Bridges Simon: Privacy (Information Sharing) Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Bridges Simon: Privacy (Information Sharing) Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 08 February 2012. Volume:677;Page:243. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga) 
: 
 I am glad to speak on the Privacy (Information Sharing) Bill and I am even more glad that it is coming to the Justice and Electoral Committee where as Ruth Dyson has encouraged us to we will take a very good look at it. We will hear from the people who know a lot about this.  
I have spoken in this House now a number of times on privacy and I would not take this too far but in some ways it is a relatively new value certainly when compared with freedom of expression and information which have been talked about and written about for literally centuries. Of course privacy rubs up against freedom of expression and we see that at the moment very graphically with the Leveson Inquiry in the United Kingdom where Lord Leveson is looking into the really reprehensible conduct by British media—the phone tapping the bugging and so on of actors royalty politicians you name it.  
There are different views I think about where legitimately we should fall as a society on privacy as opposed to freedom of information and expression. My view although I would always basically tend towards freedom of expression is that I think we should not be absolutist about this. But if there is one area where we should come close I think to being absolutist it is in relation to the most vulnerable in society particularly children.  
I agree with the comments from this side of the House about the maiden speeches given today from the New Zealand First members. It was very good to be here to hear them to get a flavour of the individuals and to hear my fellow Tauranga MP Brendan Horan who talked about— 
Hon Tony Ryall 
: He’s a list MP. 
SIMON BRIDGES 
: Yes he is a list MP; that is a low blow. Brendan Horan talked about what made him passionate about the issues of child abuse and the death of children from really serious abuse. And he is right to get angry and to get angry about the fact that in this country there are too many of those deaths and far too much serious abuse against children. Let us be very clear: the responsibility for those deaths first and foremost goes to the individual—some would say the scumbag—who has committed that violence. Let us be very clear about that. But nevertheless the Government and governmental agencies have a real role in being protective of those children and doing everything they can to share information and to make sure they can act as a bulwark as a protective agency against that abuse when information comes to them. We do not want privacy rules I do not think to get in the way unnecessarily of things like that where as I anticipate doctors find something out or the social worker finds something out and they are in a quandary about what to do with that information particularly where health and safety and sometimes life are at stake.  
I accept that this bill is about many more things than that but that is one aspect of what this bill seeks to address. As I say and as I said at the start of this contribution I look forward to discussing those issues at the select committee and hopefully hearing from a number of experts in the field in regard to privacy issues. I do not think Ruth Dyson need have any fear. Under Tim Macindoe as the new chair we have got someone who is very thoughtful and who really will want to grapple with these issues and we will do that to the best of our ability.