Logie Jan: Identity Information Confirmation Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Logie Jan: Identity Information Confirmation Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 13 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6561. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
JAN LOGIE (Green) 
: 
 I rise to speak to Part 2 of the Identity Information Confirmation Bill and firstly to say that the Green Party would really like to be able to support this bill. If—hope against hope—we get support for our Supplementary Order Paper 148 then we will happily support this bill. 
We do recognise that identity fraud is a significant issue causes much stress and hardship within our society and is something that is deserving of proactive legislation to redress. However I guess for us it is a matter of balancing harms and we have a concern that although this bill as it is currently framed talks about fraud—a lot—it also opens up a system for employers to provide pressure on people to have to provide information that they are currently protected from having to provide. 
The Human Rights Act 1993 protects job applicants from discrimination on certain grounds. Employers should in the process of employing somebody ask only questions that relate to the requirements of the job and how qualified the candidate is for that job. We have recognised that there are very common grounds that people are discriminated on. It may be their date of birth nationality sex gender identity pregnancy marital status religious belief colour race disability age political opinions etc. 
We have the Human Rights Act to protect people against that discrimination because we know that it exists. My real concern is that this bill is going to open people up to having to disclose information that will trigger that discrimination whereas at the moment they are protected from having to give it. As an example when I apply for jobs I never put my date of birth on my CV. I know that age is a basis of discrimination and that for people over the age of 40 it is much harder to get a job. I never provide that information to give that in. And I know that in this country people have been advised to change their name to Anglicise their name to be able to get interviews. My concern is that this bill will open up that process and will give employers that information without having to ask for it directly and they will therefore not be open to a challenge for a breach of the Human Rights Act. 
I will give some examples of that to prove my case around in particular age discrimination and the discrimination on the basis of ethnicity. The Human Rights Commission has done a report  
A fair go for all? 
 looking at some of the racism in employment practices. Within that they gave an example of a 22-year-old job seeker who had moved to New Zealand from Syria. He was told that he should change his name to something more Kiwi to be able to get an interview. Another example was an Auckland-based civil engineer applying for a graduate position within an architectural business in my home town of Invercargill. The hiring manager asked for more details around who he was trying to determine his ethnicity—asking for a photograph his country of origin and how long he had lived in New Zealand. When the applicant asked why he was asking for that information he was told that well unfortunately any southern New Zealand client would possibly think twice about dealing with anyone with a Middle Eastern name. 
With this bill the employer is not even going to have to say that. They are going to ask for that information because it is about verifying their identity whereas in this situation the person said “Why are you asking for this information?” and then was told and got a clear indication of discrimination. That is not going to happen under this legislation potentially which is a very real concern. 
Another basis of discrimination in this country is around age and research that was done in 2006 through the Auckland University—