Street Maryan: Urgent Debates — Diplomatic Incident Malaysian Official—Negotiations Regarding Waiver of Diplomatic ImmunityText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeStreet Maryan: Urgent Debates — Diplomatic Incident Malaysian Official—Negotiations Regarding Waiver of Diplomatic Immunity[Sitting date: 02 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19141. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour):Thank you very much Mr Assistant Speaker and because it is a 5-minute call I may have to speak more quickly than usual because there is quite a lot to say about this.First of all there is a young woman here in New Zealand at the heart of this matter who deserves an apology. That is the first thing that this House needs to be mindful of. Secondly I want to go to the issue of diplomatic immunity and whether there has been any interference with police procedures. In my view there has been none. There has been no interference in police procedures. There are things as the previous speaker Tim Groser has outlined that are done under foreign affairs protocol and international convention but I will come to those in due course as well.One fact that is clear is that a 35-year-old man who has now been named was arrested in the Wellington suburb of Brooklyn on 9 May after he followed a 21-year-old woman. The following day he was charged with assault with intent to rape and burglary. So he has been charged. Then he claimed diplomatic immunity and skipped the country. This has happened before. I remember an occasion when a diplomatic staffer—I think he was under the influence of alcohol—killed a New Zealander with his car. He immediately applied for diplomatic immunity and skipped the country.New Zealanders do not like it. New Zealanders do not like it when people are not brought to justice for alleged crimes. I do not wish to stray into the judicial process but the point here is that diplomatic immunity with all its convention and its history is not a carte blanche for every diplomatic staffer to career around the country without regard for the laws of that host country. Every diplomatic staffer understands that. Every diplomatic person understands that.I feel for the Malaysian High Commissioner. I feel for Malaysia in this. They will be mortified. They will be mortified at this man’s alleged behaviour. But for the Malaysian Government to have received mixed messages from New Zealand about whether we wanted immunity waived whether we thought there was a sufficient trade-off by subjecting the man to a military court martial in his own country is the fault of this Government. This is the fault of the Government and this is what we are railing against. How could mixed messages possibly have gone to a country with which we have had a longstanding very strong and deep relationship?We understand the justice processes in Malaysia; they understand ours. We respect each other’s justice processes but for them to have been given the impression that we would forgo justice in our country for the young woman at the heart of this alleged crime in exchange for a court martial process in Malaysia should not have occurred. The Minister should have been getting weekly briefings on this. There has been a 6-week gap between cup and lip in this case—a 6-week gap. Why was this not coming up in weekly briefings—in weekly briefings—to the Minister? And for the Minister to confuse this issue with the case of Maurice Williamson is absolutely specious.There are things that can be done and are legitimately done like applying for a waiver of diplomatic immunity that should have been done in a clear-cut way in this instance. It has been done before; it can be done again. So let us not have any of that silly nonsense of pretending that Ministers are interfering with police process. We understand what the police process has been. We would like to see justice effected for this woman here in New Zealand.