Bennett David: Immigration Bill — Second Reading 
Bennett David: Immigration Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:652;Page:1603] 
DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East) 
: 
 It gives us great pleasure to put forward the Immigration Bill which was started under the Labour Government in the previous term of Parliament. I pay due respect to the Hon Mark Gosche who was the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee chair we served under. He did a very good job of taking this legislation through to the stage we are at now. In that process a number of changes were made on the basis of some reforms that both sides of the House thought were applicable and in the best interests of New Zealanders and our New Zealand immigration system. 
It is important to remember that this bill is very much a procedural bill. Although it is one of the largest bills that we would deal with in a normal sitting it is simply procedural. When people talk about immigration they talk about the issues of who comes to New Zealand how many people come to New Zealand and under what criteria they come. This bill is not necessarily about that. It sets out the procedures for immigration cases it sets out some of the visa requirements it sets out some of the appeal processes and it sets out provisions for people to make an appeal against a judgment made in their particular case. So it is not legislation about which one can use the fear tactics of saying that it is about how many people come into New Zealand or who we do not let into this country as the Greens have just said it is. It is not about that. In fact this bill is about procedural aspects; is about making immigration law something that is effective. 
It has been long overdue. Many years have gone by without these kinds of reforms being introduced. Our immigration legislation was a hotchpotch of basic laws that had been put together and amended over time. It was due for a major reform which was started under the previous Government. The National Government has completed it in this term. 
I pay tribute to the Hon Dr Lockwood Smith. He was a very important part of that because as our immigration spokesperson Lockwood had a keen interest in this legislation. We made it quite clear from the first stages of the select committee process that we would work constructively to get a solution that would be in the best interests of all New Zealanders and that would be passed through Parliament whatever the result of the general election. That is why we did not see Labour promote the passage of this legislation before the last general election; its members knew that the bill had cross-party support. There was agreement between the parties that essentially the nuts and bolts of this legislation would be passed at some later date. 
When we look at the legislation we see some key points that need to be highlighted. These are points that the select committee made a numbers of changes to. One point was the use of biometric information in decision making. If people have travelled to America they will know that as soon as people get to the airport they undergo retina scanning which is now common in New Zealand international airports as well. We were a little bit behind the game in terms of that information about individuals. We were not storing the information that some other countries stored. It was a matter of amending our laws to take into account technological advances and how we store information on people who arrive in our country. Biometric information is very important and will be more crucial as we go forward with technological advancements in visa processing entry processes passports and identification. It is a matter of the New Zealand system catching up and of making sure that we have legislation that supports a more robust system of identification of people coming into the country. 
Another big issue in the legislation is classified information which is information that highlights or flags some kind of problem that may be perceived in terms of an individual who is coming into the country. In many cases it is something that other Governments have notified us about or that we see as a potential risk. The issue of classified information was part of the Zaoui case which a Green Party member talked about in the previous speech and it is also related to some of the other changes in the legislation around special advocates and suchlike. Essentially we were looking at a system where that information could still have an element of secrecy so that people would not be able to publicise it widely where there would be some privacy issues involved around how that information is distributed and where anyone who comes into New Zealand in unusual circumstances who has been identified as having a problem is given a fair go. In many cases those problems are very easily sorted out and the individual does not become a problem or go through to further levels of our system. However in some cases they do. In those cases we need to make sure that we have that information in a manner such that it is not necessarily in the public domain so that it cannot be blown out of proportion as has happened in some cases but can be used by the relevant authorities to make decisions based on the facts and what has actually been provided not on the basis of the coverage that a case has got through being publicised in the media. Those are the important changes to clauses 30 to 32 in regard to classified information. 
Another big change was in regard to special advocates. This is where we need to put some realism into what the Green Party has been talking about. The Zaoui case was a very public case in New Zealand and it was probably one of the biggest migration cases that we had seen in recent years from a publicity point of view. It went through a number of court challenges and a quite detailed process. It probably needed the Government to take a firmer hand in the initial stages and to make a decision rather than it allowing it to drag on and be played out through the court system as it was. Mr Zaoui’s lawyers were very active participants in the select committee process. They made numerous submissions and they raised some very important points that were incorporated into this legislation. So people cannot say that this legislation is necessarily detrimental for somebody in Mr Zaoui’s situation. In fact many of the points that his advocates had raised were incorporated into the legislation—not everything but they were looking at it from one extreme. We had the point of view that the Government has to look after its boundaries and borders and to make sure that we have some control over people who come into the country. But we need to do that in a manner that gives everybody the ability to be heard and that is not detrimental to human rights. So the role of special advocate was very important. 
Let us look at another big part of the bill the universal visa system. For a number of years additions have been made to our basic visa system. We have added a couple of new categories of visa over time. Well it really needed to be rationalised. We needed a visa system that was much simpler and could be easily followed by not only those who were entering the country but also those administering the laws through the Immigration Service. Part 3 goes through the visa requirements. It sets up a much simpler system for New Zealand visas so that people coming into this country will be well aware of what their opportunities are and what the visa categories are. Clauses 120 and 121 deal with visa requirements. 
Another big part of the bill deals the appeals process. Through the system having been built up over many years the appeals process was very complicated in that there were a series of different appeal processes. That overcomplication of the system meant that it was very difficult to follow for the appellant and also the Immigration Service found it very difficult to go through the process. We needed a satisfactory result and we have it through the changes made to the appeals process. 
In summary this legislation is a reflection of the need to reform law made over a number of years.