Graham KennedyDr KENNEDY GRAHAM (Green): Tēnā koutou e Te Whare; ka tū mō Ngā Kākāriki ki te kōrero ki te pānuitanga tuatahi o tēnei Te Pire Maritime Crimes Amendment.[Acknowledgments to you the House; I stand on behalf of the Greens to speak in the first reading of this Maritime Crimes Amendment Bill.]This bill before us essentially goes back 30 years and a bit more as has been noted before. Essentially it can be traced back to the terrorist event with the Achille Lauro in 1985 but also to a similar event—if we recall it—with regard to the Rainbow Warrior in Waitematā Harbour in Aotearoa New Zealand. Those events obviously—particularly the Achille Lauro—brought us to 1988 with the Rome Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against the Safety of Maritime Navigation and its immediate protocol the Rome Protocol for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts Against the Safety of Fixed Platforms Located on the Continental Shelf. It is worth remembering that in those days this House did not even have the nuanced constitutional maturity of a treaty examination—we just lumbered along.It took us 11 years from 1988 to 1999 to bring in the Maritime Crimes Act but we did in 1999. Within 2 years we experienced the twin towers terrorist event in New York which ushered in the age of global terrorism which in turn ushered in—for better or worse and it was for worse—the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003. I support the comments by the Hon David Parker and others about the inanity and the lack of application of international law at the global level that allowed that kind of thing to go with impunity. That in a turn brought us to 2005 with these current protocols—the 2005 maritime navigation and fixed platform protocols to the Rome convention. New Zealand signed those 2 years later in 2007 but it took us an exactly equal amount of time—11 years—to get from those protocols to this day with this enabling legislation.The 2005 protocols that are essentially before us in the context of this legislation amend both the Rome convention and the Rome protocol to ensure that the maritime security framework established under the parent treaties can respond to contemporary transnational threats. The bill enables New Zealand to ratify those 2005 protocols to introduce new offences related to maritime terrorism illicit trafficking by ship of weapons of mass destruction transportation by ship of fugitives intentionally causing death in connection with those offences and maritime boarding.Such was the state of alarm in New Zealand that it took us 11 years to get to this stage. It took 2 years to get to the stage of New Zealand signing and another 2 years—so a total of 4 years—before our Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee undertook the treaty examination. The select committee reported back in July 2009 which included the Green Party's agreement unanimously supporting continuing movement towards ratification of the 2005 protocols. That continuing movement has since experienced a pause of 7 years before resuming at any discernible pace.But if we look at the select committee's 2009 report we acknowledge as it says—and I think we would all agree—that The overriding objective of the proposed treaty action would be to update and strengthen New Zealand's ability to deal with maritime security challenges by ensuring that an appropriate legislative framework was in place. There is no satisfactory non-legislative implementation option that has been identified." Essentially the committee concluded that "Implementation of the 2005 SUA Protocols would strengthen New Zealand's support for global counter-terrorism and non-proliferation efforts and help ensure that New Zealand's domestic maritime security framework is consistent with international best practice. The 2005 SUA Protocols have particular relevance"—of course—"to New Zealand as a coastal nation dependent on the security of its shipping routes."Of the five principal benefits of the protocols given in the select committee's report two are worth explicitly identifying here I think. They are that it "would help strengthen New Zealand's legal framework that underpin necessary maritime security counter-terrorism and counter-proliferation action." and it "would also be valuable in the context of New Zealand's support for the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism and in bolstering New Zealand's ability to respond to some of the threats … ". That is the assembled wisdom of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee in 2009 and the Green Party continues as it did back then to associate itself with it.We will support the bill but we will support it into select committee and continue to monitor the progress of the bill. We do have our concerns around the designation of particular groups as terrorists. We do recognise that the 2005 protocols concern actual or attempted behaviour and do not address the classification of groups themselves but if you look at some of the provisions of the bill they could potentially cover the actions of direct action environmental groups and see such groups potentially regarded as or alleged to be regarded as terrorists. It could be regarded that some of those groups use or attempt to use ships to intentionally cause damage to other ships with a purpose of "compelling a government or an international organisation to do or to abstain from doing any act ..." to quote the legislation. But such actions are inherently violent and arguably not in line with the Green Party's principle of non-violence. Discretion does need to be exercised by Governments about whether to charge such groups with terrorist offences or not.Overall the bill enables New Zealand to meet its obligations as an international citizen and is in line with our principle of non-violence—hence our support for the bill to go to select committee—but we will be monitoring that particular aspect of the legislation closely as it goes to the select committee.Let me just conclude by associating the Green Party with the comments of the Hon David Parker in relation to the 2003 illegal invasion of Iraq and the inspired and positive leadership of the Hon Helen Clark Michael Cullen and Phil Goff in that respect. We pay tribute to all three of them and to Mr Goff who is sitting in the Chamber today—a very fine and upstanding parliamentarian. Thank you."