Borrows Chester: Private Security Personnel and Private Investigators Bill — Second Reading 
Borrows Chester: Private Security Personnel and Private Investigators Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:666;Page:13708] 
CHESTER BORROWS (National—Whanganui) 
: 
 I rise to speak in favour of the Private Security Personnel and Private Investigators Bill. This bill came before the Justice and Electoral Committee. The committee members applied themselves to it in a very studious way and sought wide consultation on it. A number of people submitted to the committee. A lot of those submitters came from the industry and some people submitted as individuals with concerns about where part of the bill might be going relating to the ability of private investigators to take photographs to videotape and to use listening devices. 
The main thrust of the bill is that technology has moved on to a place that was never envisaged at the time the Private Investigators and Security Guards Act the legislation that the bill is replacing was passed in 1974. We had a very graphic presentation from Trevor Morley who was previously the president of the relevant industry association. He brought before the committee a number of pieces of fairly basic technology like cellphones and digital cameras and he made the point that although these pieces are seen as common everyday items in most people’s possession they are not allowed to be used in certain ways by private investigators. Bearing in mind that private investigators have been through a certification process and a vetting process they are apparently more trusted than the average member of the public yet they are not more trusted than the average member of the public when it comes to doing things like taking photographs and making sound recordings. 
For instance we have the ridiculous situation where if I was a concerned parent who had instructed a private investigator to go out and look for my miscreant runaway 15-year-old daughter I could give the private investigator a photo of my daughter and say that this is the girl I want him to look for. Under the current law the private investigator cannot show that photograph to anyone else and ask that person whether he or she has seen her but he could stand in front of that person and say that she is about 5 foot 6 has brown hair and green eyes and all the rest of it. I ask whether that is ridiculous and whether that is just dumb. That is why this bill has been brought before the House. 
A number of other measures in the bill relate to security guards personal guards and a number of positions that will become invaluable during the smooth running of the Rugby World Cup next year which is one of the reasons why we need to have this legislation passed through the House quite quickly. 
As was previously mentioned by Jacinda Ardern we had a discussion on clause 66. A number of members of Parliament certainly held some reservations in respect of that clause. Two members in particular one from each side of the House had been the subject of the ongoing videotaping of their houses at the time. We also then heard of the ridiculous situation where although a private investigator cannot videotape a person’s home as a private investigator he or she can approach that person’s neighbour and ask the neighbour to do the videotaping from his or her place. That is completely without any sanction whatsoever. Many private investigators acting in that way are contracted to do so by newspapers and other media outlets. They cannot do it but a journalist can. The person who gets to write the story is able to do the taping the sound recording or the photography but the certificated vetted private investigator cannot. That seems a bit silly. 
I will touch on one other point in relation to training. It was suggested initially that people seeking certification under new provisions would be required to go through training. In the end it was decided that this training should really be a display of competency bearing in mind that a lot of people who will be working in this field have previously been working in it for a number of years and a display of competency and ability is probably far more important than sitting in a classroom and undergoing X number of hours of training. 
We look forward to the relatively smooth passage of this bill. We recognise that there are a couple of matters of contention particularly for the Green Party and the Labour Party but in the end I think that people can see that if we are to extend powers it is better to extend them to people who are certificated and who are accountable rather than to members of the public who are not. 
We also have to remember that at the same time we have the transition of the Search and Surveillance Bill which looks at regulating State agents and their ability to do similar activities. If we are constraining those activities then we should be constraining or at least monitoring and regulating the activities of private security personnel and private investigators. Thank you.