Bindra MaheshMAHESH BINDRA (NZ First): I take this call on behalf of New Zealand First and I will try to restrict my comments and my contribution to within the area of the Customs Service. We are all aware—and the Minister of Customs just mentioned it—that $4.75 million has been allocated for the modernisation and transformation of the New Zealand Customs Service workforce. A major portion of that we suspect is going to go towards modernising technology and not enough focus has been given to developing human resources. We all know that SmartGates has been functioning well but we also know that no SmartGate was able to stop Phillip John Smith from fleeing the country and going right up to Brazil embarrassing us internationally. This move towards developing technology and investing in technology is all good but what we do not accept is the move away from developing human resources. Whenever this type of announcement is made by the Government we suspect that there will be job losses—and that has happened actually. By providing SmartGates and good technology what we are trying to achieve here is to give travellers—the international passengers—a world-class experience but at what cost? We suspect and we know that it is coming at the cost of the protection of our borders. SmartGates do not stop crooks from coming in; smart people and smart policies do. If you are not employing more skilled people—and with this supposed increase in funding the Government is directing funding toward technology and not enough toward human resources. That is going to result in more embarrassment in the case another escape takes place from one of our borders. There is a huge issue of drugs coming into the country. In the last Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee hearing the Customs executives told us that only 1 percent of consignments are actually physically checked; the other 99 percent are not. So nobody knows what the contents in those 99 percent of consignments are. They go only on their profiling—only on the little intelligence that they have collected. They profile the importers and they profile the exporters from other countries and they depend on that information to check just 1 percent of consignments. That is not acceptable. We in the Law and Order Committee conducted an inquiry into the firearms issues. We have a large number of illegal firearms in the country and we suspect that this 99 percent of unchecked packages could be a source those illegal firearms. This is actually discouraging our own sportsmen our own hunters and those who have legal firearms from actually practising their own skills. The result is that the people who actually own legal firearms are discouraged by this kind of legislation and the Government's apathy towards our border control. About the fast processing and improving of the travel experience—yes foreign travellers are happier now. We do process a large number of foreign travellers through those SmartGates but those SmartGates do not stop undesirable elements. The Joint Border Management System which the Minister just mentioned is actually behind schedule and it is over budget. Just because it has capacity comparable with Canada the USA Australia and the UK it does not mean that we follow their systems entirely. I am aware that in other countries at least 50 percent of cargo is physically checked at the border.Votes agreed to.