Browning Steffan: Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBrowning Steffan: Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 20 February 2014. Volume:696;Page:16219. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]STEFFAN BROWNING (Green): I rise to speak to the Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill’s second reading. Back in September last year the Customs Service took us for a presentation over at its headquarters at the port there and went through this Joint Border Management System and where it was at. It was a very good glossy and smooth presentation. It was quite impressive and we did not think there was too much untoward about its system. It was coming together people were trialling it and we were pretty well reassured that everything was happening well. But we heard before from Phil Goff that there were doubts about how the system was coming into play and maybe there were some hiccups along the way so the Green Party also joins that call to ask the Minister of Customs and anyone from National what is going on what the hold-ups are and whether we are heading into another debacle in a systems way.The principle of this is very good. It tidies things up it makes systems smoother and way more efficient and it potentially cuts lots of cost. But there are issues of whether of course it will run smoothly. There are issues of whether there will be privacy concerns with the information that is shared. We have a lot of issues and we have had a lot of issues around privacy with thousands upon thousands of people’s data some exceptionally sensitive being shared inappropriately through different services. In fact the Customs Service not so long ago offered information on Kim Dotcom straight to the FBI without it even being asked for by the FBI. It was not legitimately being sought but there was a customs officer who thought it was just the right thing to do to earn some brownie points through supplying a private individual’s—a New Zealander’s—information to the USA’s FBI.Hon Anne Tolley: He’s a crook. A real crook.STEFFAN BROWNING: If there is anyone who is a crook it should be dealt with through the appropriate system. I think it is inappropriate for anyone in this House to call someone a crook; they are innocent until proven guilty if that was ever going to be the case.What does the border system do now? The border system is broken up into the Customs Service and the Ministry for Primary Industries. The Customs Service has a range of different services it is doing including clearance of all arriving and departing cargo and people including risk assessment and targeting duty and GST collection. There is quite a lot: intervention notification of cargo status to different ports data going from the Customs Service to the Ministry for Primary Industries and official trade statistics. There is a lot going on in terms of this data process. There is going to bea lot required of it. The Ministry for Primary Industries has got the issue of also being involved with clearance particularly around biosecurity of course. There is the clearance of certain imported foods—we have food safety issues there—and then there is export certification for animal and plant products to make sure that when our products do go overseas they are in good condition and they have been certified audited and verified whatever is required to make sure that our export markets have confidence in us so it is very important to get that right. Of course we have a big big question as we speak around meat inspections in this country because of deregulation which has allowed grotty dirty meat to go off to the United States that then has to be turned back because we have allowed the companies to do their own inspections. There are some issues around policy there. But the Ministry for Primary Industries has a role in trying to make sure the paperwork and everything that follows those theoretically good inspections happen properly.That is what the agencies are up to but what this will do is consolidate some of those transactions because the exporters and importers have had to go through both agencies and there is a lot more cost and there is a lot more paperwork. This is intended to be a good system. In 2012-13 there were over half a million transactions clearing 3.48 million export consignments—that is a lot of business—124000 cargo reports for 2300-odd commercial ships 42000 commercial aircraft arrivals and departures and 50 million mail items each year. One of the beauties of the system should it ever work properly is that the public will be able to make use of it as well whereas previously the systems have been geared only for commercial operators. So there is potential in this but we have to question with the delays in the system whether there is another debacle coming to us. The agencies have got a range of clients. They have got some pilot programmes and we heard about Mondiale Freight Services. In fact their pilot partners while they were trialling it take up about two-thirds of the volume that is going through. So there are significant trials happening. Some have opted in but others have stayed with the old system but why the whole thing is not working yet is a very valid question and we do wait for the answers to that. The current system is quite convoluted as I was saying. There is a lot of toing and froing with material through a lot of data entry points safety systems biosecurity systems third-party gateways overseas Government agencies and industry agencies. The new Trade Single Window will bring that way way back in. There will be one electronic message that will be standard and there are different connection options in that. We look forward to this system working properly—and very very properly at that.When we went to that presentation we were told where things were at to date with the Joint Border Management System then we were told the next steps and there was a big flag saying “On the way”. I think it is still there. It is very concerning that these systems are being delayed. It will be interesting to see what the costs involved in these delays are. There is a potential problem with information sharing and we do want to know and be confident about that. When I asked the Customs Service on that day about whether things were private to New Zealand I was told no they were open to trading partners. I asked to what extent we were commercially vulnerable with this and I was told that New Zealand security is the best security in place. But we know that that is not working too well. We even heard today that the Government Communications Security Bureau could not even say how many warrants were issued—it was getting its figures mixed up. There have been a number of breaches around security. We need to be sure that this system will protect New Zealand exporters and private individuals to the absolute utmost. At the moment we have not got that confidence.I want to finish on issues around biosecurity. I have just been pulling together a paper on a new pest that is around which is called theileria. Biosecurity needs to bemuch better and this system will ideally make sure that it is. It will be another step to ensure that we have even fewer pests—rather than the direction that we have at the moment which is of even more pests—coming into this country. We have got major ones that are costing this country millions of dollars in extra management costs to producers in particular. Theileria is a cattle disease. It came in to this country only about 18 months ago. The Customs Service and the Ministry for Primary Industries have not been able to isolate how it came in. We should not be having that. As we speak there has been another one that has come in: equine herpes. That is now in the horse industry. Again how the hang did that get in to New Zealand? The great white butterfly is yet another one. We just need this system to be working at its utmost. We are looking forward to this system working but we really need to know what the problems with it are. Thank you.