Goff Phil: Urgent Debates — Diplomatic Incident Malaysian Official—Negotiations Regarding Waiver of Diplomatic ImmunityText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeGoff Phil: Urgent Debates — Diplomatic Incident Malaysian Official—Negotiations Regarding Waiver of Diplomatic Immunity[Sitting date: 02 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19143. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour - Mt Roskill):An alleged attempted rape and a burglary by somebody who is a diplomatic representative of their country is a rare and extraordinary event in New Zealand. I know that when there was news that that happened the Minister of Foreign Affairs would have been notified immediately. The Minister of Foreign Affairs would have been notified immediately and he would have talked to his Prime Minister Mr Key. I know that because I have served in that position for many years. Mr McCully would have been told immediately and Mr McCully’s response would have been I imagine the same as any of his predecessors on either side of the House. It would have been: “This is a serious event. I want you to keep me informed on an ongoing basis about this matter as it evolves.” That is what Mr McCully would have demanded of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade and what it would have readily provided him with ongoing information about.I simply do not believe that Mr McCully could have said: “Oh yeah alleged rape burglary foreign affairs representative—yeah you guys handle it. Don’t bother me with it again.” That is what Mr McCully was claiming in this House. He was claiming that once the request for a waiver of diplomatic immunity was lodged he never heard anything more about it. Whose responsibility is that? The primary responsibility is with Mr McCully. A serious crime capable of a sentence of 10 years is committed by somebody who has diplomatic immunity and Mr McCully says: “OK you’ve gone for a waiver. Now don’t bother me with that again.” That is appalling.John Hayes: Just not true.Hon PHIL GOFF: That is appalling Mr Hayes. That is not worthy of a Minister who is doing his job properly. The letter was fine. The letter sent by the ministry was fine. What was not fine was the lack of follow-up by the Minister. What we have is an extraordinary indifference and perhaps incompetence on the part of the Minister in that he never followed through on that. Not only did he not follow through on that but as of yesterday he was prepared to release a letter from the ministry to Malaysia and a Malaysian letter sent back to New Zealand and say: “Look we tried to get a waiver of diplomatic immunity and it’s the Malaysians’ fault because they wouldn’t give it.” This is what Mr Key said. I listened to the radio all over the weekend. Mr McCully and Mr Key each time said: “We went for a waiver. They wouldn’t give it to us. It’s their fault.” Here it is from Mr Key in the New Zealand Heraldon 1 July yesterday: “ ‘New Zealand’s very strong preference was that he would have been charged. Effectively that sending country stopped us from doing that’ he told reporters.” There you are. That was the Prime Minister saying it was Malaysia’s fault; it would not let us seek a waiver of the diplomatic immunity.The report goes on: “The Government made a show of hauling in the diplomat’s head of mission to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs last night ‘to make it clear how seriously it views this situation’.” There we are. We have our foreign affairs Minister and our Prime Minister blaming another country because they were not prepared to lift the diplomatic immunity that would allow this man charged with serious offences to be heard before a court in New Zealand to give the victim in this case the chance to hold that offender to account and to see justice done. Then we had the statement from Minister Anifah Aman. This came out yesterday. He is the Foreign Minister of Malaysia. This is what he says in a point-by-point account of what happened. Point six: “ ‘At the same time the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Malaysia was prepared to waive diplomatic immunity of the accused to enable prosecution under New Zealand law against him to proceed.’ ” That in definitive terms is a statement by the Malaysian Foreign Minister that Malaysia said to New Zealand: “If you want us to waive the immunity we will and the man can go through the normal court procedures.”Prime Minister Key and foreign affairs Minister McCully misled this country in saying it was the other way around. Was McCully so poorly informed that he did not know what his ministry was doing? Was he so indifferent to the plight of the woman who was the victim that he did not bother following it up? What explanation can National give us for that gross incompetence and indifference by the foreign affairs Minister? I have waited all afternoon to hear an explanation; I have not heard an explanation yet.This is what else the Foreign Minister of Malaysia said: “But during discussions on May 12 the New Zealand side offered an alternative for the accused to be brought back to Malaysia. It was never our intention to treat the matter lightly.” It was not the Malaysians demanding that he be given immunity; it was the New Zealand foreign affairs ministry either under the direction of its Minister or because the Minister was not sufficiently concerned to direct them that was offering to send the man home. We had a weekend of our Prime Minister and our foreign affairs Minister blaming the Malaysians for their own incompetence and indifference. Not a word is heard from the National side because that is the truth. That is the truth.Point eight in what the Malaysian Foreign Minister said: “With the agreement of the New Zealand side the accused person and his family returned to Malaysia on May 22 [2014].” If our Government our foreign affairs Minister and our Prime Minister had wanted to see justice done for the victim all they had to do was take up the offer of the Malaysian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and that would have happened. They did not care. It was not important. It was better to sweep it under the carpet and not worry about any consequences afterwards. Well if it was a misguided attempt to avoid embarrassing the Malaysians it has backfired completely. What does the Malaysian Foreign Minister now think of his counterpart in New Zealand and the Prime Minister of our country misrepresenting the position of their country when he was prepared to do the right thing and say that if this man was alleged to have committed that offence we have confidence in the justice system of New Zealand and we should let him face that justice system?I know that under my watch and under the Prime Minister I served that would not have been treated in that way. Helen Clark would have been focused on the issue. She would have been asking for daily reports. She would have had empathy with the victim. She would have insisted that the offer of the Malaysian Government be taken up so that this matter would be handled in the way that any other criminal offence in New Zealand would be handled. This Government let the victim down. Murray McCully says he will apologise to the Prime Minister for not keeping him informed. He should apologise to the victim because it is the victim whom this National Government through its indifference and incompetence has let down. It is not good enough. It is not good enough and it is not good enough for this House once again to see a National Minister of Foreign Affairs blaming his officials when something goes wrong.Murray McCully knows that the officials cannot answer back. He has done it before. John Hayes knows that he did it over the botched restructuring of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. I have had a gutsful of a Minister of Foreign Affairs who is paid to take responsibility for the actions of his Government not taking that responsibility. You never blame your officials Mr Foster-Bell. You were an official you know that. You would have deplored—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Order!Hon PHIL GOFF: The member knows he would have deplored a Minister who blamed his officials and that he should do so now.John Hayes: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The speaker on the other side of the House should not be drawing you into the debate.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson): Thank you.Hon PHIL GOFF: I am not drawing the Assistant Speaker into the debate; I am saying that the negligence of that National Government has let down New Zealand has let down the victim and has damaged our relationship with the Malaysian Government. We have seen the poorest form of ministerial behaviour that you can possibly see in a Minister who is blaming his officials when he should take responsibility. He is the Minister. He is the person who let the victim down. He is the person who should be resigning.