Faafoi KrisCOUNTER-TERRORISM LEGISLATION BILLIn CommitteePart 1 Amendments to Terrorism Suppression Act 2002 Hon KRIS FAAFOI (Minister of Justice): I thought I might start proceedings this afternoon—begin with what we usually do in thanking the Justice Committee for its thoughts and amendments and work on the Counter-Terrorism Legislation Bill. I also want to acknowledge that this took place in the shadow—towards the end of that process—of the attack at LynnMall and along with many other members of the House this afternoon I acknowledge the victims and communities involved and wish them a speedy recovery.A lot of the measures contained in Part 1 are designed to ensure that in terms of terror attacks of this type—because the nature of terror is changing—the authorities have the ability to prevent and stop those types of offences happening. Again reports back from the select committee are that all parties around the table worked well. I understand from reading the minority views of both the ACT Party and the Green Party that there were some differences of opinion around the process in terms of timing and I'll come to that but I do want to thank the select committee for unanimously coming to the point where we could make an amendment to the definition of terrorism around intimidation. I do think it's useful that all parties came to that threshold unanimously around the table.Just around some of the criticism by both the ACT Party and the Green Party in terms of process my understanding is that this piece of legislation within the select committee was fully and well considered and any suggestion that it was rushed through hastily doesn't necessarily pass muster. I understand that there was a small amount of time still available to the select committee which would have allowed the Parliamentary Counsel Office to undertake its normal drafting and then the select committee would have reported back. I also would point out that the Government is trying to make sure it strikes the balance of making sure it does have the proper scrutiny of a select committee which we believe it did and also working to make sure that we do give the tools to the authorities which are contained in this bill in order to address some of the challenges that they are meeting on a daily basis.To some of the issues that were raised in the minority views acknowledging some concern around the planning and preparation offence within the bill by the Green Party. I understand that the select committee essentially unanimously I think or with the support of the select committee agreed to remove the planning to plan" offence which was in the first iteration of the bill. I understand there was plenty of discussion around that and to avoid confusion that offence has been removed. I do want to allow questions to be asked but this piece of legislation has been progressed out of the recommendations of the royal commission on the mosque attacks in Christchurch in 2019. It also responds to as I said in my beginning remarks the nature of terrorism changing. Our current Terrorism Suppression Act was passed when terrorism was more likely to be the actions of an organised entity or an organised group and as we've seen more recently acts of terror are being undertaken by individuals or small groups using things that might be considered everyday actions but are used to bring about harm to people in the name of their own ideology. So again I want to thank the select committee for its adjudication over this piece of legislation and I welcome any questions that members who were on the committee or not may have around Part 1."