Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:661;Page:10095] 
Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill 
First Reading 
Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General) 
 on behalf of the  
Minister of Immigration 
: I move  
That the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill be now read a first time 
. The Minister the Hon Jonathan Coleman is not here tonight because he and his wife have just had a child and that is a cause of great celebration. But I will not talk about squawking children too much because I certainly do not want to upset Mr Chauvel. 
I do not intend to use my full quota of speaking time for a bill that is as short as this one. I would like to take the time however to note that the Immigration Act was passed in this House last year with considerable support. Both the Government and Her Majesty’s loyal Opposition understand the importance of immigration and understand the importance of this Act in modernising and future-proofing the immigration legislation. Work towards implementing the Act is under way and this bill will support the continuation of that work. It will ensure that specified powers and functions in the Act can be exercised early. 
For example it will allow the Immigration and Protection Tribunal to be set up and will allow the chair of that tribunal to initiate the education and training of members before the tribunal starts to hear appeals. It will also allow the chair to begin to work for example on a code of conduct for members. The new tribunal is a cornerstone of the new Act as it will enable the streamlining of the appeals system. It has been put in place to reduce duplication and delay in the system. 
The principal Act is significant legislation and the implementation of the changes that are being introduced is indeed a sizable task. Section 474 was included in the Act to allow certain implementation work to be done by the Department of Labour before the rest of the Act comes into effect. This bill will bring that section into force on the day after the bill receives the Royal assent. I commend this bill to the House. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 Firstly in the spirit of the House I congratulate the Minister the Hon Jonathan Coleman and his wife on the birth of the latest asset to their family their child. I am sure we all join in congratulating them. It is a wonderful moment. 
I acknowledge the speaker who has just sat down and offer my sympathy to him. He has obviously drawn the short straw. Had Mr Finlayson as an eminent lawyer been in charge of the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill he would not have done what his Cabinet colleague did—that is make an omission on the Supplementary Order Paper in respect of section 474. I commend the Attorney-General for biting the bullet drawing the short straw and leading with his chin to correct the mess-up of both the Minister of Immigration and his venerable Associate Minister Kate Wilkinson who as we speak and as I said last night is probably dropping acid—that is folic acid. Everything that woman as a Minister has touched has turned to mush. From the folic acid issue to the Department of Conservation issue there has been a litany of mistakes. I commend Mr Finlayson and I again say that had he been in charge of this bill as he is an eminent lawyer which I am not I am sure there would have been no omission. 
The reason we are standing here tonight spending taxpayers’ money is the incompetence of this Government. The Labour Opposition will support and facilitate this amendment bill but we will make a couple of points going through. We wrote most of the Immigration Act when in Government and we supported its passage and the passage of most of its amendments which this Government passed on coming to office. But it is amazing that there was an omission in relation to the commencement of section 474 of the Immigration Act which as the Attorney-General pointed out allows the Governor-General to appoint the chair and members of the Immigration and Protection Tribunal and allows the tribunal to publish immigration instructions for the granting of visas under the new legislation and to approve and issue the forms that will be used for the application process under the new legislation among other things. 
I note that the Minister of Immigration earned the title of “The Maestro” in this place and in other places. He was the maestro of the Mt Albert by-election that went so wrong. He is the person who was in charge of the Rugby World Cup broadcasting debacle. He is the person who earlier this month announced a new retirement immigration package. Of course embarrassingly for him he did not look back in history. The same policy had been investigated by the former National Government in 1999 before it lost office and the policy was dismissed because it was unworkable. I also note and I hope the Associate Minister of Immigration takes a call because she shares responsibility for the hash that has been made of this that it is interesting that we are spending thousands of dollars of taxpayers’ money to come down to this House— 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Thanks to Tau Henare. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: —I could not possibly comment on that—to correct a basic error in a Supplementary Order Paper. The Government cannot blame the officials for this because under our Westminster system the Minister is responsible. Thousands of dollars of taxpayers’ money is being spent to correct a basic error. 
David Garrett 
: So sit down and we’ll get it done quicker. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I hear from the back a squawk from Parliament’s man Mr Garrett who tells me to sit down and we will get it done faster. On the one hand Mr Garrett comes from a party that believes in open public debate— 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: No they don’t. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Well he says he does. His leader says that he believes in empowering communities and having open transparent debate. It is a principle that this member has never exhibited on the select committee on which he sits. He is a person who is led by the nose by the National Government— 
David Garrett 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I have two points. One point which I guess is no record here is that Mr Cosgrove is talking about something utterly unrelated to the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill. Secondly he is referring in derogatory terms to members of the House who are both present and not present. [ 
Interruption 
] 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I am on my feet and there will be no correspondence entered into when I am ruling. I just make the point that yes I think there is some merit in what the member who raised the point of order said. Mr Cosgrove was straying out of the area. He was provoked I guess because of interjections but I think he has had his fair share and should come back to the bill. Secondly I did not take from his comments any particular offence that persons could have taken. I make the point to the member raising the point of order that offence cannot be taken on behalf of another person. I call on the Hon Clayton Cosgrove to speak to the bill. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Absolutely and in speaking to the bill I say that it is important that we have public and parliamentary debate on this issue. It is very germane to this bill. Mr Garrett and other members may want us to sit down shut up and let these things go through because of course it suits that member. I will say again that despite being Parliament’s man in this place he is led by the nose by the Government to stifle any parliamentary debate that may not suit his purpose. I am sorry but Mr Garrett will have to stay awake. He will have to do his job and earn the taxpayers’ shilling. He will have to sit in the Chamber and listen to the debate. 
Hon John Carter 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I thought I heard you just a minute or two ago give a direction to the member on this feet that he should address the bill. From listening to his address since the time that you gave him an instruction he has done nothing but berate a member of this House. He has not made any reference to the bill at all. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I have some sympathy with the point the member has made. I invited the member to address the bill. What Mr Garrett’s views are on anything is not relevant to this member’s presentation on the bill. I invite the member to come back to the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairman—I am sorry I mean Mr Speaker. You will be Chairman very shortly. I have great faith in you. 
Hon Rick Barker 
: Is this a demotion or a promotion? 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: It will be a big promotion for you. Within 30 minutes I see great things in your future. I think you will be a Chairman very shortly. This bill was laid on the Table just minutes ago so the member has not had a chance to look at it. Clearly the debate will be a little wide. If the members of the Government’s support parties are going to interject and be just plain nasty and to use the language of Dr Nick Smith resort to personal denigration then of course Mr Cosgrove as a senior Labour front-bencher will defend his honour in that respect. All I can ask is that the Acting Leader of the House Mr Power bring his calm hand to the proceedings at this time. It seems to me that at this rate we risk spiralling way out of control. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I will not respond to that. I refuse to respond to that and I simply invite Mr Cosgrove to address the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I am reminded of the words of my predecessor Mike Moore and I am sure members will appreciate this: “You’re only in trouble in this House when they’re praising you.” This bill is a relatively cosmetic amendment. I see that it is a four-clause bill. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: He hasn’t even read it. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I have had a quick skim read because it was put on the Table about 2 or 3 minutes ago and that is it. That is why we are spending thousands of dollars of taxpayers’ money because the Minister of Immigration either could not read or wanted this done under urgency in order to correct an error in a Supplementary Order Paper. The Minister of Immigration by his own definition considers himself to be an expert in this area—“The Maestro” some people would call him—but I invite the Attorney-General to perhaps hold some tutorials because I think the Attorney-General in another life was an academic who lectured in the law. Maybe he could hold some tutorials on legislative drafting or whatever to assist the Minister of Immigration. 
We will support this bill because we believe in the bill’s objectives. But in passing it it is appropriate that despite those who would stifle democracy and parliamentary debate in this place we make the point that this is another brick in the wall for the National Party. It is another error another piece of incompetence. I believe that the Acting Leader of the House is somewhere in the Chamber. Perhaps he is emanating from it. Perhaps Mr Power is offering Dr Coleman some tutorials. But this is another case of mismanagement as we sit in urgency tonight to debate a five-clause bill to insert a date to trigger a Supplementary Order Paper that should have been dealt with in the body of the legislation weeks or months ago when it was put up. 
I say to the National Party that yesterday I think we saw on the 6 o’clock news that the issue of moment before Cabinet was whether we should drink beer out of cans or pottles at the Rugby World Cup—not that we should go there because this an immigration debate. Today the issue of moment before Parliament is the correction of a date and the correction of an error in a five-clause A3 piece of paper that is supposed to be a bill. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: Sit down and let’s get on with it. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I am told that I should sit down. There is only one reason that Mr Henare would say that. It is the old saying from  
Dad’s Army 
: “They don’t like it up ’em”. “They don’t like it up ’em” in a political sense. They do not like it when the Opposition holds them to account exposes their incompetence exposes their mismanagement and exposes their stupidity. 
I pay my respects again to the Attorney-General. He tonight has shown bravery elegance honour and he has bitten the bullet. He obviously volunteered in an honourable way to accept the short straw in Cabinet and come down here to correct the incompetence of his Cabinet colleagues—of both the Minister of Immigration and the Associate Minister of Immigration. I will give due respect to the Attorney-General during the Committee stage. We look forward to a lengthy explanation as to why this error occurred and as to what he will do to correct the future behaviour of his colleagues so that we have bills brought to this House that are complete are correct and are not led by incompetent Ministers. 
DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East) 
: 
 I will take a short call on the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill regarding section 474 and the nature of this slight change that is necessary to give it the ability to achieve its purposes. We look forward to the support of the Opposition parties in making this bill a reality tonight so that the Act which most parties in the House have worked on very hard over a number of years and have supported can become the realistic and effective legislation that everyone wants it to become. It had been many years in the making. We look forward to that support. This is a very minor amendment. I look forward to the House pushing it through. Thank you. 
DARIEN FENTON (Labour) 
: 
 I will also take a short call on the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill. I understand that the reason the Minister of Immigration the Hon Jonathan Coleman is not available tonight is that congratulations are due. As a fellow MP in the Northcote area I put on the record my congratulations on the birth of another member of the Minister’s family. That is great and I am really pleased for him. 
As other people have said the bill is non-controversial. It fixes up an accidental omission in the Immigration Act so Labour will support it. It was made in the National Government’s Supplementary Order Paper on the Immigration Bill a bill that had been introduced by the previous Labour Government prior to the election. The Minister has described the bill in his aide mémoire. He said the omission of a reference to section 474 in the amendment to clause 2 on Supplementary Order Paper 32 in his name was an unfortunate mistake. I have to say it was indeed unfortunate and it is unfortunate that the House is once again in urgency and that we are once again spending time on rushing through legislation. I reflect in particular on the undemocratic “Sack Canterbury Democracy Bill” which was passed earlier today. But as I said the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill is a minor and non-controversial amendment. 
However there are a whole lot of immigration issues that I hope I will get the opportunity to talk about in the Committee stage of this bill. In particular— 
Hon Tau Henare 
: This is not the Committee stage of the bill. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: Yes I will get there Mr Henare but I just want to put it on the record in the first reading that I will want to talk about some things that have happened since the Immigration Bill was introduced such as the introduction of retirement visas for cash. We are rolling out the welcome mat to the world’s retirees and are discriminating on the basis of wealth. We are creating a “rich people’s visa” and New Zealand is to become an international retirement home. I will say a little more about that when we get to the Committee stage but in the meantime I reiterate Labour’s support for rectifying this unfortunate mistake and I give our support to its correction. 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 I begin by doing what the other speakers have done and add the congratulations of the Green Party to Jonathan Coleman and his partner on the new addition to their family. I am sure it will be a great joyful time for them. 
The Green Party will be voting against this bill for the same reasons it voted against the passing of the Immigration Bill last year. This amending bill implements many of the provisions in the Immigration Act that undermine civil liberties and we complained about them during the passage of the Immigration Bill. This is not to say that the Immigration Act is all bad. It does provide a more comprehensive and systematic approach to processing visitors and migrants than the previous legislation. Some of the really bad procedures in the old Act were excluded such as the security risk certificate procedure that Ahmed Zaoui fell foul of. There was a weird provision in the old Act that the Minister of Immigration could get a security risk certificate briefing but it had to be oral and the Minister could not even take notes. This involved misplaced trust in the authority of intelligence agencies and in this case the SIS which is an agency that got it so wrong in the Zaoui case. Thankfully Mr Zaoui and his family including his children are now well settled in New Zealand and he is doing very well. 
Such improvements in the Act last year as against the previous Immigration Act were no doubt behind the United Nations Human Rights Committee recognising our Immigration Act as positive in many ways in the UN report that was issued just last week on 25 March when the committee considered the application of human rights by the New Zealand Government. However this same UN report also criticises several immigration procedures. It proposes that the Immigration Act be amended to “ensure that no asylum seeker or refugee is detained in correctional facilities and other places of detention together with convicted prisoners” and unfortunately that is still the case in New Zealand. 
The committee also wants the Act brought fully into line with the principle of non-refoulement. This means according to the committee that New Zealand should not refuse to hear a refugee claim simply because the applicant could have applied in another country deemed to be a safe third country only later to find that that country had deported the person back to persecution in his or her homeland. I could give examples of that happening cases of people being deported back to places like Singapore and then on to a country of torture where they have actually been tortured. 
The committee also wanted the New Zealand Human Rights Commission to be able to “receive complaints of human rights violations related immigration laws”. That is something the Greens endorsed. In fact last year we moved an amendment in the Committee stage of the Immigration Bill on this very question. As the Human Rights Commission has pointed out it is wrong for it to be excluded from this important immigration area which commonly presents difficult human rights problems. 
One of the big problems in the Immigration Act as it was passed last year was the more extensive use of classified or secret information in immigration cases. There are now 11 Government agencies beyond the police and intelligence agencies—the SIS and the Government Communications Security Bureau—that can now determine that their information is classified and not to be fully disclosed to the person affected. Those agencies include such bodies as the Aviation Security Service Maritime New Zealand the Ministry of Fisheries and the Department of Corrections. 
Let us look at section 474 which this amending bill is mainly concerned with. Under the different provisions of section 474 there are broad powers to designate a person as a refugee and protections officer for the purpose of making decisions based on classified information. One of the provisions authorised by section 474 gives the Prime Minister a free hand in designating a body as an agency and enabling it to appoint what is called a special advocate to supposedly handle classified information on behalf of what might be called the defendant or the person affected. 
But there are big problems with this special advocate system. Special advocates are hamstrung in that once they have received the classified information they can no longer communicate with the person they are supposed to be helping defend and that means that the relevance and the full context of the information they have received cannot really be understood by the special advocate. This has been explained by the special advocate in the Zaoui case a solicitor called Stuart Grieve who presented a submission to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee on the Immigration Bill. He was very critical of the whole special advocate procedure and the nature of the classified information he saw. He told the committee that 90 percent of it was information that should have been in the public domain or was in the public domain but had been wrongly put into the classified information basket. 
Under the Act the heads of these 14 what are called “relevant agencies”—and I have said that they go well beyond the traditional police and intelligence agencies—can determine through their chief executive officers what is classified and what remains classified. Even the Immigration and Protection Tribunal whose set-up was provided for by the Act cannot overrule the decisions of the chief executive officers of those agencies in that respect. The State and its departments have veto power over the system even veto power over the tribunal in regard to classified information. 
Reference was made in the introduction to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal which is being set up now by this amending bill if it goes through. There is a problem with its make-up in that it does not according to the legislation have to have on it a person with expertise in refugee law. Refugee law is a specialist body of law and it is important to have someone on that tribunal who understands it particularly as this amending bill and the Act will extend the rights of detention by Government officials. The United Nations Human Rights Committee said that there should be no detention of refugees and asylum seekers with ordinary prisoners but unfortunately that is still happening. In fact under this legislation there will be room for them to be detained even longer. There is an extension of the time of initial detention after an asylum seeker arrives at the airport from 72 to 96 hours without any justification being provided for that increase in time. 
Section 474 also gives immigration officers more powers to detain and to determine that premises can be a place of detention. This is a really important issue because we have particularly in relation to Iranian Christians who have converted from Islam cases where asylum seekers have been detained for a very long time. One of them Amir Mohebbi who has now been granted status in New Zealand was in jail for 4 years. What is in the Act is quite a challenge to what the Human Rights Committee has said in its view that asylum seekers should not be detained in that way. The whole trend of the Act is towards increasing State powers over people who are coming here to an unreasonable degree and towards too much secrecy in respect of immigration processes. Thank you. 
DAVID GARRETT (ACT) 
: 
 It would be remiss of me not to take a call given the warm congratulations I wish to extend to the Minister of Immigration and I am reliably informed his wife. Of course those on this side of the House are more often married than in a partnership or some other loose arrangement such as the previous speaker alluded to. 
On the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill itself I do not intend to take 4 hours as the previous speaker seemed to take. It reminded me of listening to recordings of Castro speaking for 4 hours about nothing. 
Darien Fenton 
: You can sit down now then. 
DAVID GARRETT 
: Yeah I will very shortly. This bill is a very short bill. I think Mr Chauvel knows what I am talking about when I say that there is a very helpful High Court rule that is known as the slip rule which allows inadvertent errors to be corrected. But apparently there is nothing quite so sensible here and we have to come back as Mr Cosgrove has informed us to correct this legislation. That is a bit of a shame. 
But I do not intend to speak about Ahmed Zaoui’s history or his various potential connections. ACT will be supporting the amendment bill. 
RAHUI KATENE (Maori Party—Te Tai Tonga) 
: 
 We also extend our congratulations to the Minister of Immigration and his wife on their new arrival. We trust that all permits are in order and that nothing went wrong with the delivery. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. The terms “no guts” and “no courage” have been ruled out thousands of times in this House but that member sitting across the way from me Clayton Cosgrove has just blatantly accused our colleague Peter Garrett of having no guts and no courage. 
Hon Members 
: David Garrett. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: Oh David Garrett not Peter Garrett. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Firstly I do not believe we have a member in the House called Peter Garrett. I think he resides in the Australian Parliament. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I want members to reflect a moment. This House will get out of order when we have personal reflections and I want to say— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Yeah. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Rick Barker) 
: —excuse me I am ruling here; I do not want any correspondence on the matter—that personal reflections cause disorder. When reflections are made whether of a general nature or a particular nature offence is taken to them. Just as it is out of order to refer to an individual as having particular characteristics for example being controlled it is out of order to refer to a party in the same manner. When a member makes reflections to someone on the other side it can cause offence and people will react to it. I say to members of this House that personal reflections and derogatory comments are unacceptable in general. 
During the particular point raised by Mr Tau Henare I was busy looking at the  
Speakers’ Rulings 
 to speak about this matter and I did not hear the interjections so I could not take offence at them. I say further to Mr Henare that a member cannot take offence on behalf of someone else; the other person has to do that. But the member’s point is well made. I say to members that if they play it with a straight bat and do not make personal reflections against individuals or others in general this House will be much better. 
Hon Tau Henare 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I did not take offence on behalf of anybody; I took offence. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: I withdraw and apologise. 
I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. There are two sets of Standing Orders in this House. There are the written  
Standing Orders 
 and as somebody else said—a venerable parliamentarian—there are the unwritten standing orders. I simply make the observation to you that for personal reflections—which I did indeed make and I again withdraw and apologise; Mr Henare was absolutely correct—there is also another convention in this House. When a member of Parliament brings one’s spouse partner or family into a debate that is generally observed by both sides of the House as a no go area. That is under an unwritten standing order. I simply observe to you Mr Assistant Speaker that in my view that member made some very unparliamentary remarks about members in here. I am not asking you to take action because I suspect that that is in the unwritten standing orders but it is called a principle which perhaps that member knows very little about. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I will just say to the member that that was in some ways helpful but in other ways it was unhelpful. If the member had reflected on what I had said he would know that it was almost exactly the same point for point so it was unnecessary to relitigate. But I guess the member felt he had to get something off his chest. 
Having said that I think we should get back to business. We are here to debate. I know that the House is sitting under urgency and that it is a bit late but we should keep ourselves under a bit of a short rein and debate the issue. I ask members to play the ball not the player. 
RAHUI KATENE 
: It made for fascinating timing to receive the observations of the 98th session of the United Nations Human Rights Committee in New York just as the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill was being primed for introduction. Two aspects of that report in particular are relevant for this bill. The first is the recommendation to consider extending the mandate of the Human Rights Commission so that it can receive complaints of human rights violations relating to immigration laws policies and practices and report on them. The second is that New Zealand should continue its efforts to review the status of the Treaty of Waitangi within the domestic legal system including the desirability of incorporating the Treaty into domestic law in consultation with Maori groups. 
The first recommendation is of particular relevance to the legislation we are debating today—that is legislation that is about appointing members including the chair to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal. In effect this legislation is about one section of the Immigration Act section 474. The Immigration Act 2009 was assented to on 16 November 2009. Within the parameters of this legislation section 474 of the Act authorised certain persons to exercise specific powers and functions before the relevant provisions of the Act had begun. Yet when it came down to the wire section 474 was inadvertently omitted from the commencement provision. Today then we are facing legislation that will require section 474 to be brought into force as soon as possible to allow the necessary implementation work to be done. In real terms the bill will bring section 474 into force on the day after the date on which it receives the Royal assent. 
In this way then the bill appears to be purely administrative in nature. In fact it appears to be purely a response to an anomaly that was not identified at the time whereby the powers and functions of the appointed chair and the Governor-General were overlooked. The bill basically corrects that anomaly. The powers of the Governor-General addressed in this bill are related to the capacity to appoint a chair to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal. The powers also enable the Governor-General to appoint members to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal which will decide all immigration deportation refugee and protection appeals in New Zealand. Clearly that is an area of considerable sensitivity and controversy. The bill specifies the powers and functions that may be exercised early including the directions for the education training and professional development of members of the tribunal. Another part of the legislation establishes a process by which the chair of the tribunal can develop a code of conduct for members of the tribunal. In accordance with the recommendation from the United Nations Human Rights Committee this would enable complaints of human rights violations that might emerge from members of the Immigration and Protection Tribunal and that are related to immigration laws policies and practices to be heard and reported. 
The second recommendation of the United Nations Human Rights Committee is about reviewing the status of the Treaty of Waitangi within the domestic legal system. Even though we had considered that this bill might provide an opportunity to incorporate the Treaty into the bill it appears that the bill does not provide the process to make overarching effects to immigration and as such we have been advised that any amendment we might make to bring the Treaty into this legislation will not affect how the Immigration and Protection Tribunal will make its decisions. Notwithstanding these issues the Maori Party will support this bill which we see basically as a means of improving the administration around immigration policy implementation. The bill also provides us with an excellent opportunity to advertise our keen interest in putting forward an eminently suitable applicant to be appointed to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal. We will support this bill. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill be now read a first time. 
Ayes 113 
New Zealand National 58; New Zealand Labour 43; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1; United Future 1. 
Noes 9 
Green Party 9. 
Bill read a first time. 
Second Reading 
Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General) 
 on behalf of the  
Minister of Immigration 
: I move  
That the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill be now read a second time 
. In the first reading speeches I thought there were a number of helpful contributions. Perhaps I can be indulged to say I heard what Mr Cosgrove said about the omission. It is a matter that I myself have raised and it could well be that this kind of drafting of commencement clauses needs to be revisited. As I have said I heard what Mr Cosgrove said but at the end of the day as Alan Martin said—and Mr Cosgrove is a Cantabrian so he may not know about L V Martin—it is the putting right that counts. I think that is important to acknowledge. 
I think too that we are dealing with very good legislation. Again I heard what Mr Locke said about human rights concerns. I respect that he is a person who has a great passion for human rights and that he is one of the staunchest advocates of human rights in this place but I have to tell him that last week the United Nations Human Rights Committee commended overall the adoption of the Immigration Act in its opening statements. That committee has recognised that the Act is a good piece of work. 
Equally I think it is very important that we get on with implementing that Act it as quickly as we can. The implementation of the changes to immigration made in the Act is a sizable task that is moving full steam ahead. Section 474 which is a very complex section was included in the Act in order to allow certain implementation work to be done before the rest of the Act comes into force so the bill will bring that section into force on the day after the Royal assent. I will not go through the detail of the bill but I say a number of important tasks need to be undertaken and the sooner we get on to that the better it will be. 
I do not intend to waste the time of the House on what everyone acknowledges was a drafting error. I will apologise to the House if it helps to soothe matters but in any event I am pleased to commend the bill to the House. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 I thank the Attorney-General on behalf of the Minister of Immigration for his wonderful speech. From our side of the House we say that no apology is necessary—from that Minister at least. I think he has been very gracious to bite the bullet on this one. I am interested in his comments about what changes he may foresee in the legislative drafting process—and we may explore this in the Committee stage—and any recommendations or suggestions he has that could avoid this situation happening again. 
I suppose those recommendations could be perhaps that Ministers read the bill that Ministers read the Supplementary Order Paper and that Ministers take the advice of their officials. Having been a Minister of Immigration I know that there are some very venerable and highly skilled officials in the department and some very sound legal minds. I will not destroy their careers by naming them individually but there are some very very sound legal minds. I know that if Mr Finlayson had charge of this legislation he would have gone through the Supplementary Order Paper with a fine-tooth comb and cross-referenced the various pieces and clauses to ensure that it was completely quality controlled and we probably would not be in the situation we are in tonight. Equally he would have read the bill and he would have taken the advice of his officials— 
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: If only they were all that good. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: As my colleague Ruth Dyson says if only all Ministers were as good as the Attorney-General who I believe was taught by Gerry Mills as I was. I think we both passed School Certificate English but in different colleges and I know that Mr Finlayson is very diligent about his work. That is what Gerry told me before he sadly passed away. 
Like the Minister we will facilitate the passage of this legislation but we note that these are things that should be dealt with efficiently with good management and appropriately. I am gratified that the Minister who is taking the lead on this at least tonight is looking to solutions so that these errors do not occur again. 
DARIEN FENTON (Labour) 
: 
 I too would like to offer my thanks to the Minister Chris Finlayson for his suggestions and openness in looking for solutions. I was involved in the passing of Immigration Act 2009 as indeed many of my colleagues were. I was involved with the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and I know the amount of work that went into this Act. Many years of work and many Ministers were involved in it. The work on the legislation was started by the previous Labour Government and we worked through lots and lots of issues that were quite difficult to deal with which we talked about when we were passing the Immigration Bill several months ago. Immigration is a very difficult area of law. It is very complex law and I suppose we can forgive the error made on Supplementary Order Paper 32 in the name of the Hon Jonathan Coleman a little bit. 
Labour was committed to the Immigration Bill. We helped to facilitate it and we worked with the select committee on it. In fact we introduced that bill when we were in Government. We want to make sure that the commencement date for section 474 is brought into effect so that when the Immigration and Protection Tribunal is appointed and ready and the rest of the Act comes into effect it is all ready to go. With those few words I am happy to support the second reading of the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill. 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party will continue to oppose the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill but I think that the way the Attorney-General has engaged with the debate is good. He is treating the United Nations Human Rights Committee and its report on New Zealand very seriously. As I said in my first reading speech I recognise that the committee saw the Immigration Act 2009 as a positive development particularly when compared with the previous Immigration Act. I know that previously the committee had been worried about things like the security risk certificate provision in the old Act. In certain respects the Immigration Act 2009 represented a step forward and the United Nations Human Rights Committee was right to recognise that. In its specificity on immigration procedures and the Act it made very clear proposals which I hope the Government will listen to to not allow refugees and asylum seekers to be imprisoned in normal prisons with other prisoners as Amir Mohebbi the person who was detained for 4 years was. 
There are some very bad additions to the Immigration Act that deny human rights. One is under section 163 of the Act where the Minister of Immigration can deport anyone whom he or she deems to constitute a threat or risk to security. It is a very short direct provision that means that people can just be whisked out of the country in no time without any right of appeal. That is something that denies basic human rights. 
The other provision that really struck the Greens when the Immigration Act went through in 2009 is in what were then clauses 271 and 289. Those provisions take away from a judge the discretion to give someone in Amir Mohebbi’s position—someone detained prior to deportation—the right to be let out on bail. There is a clear definition that the judge can let someone out on bail only in exceptional circumstances. Clause 289 said that the judge cannot determine that the period of time a person has already been detained—in Amir Mohebbi’s case 4 years—can be taken into account by the judge in granting bail. Technically someone can remain in jail for ever which is a complete denial of habeas corpus. Provisions like that run up against internationally accepted principles and the principles that are accepted by the Human Rights Committee. 
With those few words the Green Party is sticking to its original position. Thank you. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill be now read a second time. 
Ayes 113 
New Zealand National 58; New Zealand Labour 43; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1; United Future 1. 
Noes 9 
Green Party 9. 
Bill read a second time. 
In Committee 
Hon SIMON POWER (Acting Leader of the House) 
: 
 Following agreement in the Business Committee I seek leave for all the provisions of the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill to be taken as one question. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there anyone opposed to that course of action? It appears not. Leave is granted. 
Clauses 1 to 4 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 Mr Hughes is very modest in allowing me to take the call; it is one of his endearing qualities that we love so much. I want to briefly address a couple of things in the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill that the Minister in the chair the Hon Christopher Finlayson may want to touch on. As I said in the previous debate I would be grateful if he might advise us on what legislative solutions he may be proposing in terms of the legislative drafting process. I also want to address some of the wider issues as posed by Mr Locke around this bill. 
As a former Minister of Immigration I say that the first responsibility of whoever is that Minister in the Government is to secure the borders of this country and I think members on both sides of the Chamber agree with that. Mr Locke referred to a number of cases where alleged—and I say that advisedly—refugees were incarcerated for allegedly in at least one case converting to Catholicism thereby inviting some sort of threat because they had gone public with that in their homeland. I believe that in the reported case that homeland was Iraq. I said in the debate on the substantive legislation that I was aware of that case and of others. Where it becomes difficult is where the United Nations deems that there is not a threat and we have to be guided by that. 
I recall that on a number of the cases that I dealt with as Minister there were great protestations by members of my own church. In respect of one or two cases certain people were very nice individuals. I think that one was a chef who had cooked for Bill Clinton. But in my view those were not valid reasons to walk away from the rule of law or the legislation and to not take officials’ advice and the advice of intelligence agencies in terms of the veracity or the lack of it of those people’s claims. I say to Mr Locke that when people convert at the airport in Seoul to any religion fly over to New Zealand tear up their passports and then claim as they yell from the highest building that harm may come to them if they go back home and on top of that when the UN Human Rights Council does not make the same recommendation in respect of a threat to their life then I say that we should respect the advice of agencies including our own department and intelligence agency. At the end of the day Ministers must make a judgment and they do. It is our job as a Parliament to secure our borders as a priority. 
This amendment bill has resulted from an omission on Supplementary Order Paper 32 in relation to the commencement of section 474 of the Immigration Act 2009. I note that the powers referred to in the bill are in respect of the Governor-General appointing members including the chair to the Immigration and Protection Tribunal; the chair of the tribunal directing the education training and professional development of members of the tribunal; and the chair of the tribunal developing a code of conduct for the tribunal’s own membership. As I said the Attorney-General has been good enough to proactively suggest that he will be proposing changes to the drafting process to avoid this happening again and we endorse that. 
I come back to the original Immigration Act 2009 which was passed earlier in this Parliament. I believe it had the support of nearly every political party in Parliament. I say to Mr Locke that maybe he would like to reflect on where his allegiance lies. This is New Zealand. We have to treat people appropriately and we have to be humanitarian to all those who come across our borders but equally we expect them to be legitimate and to not abuse our rules laws and good graces by making false claims. At the end of the day whichever party the Minister of Immigration is from in this Parliament be it Labour National or otherwise he or she is charged on advice to make a decision on the veracity or lack of it of those claims. 
If people choose to stay in prison because they will not adhere to our immigration laws then I say to Mr Locke that that is a matter for them. If we look at the international jurisdictions around the world I would wager that very few of them now do not look to the security of their borders and do not look to differentiate between those who make false claims as refugees or otherwise and who abuse our humanitarian systems. If we let in someone who abuses that system then he or she will also take the place of a true refugee or true person who crosses our border to escape tyranny from another country. Finally I would invite Mr Locke to reflect on those comments. 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 I take up the challenge from my colleague Clayton Cosgrove with great pleasure. Of the people whom he referred to like the Iranian Christian convert who was a cook and the four Iranian Christian converts from Islam who served long terms in prison from several months to 2 years—and 4 years in Amir Mohebbi’s case—every one of them now has proper immigration status in New Zealand and is living here as a legitimate person in our country. They are doing very well. They are not committing any crimes. Clayton Cosgrove’s idea that somehow those people should be rejected was actually a view that was turned down by the immigration authorities in New Zealand in the end. The problem was that someone like Amir Mohebbi had to be detained for 4 years because he did not want to be deported back to Iran where he may well have been persecuted as a Christian convert from Islam. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: The UN didn’t agree with that. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: In regard to Clayton Cosgrove’s reference to the UN I say that the UN does not always get it right. There is a simple fact governing the UN’s attitude to the situation in Iran which is that Iran takes many thousands of refugees from Afghanistan. The UN does not want to endanger that so it does not look at— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: I am trying to get my head around exactly which part of clauses 1 2 3 and 4— 
KEITH LOCKE 
: I am responding to— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: No I cautioned him as well. One errant speech that is quite broad does not open space for everybody else. We are debating the Committee stage. The member can make illustrations in comparison but he must tie them back to the clauses. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: I relate this point back to the Immigration Act and the provisions in it as I did in my original speech. But when a member stands up and spends virtually his whole contribution criticising me on those points surely I have the right to defend myself on those points. I think that the whole question that the United Nations Human Rights Committee raised and on which it was critical of New Zealand’s immigration procedures in the Immigration Act section 474 of which we are implementing was on the question of non-refoulement—that is people being returned to their country of origin where they may be persecuted. That was specifically stated in the report issued on 25 March by the United Nations Human Rights Committee. 
In the case of the Iranian Christian converts from Islam the Iranian Lower House has passed the first reading of a law providing for the execution of people who convert from Islam the religion of their birth to Christianity. It is actually in a law that has passed its first reading in the Iranian Parliament. 
The other thing that we have to put in that context is the fact that a few days ago Amnesty International issued a report on executions around the world. No. 1 was China and near the top was Iran where they have been executing people particularly since the recent protests. If we combine all these factors particularly where asylum seeker’s names are known we know that people who are deported back to Iran are under some risk of persecution. We have to take all of that into account. We should not let people just rot in jail for the rest of their lives in violation of habeas corpus and have provisions in our Immigration Act that allow that to happen just because they will not sign bits of paper. We cannot allow them to be deported back to Iran to possible persecution and even execution in terms of the law being passed through the Iranian Parliament. That is why many Christian people particularly those of the Catholic faith but also of other faiths were so strong in their support for the people whom they knew were good parishioners in their church. They knew that they were true converts. I take Mr Cosgrove’s point that some people can use that as an excuse and no doubt some people have used that as an excuse but the people in the cases that he raised are now solid determined people with the proper immigration status in New Zealand. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Let me say right now that I blame myself for that; I do. I am flagellating myself. The score is now one all and we will now talk about the commencement date and the issues surrounding that. 
DARIEN FENTON (Labour) 
: 
 That is indeed what I intend to do Mr Chair. I do intend to speak about clauses 1 to 4 of the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill. I will start with clause 1 “Title” which reads: “This Act is the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Act 2010.” 
Indeed we could call this bill if we wanted to the “Immigration (Unfortunate Mistake) Amendment Bill 2010” or we could call it if we wanted to the “Immigration Act the Minister Intends to Find Other Solutions for”—which of course we welcome—“Amendment Bill 2010”. I could go on about that but members on the Opposition side of the Chamber are generous and as we have noted the Minister has said the omission of a reference to section 474 of the Immigration Act on Supplementary Order Paper 32 should not have happened and he will be looking to find solutions. I do not want to blame the drafters of the Immigration Bill but I will say as I said earlier that it was a huge bill. It was a bill that took many many years to work on. Those of us who are now on this side of the Chamber worked on it; we began the work on that bill. We worked on it in the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and in fact— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: We wrote it. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: —as my colleague says we wrote it—we took it through all of its process in the select committee and then it came back for its second reading under this Government. So I do not want to spend too much time on trying to debate whether there should be a different title. 
I would like to talk about clause 3 if I may which states: “This Act amends the Immigration Act 2009.” I think that one of the things that the Act does is to set up the whole kind of platform for future immigration. Unfortunately there have been some pretty awful announcements since it was enacted and I am sure that I am allowed to refer to those because this bill is about the commencement date of that Act and what happens in bringing it into force. I mentioned in my first reading speech the cheque-book immigration policy announced by Minister Coleman. I do not want to be too unpleasant about that Minister’s life; I know that he has things to celebrate. But I have to say we are very concerned that the prize of New Zealand citizenship is being sold to the highest bidders never mind what skills and values those people may or may not possess. I do wonder about this whole thing of bringing retirees into the family category—the parent category—and whether we are talking about the Government’s latest make-work programme. You know we are going to bring in these older people— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: No commencement. 
DARIEN FENTON 
: Commencement? OK—no principal Act. Are we bringing people in for a make-work programme? 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: No! 
DARIEN FENTON 
: All right Mr Chairperson; I will move on to the next clause which deals with the commencement of the legislation. 
Clause 4 is about the commencement date of the principal Act and some announcements have been made since that Act was enacted. A change to the registered seasonal employers’ scheme removes the minimum wage for workers there. That change has been made since the 2009 Act was enacted and it will be affected by the commencement date of this bill. We on this side of the Chamber are very concerned about that. So in relation to the commencement provisions in clause 4 we are saying perhaps we should backtrack a little and go back to the situation that existed when the Act was brought into being in 2009. The Minister should retract the announcements that he has made because quite frankly they are appalling. They are affecting New Zealanders; they are affecting New Zealand workers and other New Zealanders. As I said it is cheque-book immigration. It is about providing visas for cash and we do not support that. Thank you. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 In speaking to these clauses I note that in respect of clauses 2 and 4 and in light of the Attorney-General’s comments about changes that he may wish to make to the legislative process it is worth reflecting on the history of why this omission occurred. I am advised that the omission of the reference to section 430—which is section 474 in the current Act—in the commencement section of the then Immigration Bill occurred between versions 22 and 23 of the Supplementary Order Paper. I was quite astounded by that. In version 22 the commencement section contained the required reference to section 430—I am mindful in making these comments of being extremely specific about the bill—in Part 12 of the bill. I am told that in version 23 the references to sections 430 and 431 were changed to refer to “Part 13”. I am also advised that the department noted that that was inconsistent with the subsection dealing with information sharing with employers and I am also advised that the department requested that the Parliamentary Counsel Office change “Part 13” to refer to the specific sections being brought into force. Indeed in making that change section 430 was unfortunately omitted. 
That I know for those people like myself who are not lawyers sounds to be quite a convoluted process in respect of the bill’s drafting and it was unfortunate that the mistake was not identified by the Minister in the drafting process especially when there are as I have said errors occurring in versions 22 and 23 of a Supplementary Order Paper. I feel sure that the Parliamentary Counsel Office has a pretty formidable reputation as do our immigration officials I know having worked with them for some years in combing very very carefully through legislation. 
I do not have the legislative history of others but where a Supplementary Order Paper has various chapters or shall we say various versions and we go to versions 22 and 23 I would have thought that somewhere down the track the Minister having read 22 previous versions might have picked up on that error. I would have thought so. But as the Minister in the chair the Hon Christopher Finlayson has said again with a great deal of grace and honour as the person who is trying to shepherd this omission through Parliament these things do happen. Even though I am a South Islander I tell the Minister that I remember L V Martin with some interest and I remember his slogan as the Minister pointed out. But again I would be interested if the Minister would take a call— 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Uncanny resemblance really with the Minister. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I would never say that; that would be deeply unkind and offensive— 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Why? They’re both successful. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: —to L V Martin! I would be very interested if the Minister would get up and give us a quick burst perhaps on how he would change or recommend changes to the drafting process. I think we have to go through the parliamentary stages but we would hate to get through this stage and pass this bill and then come back after Easter in urgency again to perhaps correct another error. So I ask the Minister on this A3-paged bill whether he could just reinforce to the Committee that we will not be back here in urgency the week after next to correct another error—perhaps a spelling mistake a date a clause a number or I do not know the grade of paper the bill is printed on. Who knows? But we do not want to be back here again. I feel confident now that we have a competent Minister in the chair that he will give us such assurances and we will not be back here to deal with such minutiae again. I look forward to it and invite him if he would be so gracious to elucidate on those points. 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 I would like to follow up Darien Fenton’s point which I think is relevant to the bill. If we look at section 474 which a mistake was made about and which this bill corrects we see that it talks about publishing immigration instructions and giving general instructions. A lot of immigration is put into effect not through direct legislation but through regulation like published instructions. We had the example that Darien Fenton mentioned of giving easy access to New Zealand and residency to those who are retirees. The category that Darien Fenton was I think rightly concerned about was for those who effectively buy their way in through having pots of money. They probably can do a bit of a money-go-round when they get here. Whether they actually invest in the future of our country is always a bit doubtful because there are always ways of shuffling money around in between countries and whatever. 
But without getting into that detail I ask what the underlying principle is. Should people come here to be genuine New Zealanders or just as people who are buying their way in because they happen to have a lot more money than someone else? Then there is the other aspect of that in terms of the demography of New Zealand. Do we need the piles— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Come into this debate. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: This is related to section 474(4)(a) and (b): the implementing of general instructions in particular. Do we need a whole lot of older people or is there a greater need if we are to redress the problem of too many older people in the population to put the emphasis more on younger people? 
That being said of course the Green Party is very much in favour of family completion and regulations in that respect—whether the people coming in to complete the family are old or young or brothers or sisters or whatever. We are very much in favour of that and we do not want that confused with people buying their way in just because they have tons of money. It has not really worked in New Zealand’s benefit in the other ways it has been tried and I do not think it will work in terms of allowing retired people with pots of money to come and settle just because of that fact. 
Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General) 
: 
 I would not want honourable members to think I have an unhealthy obsession with the machinery provisions of bills but I thought Mr Cosgrove made a very helpful contribution. He identified exactly what the problem was in the legislation which is what happens perhaps when we have overly prescriptive provisions in transitional arrangements or commencement clauses. 
One of the issues I will look at from a legislative point of view—and I am getting away from the particular bill before the Committee—is whether things can be streamlined because quite frankly it is not overly satisfactory that we have had to deal with this matter in this way. So from the point of view of an Attorney-General with responsibility for the Parliamentary Counsel Office I tell members that I will talk to a few people to make sure that it does not happen again. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES (Labour) 
: 
 I rise to take a reasonably brief call during the Committee stage of this Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill. I am motivated to do so because I had hoped that the Maori Party might take a call during the Committee stage. The member for Te Tai Tonga Rahui Katene spoke very eloquently during the first reading of the bill and I thought we might hear from the member for Te Tai Tokerau Hone Harawira during the Committee stage. Clause 1 in the clause by clause analysis refers to the change in the title clause taking place to ensure that that clause explicitly refers to the Act in which the enactment originally occurred—in other words it will enable the bill to do what Parliament thought it had done in the first place. I thought that the member for Te Tai Tokerau might have had a view on making sure that laws did exactly what he thought they would do at the time they were passed by Parliament— 
Hone Harawira 
: Steal Maori land. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: —in respect of the foreshore and seabed legislation or the provisions that were going to be referred to in the news today. The member refers to stealing land by way of interjection yet I do not think that the legislation that will come to the House will explicitly refer to the remedy he seeks. So I will be very interested to hear from him and I would like him to make a contribution to the Committee of the whole House about how legislation can explicitly refer as the clause by clause analysis says to clause 1 in respect of that. He had quite a lot to say on the television news tonight and I am hoping he will share with the Committee of the whole House his views on that. 
That point I am making goes to the heart of the mistakes that are made in legislation. The member opposite thinks that major mistakes were made; he is looking for remedies. This bill is a remedy for a particular mistake that the self-described maestro of New Zealand politics the Hon Jonathan Coleman managed to bring through with this bill. But tonight is a night for congratulating Mr Coleman. He has a new child; we are all very happy for him in that respect and we wish him well and that is why we are happy that the bill has been handed over to the Attorney-General. It is a good night for Jonathan Coleman. 
But that analysis of clause 1 refers to that so I hope that once I have finished my remarks Hone Harawira will speak to us about that. There will be a lot of people waiting to hear what he has to say about it I am sure. I am certainly one. 
Hone Harawira 
: Ha ha! Guaranteed. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: That is good. If he had said no I would have pointed out that this is one of those fortnightly Wednesdays that is pay day and he should get to his feet and explain what his views are on that. It seemed to me that there was a slightly different position tonight between that proposed by Government MP Hone Harawira who is member of the National-Maori-ACT Government and what the Ministers were proposing in respect of that law. 
I have a question for the Attorney-General who is standing in tonight for the Minister of Immigration and it goes to that correction to section 474. The aide-mémoire refers to the certification of immigration consultants under section 22(1) and that they can thereby be classified under section 23(1) and I wonder whether the Minister can explain to us exactly—well not exactly; that is unfair on him— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: No no—exactly. 
Hon DARREN HUGHES 
: No he is prescient but even this close to Easter the Minister is not quite prescient in that respect; by Sunday of course he will have the answer to everything. But I ask whether he could explain to us exactly what instructions will be classified differently as a result of this reference because the bill itself does not make that clear. Even the aide-mémoire although it refers to what will happen mechanically does not go through the issues of substance in terms of the legislation. 
My second question to the Hon Christopher Finlayson is about the appointment of tribunal members which I understand was the subject of the mistake made between versions 22 and 23 as referred to by Mr Cosgrove. A mistake was picked up there and it referred to the tribunal members. I wonder whether the Minister could tell the Committee just for our own interest to what extent work has been done to begin to appoint those tribunal members. Was the mistake discovered because tribunal members were about to be appointed? 
In other words has it been decided who the tribunal members will be or has it pretty much been decided who they will be? How far down the road has that process through the Cabinet appointments and honours committee travelled? We certainly do not need to know names; we are not on a fishing expedition for that. We are almost certain that an appointment could be part of the severance package for the Rt Hon James Brendan Bolger but we are not sure about that. I certainly hope the severance package is much more generous than that because he has worked hard for our country and deserves it. But now that the Minister has told us how much work has gone on with regard to those appointments I would like to know if we passed this law tonight and we specifically did not give a commencement date this time when they would be made. Jonathan Coleman made us give a date last time and he was wrong about that so we are correcting it tonight. We are very happy to do that; there is support from the Labour Opposition in that regard. But when can we expect tribunal members to be appointed under this particular provision? 
Those are the two questions I have. In addition I am waiting for Hone Harawira’s contribution which I am anticipating will take place now. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That clauses 1 to 4 be agreed to 
. 
Ayes 113 
New Zealand National 58; New Zealand Labour 43; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1; United Future 1. 
Noes 9 
Green Party 9. 
Clauses 1 to 4 agreed to. 
Bill reported without amendment. 
Report adopted. 
Third Reading 
Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Attorney-General) 
 on behalf of the  
Minister of Immigration 
: I move  
That the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill be now read a third time 
. Once again I thank honourable members for their generosity of spirit in facilitating the expeditious passage of this bill. 
Can I simply say that during the Committee stage an issue arose about the appointment of the tribunal. My understanding is that those particular matters have barely advanced so we will get on with that now. This bill is looking as though it will pass. This bill is an important bill though a very specific one and it will help the implementation process by ensuring that certain implementation tasks can be done in advance of what could be called the “go live” date of the commencement of the bill. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Such modern language. 
Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON 
: My response to the chief Opposition whip is to tell him to get with it. It is time to move on. One cannot live in the past all the time. 
I will not go through section 474 in any great detail because there are certain things the Governor-General has to do—for example appoint members including the chair to the tribunal. The Prime Minister has to do certain things the Minister has to do certain things and the Attorney-General has to do certain things with the chair of the tribunal like agree on any general practices and procedures that may be necessary in relation to proceedings involving classified information heard by the tribunal which could be a very important matter once the tribunal gets under way. Then I have to agree with the Chief Justice on any general practices and procedures that may be necessary for other proceedings involving classified information provisions. 
There is a lot of practical work that needs to done and that is why we need to get on with it as quickly as we can why the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill has been needed and why I have come down to the House in sackcloth and ashes to accept blame on behalf of the Government. I will flagellate myself later on and then I will go to confession. There we have it; a mistake was made and I have manfully and with some courage accepted it. Now having accepted it we move on as I am exhorted to by the chief Government whip. I commend the bill to the House. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 If only there were more moments like this in the House. I want to extend— 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Nick Smith could learn a thing or two. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Yes Nick Smith could learn a thing or two absolutely. I want to extend the parliamentary olive branch to the Minister the Hon Christopher Finlayson who has been even more gracious than I think all of us expected him to be. Like myself he went to a Catholic school—a second-rate one in Silverstream as opposed to St Bede’s—but I have to say that he has acted— 
Hon Christopher Finlayson 
: St Pat’s Town. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Sorry it was St Patrick’s College Wellington. I apologise. The late Gerry Mills would be looking down in shame. I say that the Minister has acted gracefully and with a high degree of honour. We hope that he will not return to his office in the dead of night and flagellate himself as he said he would. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: He promised. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: He promised he would. Indeed it may be appropriate that instead of the Minister flagellating himself perhaps the Leader of the House who has made many many more mistakes than this Minister may take up that sort of biblical challenge as another Marist old boy of St Bede’s. Perhaps Mr Finlayson in giving Mr Brownlee some lessons in House management and legislative management may also give him some lessons in self-flagellation. 
This is relatively benign legislation. I note that the debate has been conducted with a degree of good humour apart from—and I have to say this as I will not let it pass—some very derogatory comments made by a member of this Chamber that bastion of principle Mr Garrett about members’ partners relationships and families. He would be the only person in a debate like this where there is a little jocularity and good humour but a degree of scrutiny who would lower himself to that level and bring the debate down into the gutter from where he seems to slither from time to time. 
In respect of the Green member I know his points are heartfelt in respect of the human rights aspects of the Immigration Act itself and this amendment to it. I simply reiterate the points I made to him before. I agree with him that when people cross our border in a genuine fashion perhaps as genuine converts to religion and enter New Zealand in fear of their lives if they return to their country of origin I believe that our past immigration processes inefficient as some of them were and the new Act would allow the Minister and the department on evidence to act in a humanitarian fashion. The member who laughs has little experience in immigration matters. It is appropriate that the relevant Government agencies scrutinise the veracity or lack of it of an applicant. 
Mr Locke asked how we will know that the UN will always get it right and that is a good point. He then went on to quote Amnesty International which I have great respect for as a non-governmental organisation but which I would put in a second order of priority after the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees or the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. I put it back on Mr Locke and ask him how we know that Amnesty International and other non-governmental organisations that do not have the ability the intelligence capability and the intelligence agencies that the UN Governments and other Crown agencies have are able to make those judgments. I put that back to him because maybe he has a crystal ball that many of us in this Chamber do not have. Maybe he can judge the righteousness or lack of it of those who choose to take advantage of our humanitarian Kiwi spirit. Maybe he can judge that through some sort of crystal ball that we do not have. 
Shane Ardern 
: Divine intervention. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: Maybe that is the case. Mr Finlayson being a pillar of the Catholic Church may rise to his feet and elucidate on that purpose. But in all seriousness this comes down to Ministers whether they be Labour or National or any other flavour in this House who sit in the chair of the Minister of Immigration being forced to make judgments on the veracity or lack of veracity of cases. Mr Locke seems to have taken my comments to heart as if I am saying that we should be sceptical of anybody who crosses our borders and makes a claim. No we should question we should seek evidence and then we should make judgments. But as Minister of Immigration I never accepted pressure from groups based on a lack of knowledge and a lack of evidence. It is not enough to say that somebody is a pillar of a church. I am a Catholic and I do not think I am a pillar of my church but I think I have to be judged perhaps on evidence. It is not enough to say that somebody is a good bloke. It is not enough to say that that person has been incarcerated for a number of years by their own choice I say to Mr Locke. 
In one of the cases that he talked about the incarceration of that person was that person’s choice. That person could have ended his or her incarceration. I recall those cases. Ministers of Immigration must be guided by international agencies. Maybe the UN has changed its mind but when I was in the chair and perhaps until recently the UN took a far different view on Iran than Keith Locke did at the time. I think we may have discussed this at the time over a number of cases. 
Our job as a Parliament as a Minister of Immigration as an Opposition spokesperson as a constituent or as a list member of Parliament representing those nationals who wish to take advantage of our Kiwi humanity is to make judgments on evidence and to represent them on evidence. But at the end of the day—and Mr Finlayson has to bite the bullet on this one tonight—Ministers and Government agencies have to bite the bullet and sometimes make unpalatable decisions. Maybe Mr Locke has the view that we should open our borders and without evidence accept all those people who come across them. Well I have to say to Mr Locke that there are some bad people in the world some people are a threat to our borders and the borders of other countries and it is our duty as a Parliament and as a Government to ensure that our citizenry first and our border first is secured. 
With those comments the Labour Opposition as we have said throughout the debate will support this legislation. We wrote most of the Immigration Bill; National passed it. We supported it. We believe in the bill and the consequential amendments and in Mr Finlayson’s cast-iron rock-solid pot-riveted guarantee that we will not be back here on the Tuesday after Easter Monday or after the adjournment in urgency correcting another mistake made by Mr Coleman “The Maestro” of the Parliament. I am sad that Kate Wilkinson the Associate Minister of Immigration who has some oversight for this area has not taken a call but it may well happen. She may do something that is completely out of character for her—front up grit her teeth and take some responsibility. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: Not a chance. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: I will not be taking up Mr Hughes’ wager on that. 
I conclude by congratulating the Minister. He has treated this issue with a high degree of seriousness as we all have. He has been magnanimous and said that he will look at the Parliamentary Counsel Office talk with its drafters and make recommendations to perhaps stop the error from happening again. As I say after 22 or 23 versions of the Supplementary Order Paper going through still we had errors. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: A Nick Smith special. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: The member says it is a Nick Smith special. I am not quite sure what he means by that and I will leave that to Mr Hughes. But Mr Hughes did make a very pertinent comment in respect of the conduct of the Minister Mr Finlayson being gracious and honourable and his preparing to take responsibility. There are one or two members—one Dr Nick Smith sits opposite me—who could indeed as Mr Hughes said learn from Mr Finlayson’s example. There is no politics in this; it is one of those rare moments in this House when in that old-fashioned Westminster tradition a Minister will come down to the Chamber and not blame his officials not blame anybody else but actually grit his teeth and say he is responsible. The ground-breaking thing that has happened tonight is that Mr Finlayson is not actually the responsible Minister. He has ridden the horse very well tonight as Attorney-General but he is not the responsible Minister. 
I pay tribute to and congratulate Dr Coleman who could not be here. I am not breaching the Standing Orders by saying that. He has a very good reason for not being here with his wife having had a child this evening and we congratulate him on that. That obviously was not a mistake. We look forward to further debates with Dr Coleman and I look forward to Mr Finlayson in the future as Attorney-General implementing those strategies plans and procedures to streamline the legislative process. Along with Mr Finlayson I commend the bill to the House. 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 I think the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill has generated better debate than I had expected and I welcome the contributions from various members—Clayton Cosgrove Darien Fenton and Chris Finlayson—in that respect. I do not disagree too much with the framework that Clayton Cosgrove outlined in the last speech because I too believe that immigration decisions should be based very much on the evidence at hand. But it is important to pull in all of the evidence possible and not rely on one bit of evidence. 
Clayton Cosgrove said the United Nations’ evidence might be the highest form of evidence. I do not think that is always the case particularly because as anyone who studies the United Nations knows it is balancing competing interests and operating in a certain geopolitical reality. One of the key features of the Iranian situation is the tens of thousands of refugees it receives particularly from Afghanistan; the UN is very grateful that the Iranian Government allows those refugees to be hosted on its soil. That could colour the UN’s decisions on the danger to Christian converts from Islam. I think the other evidence that we consider in making these decisions—and I am using this one as an illustration in the context of this bill—is what happens in Iran. The Lower House of the Iranian Parliament is actually debating and passing a law that says that Christian converts from Islam can be executed—not just imprisoned but executed. “Apostates” is the term that they use. Our embassy in Tehran could gather evidence. Under the 1951 refugee convention we are supposed to collect evidence and make our independent judgment on whether people returned to a country will actually be persecuted—not just do what the UN or whatever organisation it is says. We have to look at all the evidence. Our embassy in Tehran could gather evidence. Also it is important to look at the evidence provided by the Catholic Church because it has people in Iran. It has a big international network to gather evidence. It has been involved in campaigning to stop people like the people we have talked about tonight being returned to possible persecution in Iran. 
I realised as the discussion went on that there is a common bond between me Chris Finlayson and Clayton Cosgrove. Mr Cosgrove referred to St Bede’s College and I taught two terms at St Bede’s College many years ago. I think it was before Clayton Cosgrove arrived. I do not think I could have controlled a young fourth-form Clayton Cosgrove. He is bad enough when he is this age. 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I feel that it is appropriate to confirm for the House that Keith Locke never taught me at St Bede’s. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Eric Roy) 
: That is not a point of order. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: Thank you and I thank Clayton Cosgrove for that point of order. 
Hon Darren Hughes 
: No thank God! 
KEITH LOCKE 
: Thank God! That was my only problem at St Bede’s—I did not have God on my side in the way that the priests did in disciplining rather rough fourth-formers and third-formers but there we are. 
The proof of the pudding is in the eating in a lot of refugee cases. Clayton Cosgrove and I may ultimately agree on this: the reason why I think people were right not to sign papers to be deported to Iran—and I am talking about Amir Mohebbi who was in jail for 4 years Ali Panah who was in jail for 2 years and Thomas Yadegary who was in jail for 2 years—is that if they had signed that bit of paper they might be back in Iran being persecuted today. Instead they are sitting in New Zealand as good New Zealanders. That is the result in the end of a thorough immigration process. I think that people like me who defended those people have been proved right in all of the cases that were prominent in the media. 
It is important for us to pay attention to immigration issues because every MP knows that we get a lot of them and that people get very distressed if they are not being treated fairly by the immigration system. We are often defending immigrants and making sure that they are treated fairly. So we all have a vested interest in getting it right. 
Towards the end of the Attorney-General’s contribution he raised a point that in my opinion indicates that this bill gives the Attorney-General too much power. That may be OK at the moment when we have a very good Attorney-General but he himself indicated that the bill provides that when the Immigration and Protection Tribunal is dealing with classified information it has to work with and get the consent of the Attorney-General; in effect the Attorney-General can veto the Immigration and Protection Tribunal which is not a very good procedure to have because that tribunal should be truly independent and determine those matters for itself. Sure there should be a provision for consultation but not a provision allowing the Attorney-General to veto tribunal decisions. The other thing the Attorney General mentioned I think was that in terms of process and classified information there has to be agreement not only between the Attorney-General and the Immigration and Protection Tribunal but between the Attorney-General and the Chief Justice. So the Attorney-General can veto the Chief Justice which is not necessarily the best situation. Again that could have been written as a consultation procedure not effectively a right of veto. 
So there are a whole lot of things that are important to address under this bill. It is good that the UN Human Rights Committee has discussed our Immigration Act and our immigration procedures. It has come down with some criticisms and some praise—a combination of the two. Hopefully that will continue. 
I think the Minister of Justice Simon Power when he went to New York to participate in that assessment of New Zealand’s human rights including immigration rights by the UN Human Rights Committee enjoyed the experience as he enjoyed a previous experience in Geneva a couple of years ago. It is good when we are engaging with the world community to try to meet the standards of the world community. There are so many countries that do not. In general we are better than other countries but that does not mean to say—particularly on this often fractious issue of immigration and the rights of people who are trying to come here to settle here and to visit here—that we should not have the fairest processes possible. Unfortunately the Greens will have to continue to cast a vote against this bill because it still offends too much against our civil liberties particularly in undermining fair open and due process for visitors and migrants to our country. Thank you. 
DARIEN FENTON (Labour) 
: 
 It is a pleasure to take a call in the third reading of the very non-controversial Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill which was drafted to fix up an accidental omission in the Immigration Act. As we have said Labour is supporting it. 
I pay my respects to my colleague from the Green Party because he is very well versed in the very controversial issues around immigration. We heard about a lot of them when Keith Locke was sitting alongside me on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee as the original Immigration Bill went through the select committee process. As I said earlier it was a very long process and quite a difficult one too because immigration by its very nature is discriminatory and our country has to make decisions about who we will let cross our borders and who we will not and that is very very difficult. 
I pay tribute once again to the various Ministers of Immigration who helped put the original bill together including David Cunliffe Clayton Cosgrove and Lianne Dalziel and—forgive me if I miss anyone—also Mark Gosche who was the chair of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. We went through a very long process on that Immigration Bill and we heard from many very very powerful submitters. They were powerful in the sense that the stories they told us were incredible and we could only wonder at the lives that some people are forced to lead. 
I am no expert in the international scene but along with most other MPs I get people coming to talk to me about their situation and about what they are trying to do. They are trying to enter the country to get a work permit to get permanent residence or to stop themselves from being thrown out of the country because their work permit has expired and so on. 
In this third reading speech I particularly want to mention as I have in previous speeches about immigration the Chorus workers who were employed by Telecom. They were mainly Filipino and they were brought here on work permits to do jobs we could not get anyone else to do. They were highly skilled workers. Their work permits were revoked and they were eventually sent home because Telecom decided to end its contract with Chorus the new contractor decided to make all those workers owner-operators and under New Zealand immigration rules people on work permits cannot change from being employees to small-business owners. I think New Zealand got the worst end of the deal. Certainly the workers were treated appallingly. I appealed to the Minister of Immigration on many occasions to intervene and I personally met a lot of those workers. Many of them came from the North Shore and in fact from Northcote where the Minister is the electorate MP. Unfortunately many of them have had to go home and I do not think that has done our reputation any good at all. 
We acknowledge that it is important that the commencement date for section 474 of the Immigration Act is brought into effect so that the Immigration and Protection Tribunal is appointed and ready when the rest of the Act comes into effect. We will be interested in who the members of that tribunal are. We look forward to hearing the announcement from the Minister. 
As I have said this bill is a very minor and non-controversial amendment and that is why we are supporting it. I congratulate the Minister Jonathan Coleman and his wife on the birth of their child. It is probably a good thing that it happened tonight because we had quite a long list of things we were going to talk about regarding Jonathan Coleman’s errors and embarrassments. In the spirit of a new life coming into the world we will not go there but I do want to talk about decisions made since the Act came into force—decisions that I have already referred to. 
In particular I want to talk about retirement visas for cash—if I may return to that theme—which roll out the welcome mat for the world’s rich retirees. It is discrimination on the basis of wealth. The Minister has made a mistake because that policy was looked at 10 years ago and was dismissed as an expensive mistake by the then Associate Minister Lockwood Smith—in 1999. It was pointed out to him that the benefits of bringing in people of retirement age who contribute cash and sign up to health insurance were marginal while the risks were significant. Those visa holders would receive at least some of their health care from the public system New Zealand taxpayers’ resources pay for that so the retirees would not be paying for themselves. There would be the possibility of lobby groups forming in response as well as the possibility of no health insurance being available. Officials certainly bagged this policy 10 years ago but Minister Coleman has resurrected it. I am not sure why he did not look back at the advice from 10 years ago because nothing has changed. Those risks still exist today and even Jonathan Coleman admits that the benefits of this scheme are marginal at best. He said that the policy is not a huge deal and is unlikely to be a cash cow so we will not be overrun with people. Well he hopes we will not. But as with some of the other decisions the Minister has made since the passage of the Immigration Act 2009 I have to ask what is in it for New Zealand. Will it have any noticeable effect on our economy? I think that is unlikely. I think the potential costs for New Zealand associated with allowing retirement-age migrants to settle here will be greater than the potential investment earnings. 
The number of people granted residency under the family (parent) category has not been increased but those with enough money who fit under the new parent retirement category will have priority. I think that is incredibly unfair. It means that people with most of their family living in New Zealand already but who do not have a lot of money will miss out. As MPs we hear from people who have settled here and want to bring their parents to live with them. But if they have not got the money they will be at the bottom of the list—that is the truth. I think it is very inappropriate to prioritise an investor migrant under the family migrant category which is what that policy does. It is cheque-book immigration. The prize of New Zealand citizenship is being sold to the highest bidder whatever that person’s skills and values. I suppose it could be a make-work programme because we will need lots and lots of caregivers to look after these rich retirees. We already have reports stating that there are not enough caregivers to look after the people who are already in New Zealand. There already is a shortage of caregivers—low-paid caregivers earning the minimum wage. The report I saw said we will have to import more of them. So I suppose that that immigration policy could be a make-work scheme. 
The other decision made under the Immigration Act 2009 that I mentioned earlier relates to the Recognised Seasonal Employer scheme. The Minister decided to undermine the requirement that those workers must be paid a minimum wage that includes the cost of their accommodation. I think that is shocking. In the last few weeks there have been a couple of high-profile cases where workers have been paid well below the minimum wage. There are some real questions to be asked. Meantime the Minister has been trumpeting the policy which Labour introduced but Labour put in a lot of safeguards round it which have been removed. Now we are starting to see exploitation of those workers which I think is shameful. 
To return to the bill it is non-controversial and Labour supports it. It has to happen. A lot of work was done on the Immigration Act 2009 and most of it was Labour’s work. Immigration is a very very difficult area. We are not happy with the decisions that the Minster has made since the Act came into force but we will support this amendment. Thank you. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the Immigration Act 2009 Amendment Bill be now read a third time 
. 
Ayes 113 
New Zealand National 58; New Zealand Labour 43; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1; United Future 1. 
Noes 9 
Green Party 9. 
Bill read a third time.