Parker David: Privilege — Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee Question of Privilege Regarding Use of Intrusive Powers Within the Parliamentary PrecinctText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeParker David: Privilege — Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee Question of Privilege Regarding Use of Intrusive Powers Within the Parliamentary Precinct[Sitting date: 22 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19327. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon DAVID PARKER (Deputy Leader—Labour):While we thank the people who assisted the Privileges Committee could I make mention of Debra Angus and Meipara Poata. Debra Angus and Meipara have provided assistance to various committees over the years. Actually when you come to these issues which are arcane in terms of the constitutional principles at large Debra Angus I think is probably one of the experts in the Commonwealth. I particularly value the advice that we get from her and the assistance to the committee that we get. It is interesting that some of the reports that we have done recently have turned up being quoted in reports of other Commonwealth Parliaments around the world particularly in relation to our questions concerning parliamentary privilege.What caused this inquiry was something that really it would be hard to script in one of those old silent movies the Keystone Cops. It was the report that went wrong into the report that went wrong. The original report was that of Rebecca Kitteridge into things that went wrong at the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) and concerning those affairs of State which I do not want to make light of because they were serious affairs. It then turned out that that report was leaked to the media. We all know that it was leaked by the Hon Peter Dunne. We note that that is not because of admission; it is just that he has refused to deny it. He lost his ministerial portfolios—for a very brief period because the Prime Minister thought he might need him to form a future Government I think was the reason. So he had effectively a very short time suspended as a Minister.We then had as a consequence of the leak that was never proven because the Prime Minister refused to reach a conclusion on all the evidence that it had been leaked by Peter Dunne the incident of the manner of the inquiry into the unauthorised release of information relating to the GCSB compliance review report—i.e. this is the inquiry into the leaked report by Rebecca Kitteridge. This inquiry was by Mr Henry and Mr Henry and those who assisted him managed to get released to them things that should not have been released. Those included documents relating to the movements of members of the gallery notably Andrea Vance and copies of phone records which indicated who was phoning who.John Hayes: Who was phoning whom.Hon DAVID PARKER: Whom. Thank you. The finest contribution from Mr Hayes! Knowing Mr Hayes as I do I will go and check that one afterwards. I wish him well in the next stage of his career.It then transpired that the Henry report did not even use the Official Information Act which could have actually been quite useful for getting information from the ministerial hard drive as to whether the ministerial hard drive was used for communications with the press which would probably have been disclosable under the Official Information Act. Actually we still have not had a final decision on that from the Ombudsman; it is so long after the event that it has become a bit farcical. But not having used the Official Information Act to get what was probably official information under the Official Information Act because it was ministerial information I do not think it is permissible for a Minister to claim that they did something on a ministerial hard drive and then because it is inconvenient for them that it proved they leaked a document claim that it should not be disclosed under the Official Information Act. But in any event that is not the route that Mr Henry took. He managed to convince Parliamentary Service to release information that ought not to have been released and then we had the hullabaloo about the release of both information of members of Parliament and information that should have been kept confidential for the press.I want to make the fundamental point that the reason that we do this is not actually to serve our own interests. It is to protect democracy. One of the things that are very important in this Parliament is that members of Parliament can go about their business. They can receive information confidentially from constituents. They can where appropriate—Denis O’Rourke: Or journalists.Hon DAVID PARKER: That is right. They could receive the information confidentially from journalists. They can receive information confidentially from anybody and that ought to be their information to disclose unless it is information that they hold as Ministers within the Official Information Act or the ambit of the Official Information Act. It is important that that be retained because that is actually one of the mechanisms by which we protect in appropriate cases the anonymity of people who are bringing us information—to encourage them to do so—through the processes that we have including the privilege that we have in Parliament to actually say things even if they attack the interests of the wealthy and might in ordinary circumstance be suppressed because of the risk of a defamation suit at the behest of people who feel that they do not want their reputation undermined even if it is a fair undermining of their reputation. Some people have got very deep pockets and go to extraordinary lengths to protect their position.So one of the roles of this Parliament is to protect the cleanliness of democracy by being transparent about things that go wrong and that is what this actually relates to. If the information that comes to members of Parliament can be obtained and given to somebody else well it is less likely that information will come to us. Similarly the role of the press is to work around this place and find out where things are going wrong. Sometimes that is through disclosures by members of Parliament. Sometimes those disclosures are not to the liking of their own political parties but none the less that is one of the things that happen in democracy. The role of the media to try to winnow those things out and encourage people to talk about things that perhaps should not be happening within political parties from time to time is a very proper role of the press gallery and the media ought not to have the confidentiality of their communications which are held on parliamentary systems or where they walk around the building able to be scrutinised on the basis of the swipe card records that are held by computer systems as a consequence of when we swipe through electronic locks as we go from one part of the building to other parts of the building.So it is for those reasons that the Speaker referred these issues to the Privileges Committee. The Privileges Committee has come up with a series of recommendations that we agree on unanimously across Parliament which is fantastic. All of the areas of disagreement were worked through by the members of the committee so that we got to agreement and we all agreed in respect of the likes of that swipe card information which really would not have been available to be collected a few years ago. It was only when we had these electronic security systems and the computer systems to keep records of those over time that we could have the sort of information that can establish patterns. Similarly a lot of the stuff that is collected on emails would not have been in written communications in earlier years and the phone records which are now so detailed would not have been available years ago either. You would have just picked up the phone and there would not have been an electronic record of the numbers that were being phoned.That sort of information is now collected for different reasons but it ought not to be automatically disclosed so we make the presumption that this sort of information should not be released and that individual members should retain complete control over this. We discussed the issue as to whether that should be something that could be divulged to whips of parties and we all agreed that it ought not to be. It ought to be the preserve of individual members of Parliament. In respect of journalists again we were absolutely clear that they ought to be in a similar position and should retain control over the information that affects them. That would not stop the Official Information Act release of ministerial information that showed dealings with a journalist because that is actually disclosable under the Official Information Act. In respect of other information the Speaker is delegated to do it and we trust the Speaker to do that well.I do not think I will say anything more than that. I think that this is a good report. These things as I say are not actually for the protection of individual members; they are to keep this place functioning for the good of democracy.