Carter Chris: International Non-Aggression and Lawful Use of Force Bill — First Reading 
Carter Chris: International Non-Aggression and Lawful Use of Force Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:656;Page:5743] 
Hon CHRIS CARTER (Labour—Te Atatu) 
: 
 I rise on behalf of the Labour Party as its spokesperson on foreign affairs to speak in support of Dr Kennedy Graham’s International Non-Aggression and Lawful Use of Force Bill. 
We have just heard from Dr Wayne Mapp from the National Party that the Government will not be supporting this bill. He concluded his 10-minute presentation by saying there is another way to deal with the bill. Of course there is and that is to send it to a select committee. There are ways to improve this bill and we have to reconcile this legislation with domestic legislation. We have to see that it fits in comfortably with the International Criminal Court. Aspects of the bill could be improved and I am sure Dr Kennedy Graham would be the first to concede that. We have a process here at Parliament to improve a bill and that is to send the bill to a select committee. It seems that Dr Mapp is not prepared to follow his own advice and that the Government will not support this bill being sent to a select committee. 
Dr Mapp made a couple of points in his rather confused presentation—his presentation of denial—that I feel I have to take umbrage with. Firstly he said this bill empowers our foreign policy to be handed over to the United Nations. Well frankly I would be very happy for our foreign policy to be in sync with the policies of the United Nations. Dr Mapp was quite prepared when National was in Opposition to hand over our foreign policy to the United States. When Labour was in Government supported by the Green Party we said no to the deployment of our troops to Iraq. We said no to that. Members may recall that Mr John Key the current Prime Minister of our country said in the  
Rodney Times 
 that the National Party would send troops to Iraq. Of course he later recanted on that position; he is well known for such flip-flops. But the reality is that National would have caved in to the Americans; we did not do so. 
Secondly yes the previous Labour Government did send our SAS troops to Afghanistan. Mr Goff and other speakers explained yesterday in the debate that when those troops were sent there they were sent to find al-Qaeda. It was a mission supported by the United Nations and many countries in the world. Now of course they will be sent to fight the Taliban which is quite a different scenario altogether. This Government will also have our provincial reconstruction team plucked out of the excellent job it is doing in Bamian. 
I say “Good on you!” to Dr Kennedy Graham. His bill attempts to build on the principled foreign policy that our country has enjoyed for a very long time. It builds on things like our nuclear-free policy. It builds on the excellent work that this country has done—a small country but one with a powerful voice in the world—on the banning of cluster munitions on the attempts to ban the use of landmines and on the pursuit of peace and the very active role that our country has played in that area. Indeed we play a very active role in peacekeeping missions such as the Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands and the work we did in Bougainville in brokering the peace agreement there. These are all things that have given this small country of a little over 4 million people an enormous reputation in the world. 
We just heard the National Government say no to this bill. It was a sort of dumbing down of our foreign policy. We have seen much of that in this House since the election. Whether we go from things like conservation to the provision of social services such as education we find there has been a general dumbing down. I remember saying on Radio New Zealand National on election night last year that John Key would become the George Bush of New Zealand. He is a man whom history will record as having dumbed down a country a man who has seen the grinding down of our reputation. The failure to support this bill’s referral to a select committee is just about that: it is about dumbing down New Zealand’s foreign policy. It is about slavishly following some other countries rather than about being a good citizen in the world. I say “Well done!” to Dr Kennedy Graham. He is building on the reputation that our country deserves to have because of its strong support for peace in the world. I say to him that the Labour Party supports his bill.