First Reading 
Tisch Lindsay: Identity (Citizenship and Travel Documents) Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:618;Page:14508] 
LINDSAY TISCH (National—Piako) 
: 
 It is always good to follow an optimist. When the member said that ProgressiveAlliance membership is increasing—a 100 percent increase from two to four—it is really good especially when it is going to have some candidates. This is an important bill. We have some reservations about it and I will canvass these as we go through but we will be supporting it to the select committee. 
People can be very proud and privileged to be citizens of New Zealand. I am certainly one. Our family came from Germany originally back on 9 May 1851 and I am proud to be a Kiwi and to have the rights of a New Zealander. So it is important that we look at what is best for the country and how we can add value to it. But we do have some concerns. First I want to highlight the proposed changes. That has already been done but I think it is important that we put on the record what these are. We will then be able to debate them during the bill’s progress especially during the Committee stage when after the bill has been examined by the select committee we will have an opportunity to debate it on a part by part basis. The qualifying period to become a citizen will increase from 3 to 5 years. That is a major concern in that many people living here fail to qualify if they have been overseas within that 3-year period. 
I have a letter here from a constituent which has gone to the Minister’s office and it is appropriate that I read it out. I have the writer’s permission. The writer is Dutch and this is what he says: “I have been in New Zealand since 1973. I have a Dutch passport with a permanent re-entry permit without any travel restrictions. At the end of last year I started New Zealand citizenship proceedings and had an interview with a member of Internal Affairs. The applications with the submission were sent to the Minister. During the interview I was told that the Minister would not approve my application on the grounds of being out of the country for more than 1 year during the past 3 years.”—that is what the law says. “Every year we spend the winter months in tropical parts of Australia—Queensland in particular—from June through to the end of October. We have family over there and we do extensive travel. My wife is 71 and I am 73 years of age.” 
So here is an example of someone who goes overseas for a period at that age to see family. Yet he has lived in New Zealand continuously since 1973. The point is that because he has not been here for that 3-year period as he had gone to see family he is not eligible for citizenship. That is what the law says. So one of the proposed changes that the Minister is advocating is that this provision go out tofor 5 years. It will be 5 years before a person will be able to apply for citizenship. Yet these people have been here for 31 years since 1973. 
There is another case—and this certainly will be interesting when we have the Committee stage—of a person who lives in my town. This person has been here for many years. The person is very experienced and very professional doing work for Goodman Fielder over in Fiji. This person was out of the country for 3 months that is all. In that period the person did not have the required 3 continuous years to be able to go for citizenship. This person a well-known citizen has actually missed out on citizenship. This person has come back to New Zealand and lives in Matamata where I come from. Such persons will of course be further disadvantaged by this provision now going out to 5 years. 
If we were then to look at another part of this bill which we think is going to be quite onerous it is that passports will need to be renewed every 5 years instead of 10 years. WNow we do not have any difficulty with making sure that those passports are up-to-date and importantly that the scrutiny that goes into passport applications right at the beginning is very very thorough. That is fine. But if we are going to reduce that to a 5-year period so that people have to go through the process again to get a renewal of a passport the costs associated with that are going to be horrendous. 
I have here the figures for application fees for passports. To get a standard service it is $71; to get an urgent service it is $146; and for a call-out service it is $401. So the costs associated with getting a passport are horrendous. If we then look at what children under 16 years of age must pay a standard service is $36. For an urgent service it is $111 and for a special call-out it is $366. 
 So huge costs are associated with getting a passport in the first place then to reduce the time for which a passport is valid from 10 years down to 5 years will put immense pressure on those people who can ill afford it. It is just an extra compliance cost. 
I have here the estimates for 2004-05 and a record of some of the questions that were asked. One question asks: “What was the breakdown of the user charges from the department?”. The fees from births deaths and marriages were bringing in just over $8.5 million; passport fees were bringing in $21 million; and citizenship fees were bringing in $10 million. The Minister said that there are about 2.5 million active passports at the moment. When I look at these figures huge amounts of money are coming in to the Department of Internal Affairs. Some years ago on the Regulations Review Committee we had an issue whereby the department wanted to increase passport fees and at that time it was looking at cross-subsidisation. As members will know there cannot be cross-subsidisation when there are fees and duties; there can only be cost recovery. So we are concerned about that issue. 
If we look at what will happen in border protection and border security we are quite comfortable with that. The House has just been considering the Border Security Bill and we saw that the increased costs to people who are importing and exporting will be about $20 million. It was an argument about private good versus public good and during that time a great debate went on as to who should pay whether the costs were relevant and more important in relation to this bill whether reducing the length of time of a passport from 10 years to 5 years would make better citizens out of New Zealanders. 
National is concerned about the lack of provision in the bill for another issue and I quote here from a question in a Department of Internal Affairs paper: “I have heard reports that babies of non – New Zealand citizen foreign mothers born in New Zealand will no longer get citizenship. Is that correct?”. The answer was: “No the bill contains no reference to citizenship-by-birth issues.” National is very concerned about that provision. 
 It is just a cheap way for people to come to New Zealand have their children and then opt out. Those children then become New Zealand citizens because they were born here and National is very opposed to that. It is citizenship by stealth. If this bill is a security measure if it is to help improve the security of New Zealanders and New Zealand it is a back-door attempt. That is the reason why we are opposed specifically to the clause that provides that if someone has a child born here and the person is not a New Zealand citizen that child will get New Zealand citizenship. 
We will debate that issue at some length during the select committee. We want a clause introduced into the bill to prevent that from happening and prevent the right of people becoming New Zealand citizens just because they happen to be born here to foreigners. I give notice that this is a major concern of National and in the select committee we will make sure that that voice is heard and also during the debate. If the clause is not included in the bill we will move an amendment to make sure that that happens. 
Although we have voiced concerns about a number of issues and we want to see them debated further I do know that the Department of Internal Affairs and the passport people have done a good job in identifying some of the issues we saw happening in Thailand. However we will be supporting the bill to the select committee.