O'Connor Damien: Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Connor Damien: Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 27 August 2013. Volume:693;Page:13093. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Labour—West Coast - Tasman): I appreciate the member over there John Hayes and with all due respect to him if you ever wanted to get a classic Tory speech then that is it. Obviously the research unit has once again dragged out the template—dragged out the template—and given it him. I know that the member over there is far better than that speech but it is a classic Tory speech: the cost of everything and the value of nothing. Here is the point. We support this piece of legislation. In fact we developed the concept of one hub for information sharing. We did so on the basis of our border systems being more effective but this National Government has come in and said: “Oh we want them to be more efficient so we will focus on the $45 million that’s going to be saved every year.” Well good luck to it. It has saved $26 million in the cost of the Ministry for Primary Industries too. We are now starting to see the value that is being destroyed from an ideologically drivenGovernment that wants to drive down the investment drive down the cost and forget the value of what we are doing here.We support this bill and the concept of it. It is just about evolving technology. It is about sharing information but being more effective. Efficiency is a great objective but it should not necessarily be the sole objective particularly when it comes to the issue of border protection for trade coming in and out of this country so as to ensure our reputation for outgoing goods or our biosecurity for incoming goods the value of which we cannot calculate. We cannot calculate the lost value of our reputation through the latest debacle over meat and dairy exports. We will be a long time trying to calculate the cost of that in the same way that if we let into this country any major biosecurity incursion we do not know what that will do to this country. The Government might try to establish the cost of it but the value of having proper border security and proper customs security is something difficult to calculate over the long term. The Government has worked out $45 million a year in the same way that it could say that it saved $260 million over 10 years from driving efficiency in the Ministry for Primary Industries. Well we are now starting to see the cost of that. Ask exporters of our food products what is going to be the lost value for them in the marketplace of the massive botch-up that we have seen over dairy and over meat.The point is that the Border Processing (Trade Single Window and Duties) Bill that we are discussing here is a good objective and a good exercise but if it is driven by just ideology and efficiency and not driven to give us a more effective system of border protection and protection of our country from unwanted goods then I suggest that the Government has got it wrong. We have seen its consistent approach to that. The first Budget we had in terms of border security was a cut to biosecurity of $2 million the loss of 48 front-line jobs and a squeeze on a large number of other Government agencies. That is what the Government was doing to give efficiency but at a big cost to effectiveness. We are starting to see that roll out. We have hadPsa we have had the large white butterfly and we have had varroa. We have just recently seen that scorpions have been brought into this country. So clearly the system is not effective enough.Hon Phil Goff: It’s just the Prime Minister masquerading as a scorpion.Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR: Well that is true. The Government has got a few scorpions over there now and there will be a few more stings coming for the poor average Kiwi worker in the months to come if we allow it to get away with what it wants to.I will come back to the bill before us and say that conceptually this is the right thing to do. The bill in principle is the right thing to do. We are just simply aligning the information database and platform so that we can check and investigate. But let us not forget what is actually being done at the moment which is a systems analysis and the sharing of this information will allow that to develop further. We are not checking people more closely we are not checking goods more closely we are just putting in place better systems or so we are told—better systems with less money so we are told; more efficient we are told. What I want to know is whether they are going to be effective. Are we going to correctly identify through the new efficient systems where there is real risk to this country. The performance of border management agencies—I applaud them for identifying and capturing some drugs hauls. This is no reflection on the front-line staff but I get emails from biosecurity staff who have walked from the job because they cannot ethically remain in place knowing they are not doing what they should be able to do and what they need to do.There is a compromise here and my concern is that in the drive for efficiency which the Government is determined to undertake at every level of Government responsibilitythe effectiveness of the systems is being undermined. The Trade Single Window that we are aiming to have there—a bit like the SmartGate system for individual travellers—poses huge risks for us long term if not properly resourced and if we do not have the investment in the best technology. I see what we are exposing now is that in the area of trade certification and clearance the reality is—in spite of the Ministers over there cutting funding and continuing to get up on their hind legs and say: “We have the world’s best practice. We have the world’s best systems.”—that we do not. We need more investment in the area of border protection. If as in a couple of other bills being passed through this House under urgency the objective of the Government is to have them fiscally neutral then what we are doing here is maybe improving the database but if we do not have the resources to go with it we will not have a more effective or better system in place. That is what Labour supports—moving to a more effective system of border processing but keeping in mind our ultimate objective and that is protecting us from unwanted goods or persons or products or organisms.We have a huge advantage internationally through our reputation the value of which is impossible to calculate and the cost of which this Government drives down every single day. It thinks driving down the costs is going to give us better outcomes. That is a dangerous strategy to undertake and I say to the members getting up and saying that this is going to save $450 million etc. etc. and put more money back into the pockets of people—ask the exporters what the cost is of the latest debacle around dairy and ask the exporters what the latest cost is of the debacle around meat and you very quickly get to tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars. The projected savings quickly disappear if we do not end up with a more effective system not just a more efficient system. I know there are members over there scratching their heads saying “What’s the difference?” because they have never heard of that but hopefully they will take time to reflect. I know maybe the next speaker might explain that. It is time to reflect on the reality that effectiveness is more important than efficiency. When it comes to our reputation when it comes to our border protection and to this current privileged position we have where we have relatively low disease rates and a reasonably safe uncorrupted healthy environment we do not want that compromised by an ineffective system.