Menéndez March Ricardo; Penk ChrisRICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH (Green): Thank you Madam Chair. I invite any other member of this committee to participate in this debate. I think as a House of Representatives it's a bit of a disservice to have literally one member other than Phil Twyford to my right making a contribution.Hon Shane Jones: It's boring!RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: It may be boring but do you know what? Detaining asylum seekers may be boring to Shane Jones but this is quite significant. Asylum seekers are some of the most marginalised people and actually we're going to be introducing a piece of legislation that as many human rights organisations spoke about is diminishing their rights. We should have a proper debate on this and actually seek answers.Carl Bates: What sort of logic is that? Democracy?RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: Democracy indeed. You're getting paid to actually legislate—CHAIRPERSON (Maureen Pugh): Order! [Interruption] Carl Bates please do not debate across the Chamber with each other. We'll come back to the bill.RICARDO MENÉNDEZ MARCH: Thank you Madam Chair. To go back to the actual bill the other part of the system around public health concerns would be around for example the public health issue I wonder with this new categorisation.I'll go back to the issues around detention which I know are in Part 2 but there will be people who will present with for example quite severe mental health distress. That's actually a completely separate health issue to for example a transmissible disease. But what I wanted to check around the mental health needs of these people are initial arrivals. This is before the detention part of the bill in Part 2. This is around the categorisation around arrivals—whether he's got confidence around the system being able to absorb and to identify those mental health needs before detention because ultimately in order for Part 2 to work effectively you'll need to make decisions that actually are responsive to the needs of those people.So with creating a categorisation of mass arrivals which in and of itself allows for the detention from Part 2 I do want to have confidence that the Minister is on top of any resourcing additionally or otherwise that would be needed in order to ensure that the detention components of Part 2 won't cause further harm.Hon CHRIS PENK (Associate Minister of Immigration): Madam Chair thank you very much. I think I can answer reasonably briefly the concerns raised by the member. The advice that's been provided by officials is not complex advice. I think it's if I may say pitched at the right level for a layperson like myself but acknowledges the complexities of the health needs that may arise in a mass arrival group. The member's right to raise the fact that these could be quite challenging but of course that only indicates the fact that it may be that more time is needed to process those who are in this situation—I was going to say who find themselves in this situation and/or those who place themselves in this situation".As to whether the capacity of the New Zealand public health system and indeed the immigration service is sufficient to process them in a timely manner—well I can't vouch for that. With all due respect that's not within the scope of the bill except to say that to the extent that resources are finite—and it might be that if a mass arrival were to take place for example over the Christmas and new year period where it might reasonably be expected that there were fewer resources available—that again is an argument in favour of having more flexibility in a system such that it might be that more time is needed than four days or even seven days out to 28 days.Of course we're straying now into the detail of Part 2. I look forward to those discussions but I think if I may say that provides a bit of a response in terms of the nature of the distinction between a mass arrival group versus those who might be considered more traditionally as a passenger coming on to these shores."