Norman Russel: Urgent Debates — Government Communications Security Bureau—Review of ComplianceText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeNorman Russel: Urgent Debates — Government Communications Security Bureau—Review of Compliance[Sitting date: 10 April 2013. Volume:689;Page:9220. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Dr RUSSEL NORMAN (Co-Leader—Green): I rise on behalf of the Green Party to speak in this urgent debate related to the Kitteridge report on the Government Communications Security Bureau. The Government Communications Security Bureau is a very unusual agency in New Zealand. To some extent it is under the control of the New Zealand Government and to some extent it is not and that is I think where a lot of the problem arises.I think it is pretty illuminating as a starting point to quote from David Lange. David Lange was the Prime Minister of course and was responsible for the Government Communications Security Bureau some years ago. When Nicky Hager wrote his bookSecret Power exposing the role of the bureau David Lange had this to say in the preface that he wrote for the book. He said about the satellite station at Waihopai that the bureau built—that the New Zealand Government built—“We even went the length of building a satellite station at Waihopai. But it was not until I read this book that I had any idea that we had been committed to an international integrated electronic network.”So the Prime Minister of New Zealand who was responsible for the Government Communications Security Bureau at the time the Waihopai spying station was built had no idea what the purpose of the station was. The bureau did not tell him because it is a secretive agency that works mostly for the US spy agencies rather than for the New Zealand Government. And that is just a fact.The thing that Mr Lange went on to say in this book was that “… an astonishing number of people have told him”—that is Nicky Hager—“things that I as Prime Minister in charge of the intelligence services was never told.” The Prime Minister was kept in the dark. David Lange went on to say that “… it is an outrage that I and other ministers were told so little and this raises the question of to whom those concerned saw themselves ultimately answerable.” The truth is of course that the Government Communications Security Bureau sees itself as ultimately answerable to the US spyagencies and that is the problem: the Government Communications Security Bureau is a rogue agency. It does not report to anybody.The Prime Minister does not know what is going on at the Government Communications Security Bureau as the report illustrates. The bureau acts illegally as the report illustrates—that is as I think Bill English was just saying it did not pay very close attention to its compliance with the law. To put it mildly it acted illegally.It is an agency that does not really have any parliamentary oversight. There is no parliamentary committee that looks over the intelligence services. There is the Intelligence and Security Committee but it does not have any power to see what the bureau is doing. There is the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security who has a woeful record of not providing any proper oversight of what the SIS and the Government Communications Security Bureau are up to and it means that the bureau and the SIS are free to do as they want. And what they want to do is engage in unlawful activities it turns out as we have discovered from this report.The reason why this matters so much is that it goes to the heart of fundamental rights and freedoms for New Zealanders. When you think about it do you want to live in a society where you have these rogue State agencies looking at all of your emails and you have these rogue State agencies opening all of your correspondence spying on you listening to all of your phone calls monitoring all of your internet use and breaking into your house and putting bugs in your house? These are the activities that these agencies undertake lawfully or unlawfully. These are the kinds of activities that the Government Communications Security Bureau and the SIS actually do.So ordinary New Zealanders if you were to think about it what kind of bar would you have that would make it acceptable for the State to so breach your fundamental rights and freedoms that the State could break into your house and put a bug in your house and the State could monitor all of your emails and all your conversations on the telephone? The bar has to be very very high if you are to let the State engage in those kinds of activities. The problem is that because nobody is watching what the Government Communications Security Bureau and the SIS get up to nobody knows whether the bar is being met for SIS and bureau activities.There is insufficient oversight as this report amply demonstrates to double-check on the people who are supposed to be watching. There is a Minister in theory who is supposed to be watching what goes on inside the Government Communications Security Bureau and the SIS. The Minister is clearly either asleep at the wheel or just does not care what is going on inside the bureau and the SIS and is letting them get on with their business. From my point of view when you are talking about fundamental rights and freedoms having a Prime Minister who is asleep at the wheel in his job as the only democratic official having oversight over the Government Communications Security Bureau and the SIS is unacceptable. There is only one democratically elected official who has oversight over the security agencies and that is the Prime Minister and the Prime Minister has manifestly failed to do his job. That is his job and he has completely failed to do it.Obviously the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security has failed to do his job as well. There is no question about that. It is as plain as day.This also cuts to the Prime Minister’s role as the head of the SIS and not only the SIS but also the Government Communications Security Bureau. Let us remember that the interception warrants that were signed off so that the illegal activities that the bureau did could take place were signed by John Key. John Key signed the interception warrants as the Minister in charge of the NZ Security Intelligence Service and then the other ministry that he is responsible for illegally implemented those interception warrants.Hon Gerry Brownlee: How many of the 88 were signed by Helen Clark? That was OK was it?Dr RUSSEL NORMAN: That is the basic truth. Now we hear the shouting from the Minister who does not like the truth as usual. But I am sorry Mr Gerry Brownlee it is just the fact that is in the report. It is simply in the report that the Prime Minister signed the interception warrants that were illegally implemented by the bureau. You do not like it but it happens to be true. So the Prime Minister—Hon Gerry Brownlee: I didn’t like it when Helen Clark did it either.Dr RUSSEL NORMAN: Mr Gerry Brownlee brings up the previous Government. I fully agree that the previous Government was as culpable because it put through the legislation which the National Party supported. It put through the legislation as did the National Party. It supported it. You voted for it did you not Mr Brownlee?Mr SPEAKER: Order! Do not bring me into the debate.Dr RUSSEL NORMAN: Yes that member voted for it. So the National Party voted for the legislation as well as the Labour Government which pushed it through even though the Green Party at the time warned that if you set up spying agencies that do not have oversight they will abuse their rights—and it has become so. What this report shows is that if you set up an agency like this that does not have proper oversight it will abuse its rights. That is exactly what it has done—abuse the rights and freedoms of New Zealanders rather than protect them—and that is a tragedy.I was saddened to hear the Deputy Prime Minister criticise section 14 of the Government Communications Security Bureau Act and I think it is important to read out section 14 “Interceptions not to target domestic communications”. It states: “Neither the Director nor an employee of the Bureau nor a person acting on behalf of the Bureau may authorise or take any action for the purpose of intercepting the communications of a person … who is a New Zealand citizen or a permanent resident.” Parliament chose to put a very clear legislative direction in place. It is in black and white. The Government Communications Security Bureau and the National Party come along now and say that it is not very clear. For anyone reading this section of the Act it is patently clear that what the bureau did was illegal and unlawful. It is in black and white. You have only to read the Act. Parliament purposefully chose to constrain the bureau and prevent it from spying on New Zealanders and then while John Key was supposed to be providing protection the bureau went ahead and spied on New Zealanders and broke the law.So it seems to me that we need a fundamental reform of the oversight of these agencies and the agencies themselves. If we are to have these kinds of Draconian authoritarian dictatorial powers in the hands of a State agency that breaches the highest levels of our rights and our freedoms then there needs to be very strong oversight. There needs to be very powerful justification for any agency to exercise these kinds of powers and there needs to be very powerful oversight. So far we have not had that oversight and—surprise surprise—the agency which is not being monitored by the democratically elected officials who have that job has abused its power and acted illegally to spy on New Zealanders in spite of that.It seems to me that if we are to protect freedom and democracy in our society we have to keep the spy agencies in check in order to protect those fundamental rights and freedoms. The present Government has clearly failed to do that and based on this report it clearly appears that the previous Government failed to do that—to keep the spy agencies in check. The Green Party will keep pushing to make sure that that happens.