Dalziel Lianne: Private Security Personnel and Private Investigators Bill — First Reading 
Dalziel Lianne: Private Security Personnel and Private Investigators Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:653;Page:2683] 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I too fully support the Private Security Personnel and Private Investigators Bill. I think it has considerable merit and I am very pleased to see that it will be going to a select committee. Usually under this Government I get up in the House complaining that bills are not going to a select committee at all or that they are going for a very short time and are being rushed back through the House as has happened on the Commerce Committee. Of course that is something our very efficient committee can deliver on in terms of our workload but I am somewhat confused at why this bill has been given 11 months. 
Hon Gerry Brownlee 
: Oh come on! Not you! 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: Well I was confused until I heard Sandra Goudie’s speech because the Minister Richard Worth did not actually indicate in his speech why it was going to the select committee for 11 months except for a very subtle reference to the fact that it might require a substantial rewrite. I think that is how he put it—a substantial rewrite. He did say that he did not want to withdraw it and start all over again. What a lazy Minister! He is not withdrawing it and starting all over again. He is not doing his job. Instead he is getting the chair of the select committee to stand up in the House and say what the Government is planning to do. That is very interesting. I think that the public have the right to see the bill the Government will in fact consider not the one that was already introduced into the House. 
Sandra Goudie 
: It’s not my select committee. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: I am sorry that I have the member mistaken for the chair of the select committee. She is desperate for me to acknowledge the fact that she is not good enough to be the chair of the Justice and Electoral Committee. That is fine by me. 
John Hayes 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. In the context of your earlier discussion I ask you to bring the member back to the point of the debate. 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: This is a wide-ranging debate. We are on a first reading speech. There is nothing untoward in what the member has said. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: I am referring to the fact that this bill is being sent to a select committee for 11 months. The reason that— 
Sandra Goudie 
: Which one? 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: The Justice and Electoral Committee as I understand it. 
Sandra Goudie 
: Well it’s nothing to do with my select committee. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: I know; I have already apologised to the member. I have already said that she is not up to being the chair of the Justice and Electoral Committee. We all know that and I am terribly sorry that I mistook her for somebody of intelligence. 
I want people to understand that she has actually told the House what the Government is preparing to do and I think we have to focus on that because this is the bill that will go out for public consumption. This is the bill that was subject to the regulatory impact statement. It is not the bill that will be reported back to the House according to both the Minister who has indicated a substantial rewrite and the somewhat less elegant member who probably referred to gutting the bill—because two things are missing from this bill according to Sandra Goudie. 
The first thing missing from the bill is the right to film and photograph people without their permission. There are all sorts of rights-to-privacy issues there but she does not care about that. The other thing that is missing from the bill according to Sandra Goudie is the right for security guards and private investigators to arrest and detain. She wants them to have that right. Who does that now? The police do that. That is a police function. So the National Government is not only determining that we will have private prisons but also that we will have private police under the police State that it is sneaking in through the back door. 
I say that the Minister has no right to rely on the existing wording of a bill just to get this devious plot brought before a select committee without proper consultation and proper reference to the public about the changes that might be implemented. I do not think it is appropriate that members of the Government know full well what the Government is planning to do. As soon as this bill gets to the select committee the private police option is in there. 
John Hayes 
: So? 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: He said: “So?”. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: Of course he did. Members opposite have been briefed by their Government about what is planned. Government members are using the very good bill introduced by my very good colleague the Hon Clayton Cosgrove. They are putting it forward as a kind of Trojan Horse. But in behind the Trojan Horse is a design for a complete rewrite of the bill after 11 months at a select committee. What we will find is a private police State implemented by the National Government behind the closed doors of a select committee that is not open for public consideration. 
I refer the House to the regulatory impact statement in the bill as it stands. Of course it makes the point that under the current Act people are already required to be licensed if they are running businesses as private investigators etc. The point that is being made is that the weaknesses of the existing legislation were spelt out in the regulatory impact statement. The policy objectives were all set out in the regulatory impact statement. The options for reform were considered then the particular requirements set out in this legislation were determined to be the appropriate way forward. 
It is true that people in the industry itself want the right to arrest and detain and they want the right to take photographs or audio recordings without the subject’s written consent. Of course they do! It is in their commercial interests to argue for that. But there are considerations that need to be put before both the House and the people of New Zealand before these things are debated at a select committee. I think that the Government should say exactly what it will do in this legislation. If the Government intends to bring in photographing audio recording and video recording provisions and if it intends to bring in essentially a private police force option—which is the arrest and detention provision—then I challenge it to bring the Supplementary Order Paper to Parliament and refer it to the select committee because to have the select committee make such substantial changes without the input of the New Zealand public would be a travesty. 
Even I do not think that the National Government would stoop so low as to bring in a private police State without that sort of consultation. It is absolutely outrageous that the Government has put up this 11-month visit to a select committee in order to be able to do this in the closed environment of a select committee rather than in the open environment of this Parliament where we get a chance to debate the real issues. 
It is very important that we do move on this legislation. When we consider the degree of responsibility on the people in this sector and some of the issues that other speakers have already raised in the House we see that this is actually an incredibly underpaid overworked and difficult area of work in which to operate. These people need proper training proper wages and proper conditions of employment. They need to have the professionalism that is associated with the changes proposed in this legislation. 
We do not want to hold up the legislation. We are amazed though to find that there are further plans for this legislation once it hits the select committee. It is unfortunate that the changes are not being dealt with in an upfront way. The Minister himself may be a member of the Justice and Electoral Committee where his bill will go for consideration. I hope we can get from him an absolute assurance that he will bring any substantial rewrite of the bill to the House by way of a Supplementary Order Paper to be referred to the select committee for the calling of submissions. Otherwise an enormous travesty of justice could be done. 
I do not believe that the Minister in his heart would want that to occur because it is such a substantial change. Once private companies with commercial interests have the right to arrest and detain ordinary New Zealand citizens we are talking about a private police State. There is no other way to describe it. I am deeply deeply concerned about the references that have been made in this House to those amendments coming through the select committee process. That was ruled out by the previous Government and I am happy to stand by that decision. I support the bill as it stands and I commend it to the House.