Fox Marama: Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFox Marama: Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee[Sitting date: 09 December 2014. Volume:702;Page:1221. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MARAMA FOX (Co-Leader—Māori Party):Kia ora e Te Mana Whakawā ō tātou mate takitini e takoto mai rā i runga i ō tātou marae maha i runga i ō tātou papa kāinga i roto i tō tātou Whare kua ūhia rātou ki ngā taumata kōrero e tika ana hei poroporoaki i a rātou.[Thank you Mr Speaker and in regards to the myriads of our deaths lying there upon our many courtyards home settlements and in our House fitting tributes of farewell have been accorded and cast over them.]The Māori Party stands at the second reading to oppose the Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill.If I was to take a walk just 5 minutes down the road to the Wellington Railway Station I would see the impressive bronze statue of Mahatma Gandhi. At the statue’s unveiling in 2007 Mr Ernest the Indian High Commissioner said: “On India’s part the gifting of the statue is an expression of our deep appreciation and acknowledgment of the commitment of the people of New Zealand for setting an example to the world of a tolerant open and inclusive society”. How is this relevant to the bill on countering terrorism? It has everything and nothing to do with this legislation.The major concern for the Māori Party is that the bill seeks to change the law to allow the New Zealand SIS to conduct surveillance activities without a warrant “in situations of emergency or urgency”. It then allows the Director of Security to authorise surveillance activities to be undertaken “in situations of emergency or urgency”. So how does this connect to Gandhi? The statue immortalises our nation for its tolerant open and inclusive society yet it is noteworthy that our champion of peace Te Whiti o Rongomai is not honoured similarly with a statue of his own.And where is the link to this legislation? Where it is explicit is that Te Whiti o Rongomai was the leader of Parihaka a Māori village in Taranaki. Te Whiti was one of those great leaders alongside Mahatma Gandhi Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela and yet his story is relatively unknown in our official histories. His story dates back to 1880 and the West Coast Settlement (North Island) Act by which any Māori in Taranaki could be arrested without a warrant and jailed for 2 years with hard labour. Te Whiti was arrested and then held under the West Coast Peace Preservation Act of 1882 without warrant charge or trial and jailed for 3 months. These two Acts are a precedent for the legislation that will be passed today—a bill that will pass into law measures to introduce surveillance without warrants.Warrantless surveillance is warrantless surveillance whether it is for 48 hours or 24 hours. It makes no substantive difference. We have been here before. We have brought into law legislation that does away with basic human rights through the initiative of warrantless search and surveillance. Although we welcome the fact that the amended bill has cut back the time frame for the Security Intelligence Service to conduct surveillance without a warrant from 48 hours to 24 hours it is the principle at stake. Our constituents have clearly told us they do not trust the authorities with such extraordinary powers.Of course we are as concerned as any party with the increased threats and we accept the need for robust measures to be in place to ensure that spy agencies can respond rapidly to terrorist threats hence the reason we disagree with the urgency under which this legislation is being considered. But with the shameful history of this nation and its disproportionate treatment of Māori under a questionable surveillance regime we cannot willingly allow the rule of law to be cast aside to increase opportunities for spying on New Zealanders. Te Whiti o Rongomai and Tohu Kākahi in the 1880s the alleged Operation Leaf in 2004—which supposedly gathered political intelligence on Māori though wire-taps and computer hacking—and fast-forward to 2007 the people of Ruātoki and Tūhoe and Operation Eight. Just to be clear: we do not believe that a warrantless search can be justified under any circumstances.We appreciated the changes made by the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee and we are gravely concerned about the rapidly evolving threat of terrorism both locally and internationally but we truly believe that the capacity and capability of our safety and security measures can be increased without compromising on basic citizen rights—compromises that with overtones of racial profiling may well infringe the rights of Māori just as has happened in the past. Although there are considerable changes the bill has not been subject to a full process of public scrutiny and still poses a number of issues. We therefore continue to oppose it.