Stanford EricaERICA STANFORD (National—East Coast Bays): Thank you Mr Speaker. I'm pleased to rise in support of the Immigration (Mass Arrivals) Amendment Bill. I just want to start by saying that it's worthy of note that the Minister Michael Wood invited both the Hon Gerry Brownlee and myself to two extensive briefings on this bill and full access to his officials. I just wanted to note that and thank him very much for the bipartisan approach that he's taken to this bill because this is the kind of bill that absolutely deserves that kind of approach a bipartisan approach.With that it's important just to go into some of the detail of the bill because while we support this bill at first reading it is worthy of noting that there are a number of things that need to be thought about by the select committee and we have to ask the officials some questions around especially around the detention part. I have a good friend of mine who was involved back in 2012 I believe in an exercise of mass arrivals in New Zealand which was held at Devonport Naval Base in the North Shore electorate where they practised an exercise just like this. I think many of the things that are being discussed in this bill today were things that they considered back then because as the Hon Michael Woodhouse explained today in his contribution it is not as described an orderly process but actually it is organised chaos: people arriving without any documents with different health statuses trying to work out who are the people smugglers who are the criminals who are the genuine refugees. It is a process that can take a really long time and it needs to be worked through.So one of the things that this bill attempts to do is to give warranted officers and then the courts more time to process these applications. It was the case or currently is the case that you can hold someone for 96 hours while a determination is being made. What this bill attempts to do is to allow again someone a warranted officer to take that 96 hours to make the application and then the judge has up to seven days to make a determination and then 28 days if that's not practicable to consider it in that time. What the court is determining is the risk and who these people are and where they should be held. So if you have—obviously you've got potential criminals on the boat who are the smugglers you want to know who they are you want to know who the low-risk people are who the medium-risk and high-risk potential people are so that you can then place them in facilities determined by their level of risk.The question though is that if you're taking 28 days to do this as Michael Woodhouse alluded to what do you do with them in that time? I don't think that's been answered in this bill and that's something that we want to ask officials because it would be my understanding that you would detain them either at a high-risk facility like Mt Eden Prison potentially at a naval base like the one at Devonport or up in Whangaparāoa or somewhere else but the bill doesn't make clear what you do in the meantime. Do you assume that everybody is high risk and we go with a high-risk facility while that 28 days is being borne out? But I can certainly understand because during that process back in 2012 you know one of the things that came out was that it does take a long time to process people and I can understand where the Government is going with this.It is worthy of note again though that although this is a low risk there is a risk. It's not no risk like the Labour Party in Opposition said 10 years ago when they vehemently opposed the bill that the Hon Michael Woodhouse put forward and he made some of those comments back then about you know some of the comments that the Labour members had made at the time about how this was akin to little green men landing you know on our shores. It is a real risk albeit a small risk and I do remember a case when I was working for Murray McCully many years ago—and it would've been around this time actually—of a threat.So I understand that the reason that the Minister is bringing this bill—and if you read between the lines—is that there is some risk and it is an important time 10 years on to take a look at this piece of legislation and figure out if it can be more fit for purpose. But I think we can take from the fact that the Minister is bringing this bill that reading between the lines there is some risk and we need to be prepared for a mass arrival and also balancing the rights of those who are seeking asylum with the rights of New Zealanders to be safe and protected.I guess the next question of course—I mean this bill is just dealing with how to detain people according to their risk and giving them the rights that they deserve. What's not talked about in here I guess and what Gerry Brownlee alluded to was what happens then and it'll be interesting to talk to officials around the length of detention time. As I understand it from the bill I think it's new section 317AB from memory you can detain someone for up to six months and then application can be made to hold those people for longer up to 28 days at a time I believe—317AB(2)(b) if I'm right.So it is important to ensure that we are detaining people in a facility that is the right facility for their level of risk and that is what this bill wants to do. It gives the courts more time like that seven days or up to 28 days to determine that because of course they will need to go to Interpol they will need to go to the local authorities of the country of origin of that person and ask questions about their identity and previous convictions to determine who they are and what sort of risk they are. But also more importantly it is to sort out who are the real criminals on that boat which are the people smugglers the ones—and as I was talking to Michael Woodhouse just before you know they're not going to identify themselves and potentially people in the boat the asylum seekers are going to be fearful of pointing them out as well. So determining who those criminals are and who those very high-risk people are for the point of detention is very important.So I just want to reiterate to the Minister my gratitude for the way that he's invited myself and Gerry Brownlee into briefings and given us access to his officials so that we can get a really good understanding of the bill. It is important that we do this in a bipartisan way. We will support the bill. We think that it is time that we take a look at this legislation after 10 years. We do have some questions to ask around what happens to those people in the 28 days what sort of facility they'll be held at because I am concerned about pregnant women women with children and if we're still determining their level of risk after 28 days are they going to be held somewhere like Mt Eden? That's something that I think we need to figure out because it's not clear in the bill—unless of course I'm missing something but Michael Woodhouse and I have the same concern there.I don't think there's anything more that needs to be said. I look forward to scrutinising the bill at select committee and getting some more information especially around that 28day period and where people will be held. With that I commend the bill to the House.