Collins Judith: Social Security (Entitlement Cards) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Collins Judith: Social Security (Entitlement Cards) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:639;Page:9157] 
JUDITH COLLINS (National—Clevedon) 
: 
 I am grateful for the opportunity to speak on Part 2 of the Social Security (Entitlement Cards) Amendment Bill. This part deals with the Births Deaths and Marriages Registration Act and disclosure of that information on microchips embedded in the cards. That is a concern because this same Government has been talking about restricting the right of New Zealand citizens to access births deaths and marriages information yet it wants to keep for itself the right not only to access that information but also to stick it on to a microchip and put that microchip into a card. Why do we have this double standard going on? 
I heard one of the speakers before from the Government side of the Chamber speak about the information that would be on the microchip—name address date of birth those sorts of things. Most people would think that was quite fine. But how do we know that that is all that is on that card in that microchip? How do we know? The reason we do not know what is on the card is that we do not all have little microchip scanners or magnetic strip scanners to tell us what is on it. We do not actually know. So when the Government says that the only information on the microchip is what is already on the card superannuitants can only hope that is true because they have no way of verifying it. That is a real concern. 
We have asked people whether they have thought about what happens with cards that are already being used from which information can be downloaded and stolen. The Privacy Commissioner has drawn our attention to that and she would like to have a proper inquiry and debate on this issue. That is why National members have supported amendments relating to this issue. We do not believe that we should not have microchips and should not have barcodes but we do believe that when we introduce new technology into very sensitive areas like this we should have a proper public debate on it. This bill has had a sort of truncated process; it was introduced at the end of November and sent back to the House in March—all for some political grandstanding by the Associate Minister for Senior Citizens. None of it is about making sure that information is safely held. 
I do not know whether many people know of people who have used their credit cards overseas come back home then all of a sudden found that $10000 had been whipped off their credit cards. That happened to a friend of mine who was in Italy. She used her credit card in a restaurant came back and found that thousands of dollars had been run up on her credit card. There are sophisticated ways of taking information out of magnetic strips and microchips and that information is then sold to criminal gangs working in Europe and Asia that use it to manufacture new cards. We should be saying to superannuitants that they need to be aware of that. When they hand their cards over they need to know that those cards are not just cards; they have information on them that is private. 
Some of that information births deaths and marriages information is so private in fact that this Government wants to restrict the right of New Zealand citizens to access it because it does not want it to be used wrongly. Yet here it is putting that information on a card when it does not really need to be there. 
The other thing we need to think about is that this bill allows births deaths and marriages information to be put on a card in relation to a person’s spouse or civil union partner or former spouse or civil union partner. What about the long-term de facto people who the previous Parliament said were just the same as married people and civil union partners? What about them? I did not vote for that bill because I knew that it was silly. But this Government which forced that legislation through has forgotten about those people whose relationships are not registered. People in long-term de facto relationships will be treated differently from other couples. Has the Minister considered that? I do not think he has. 
The Minister talked about the various people who made submissions about this issue and he just dismissed them as being wrong because they did not agree with him. They include people from the New Zealand Law Society which has a special committee to look at these things. Those people do not sit around all day thinking about their next overseas trip; they are sitting there thinking about very serious legal issues and saying they are issues that should be taken into account.