Williams Poto: Passports Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeWilliams Poto: Passports Amendment Bill (No 2) — Second Reading[Sitting date: 10 September 2015. Volume:708;Page:6561. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]POTO WILLIAMS (Labour—Christchurch East): Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker for the opportunity to take a call on the Passports Amendment Bill (No 2). When we were last in the House debating this bill I recall my colleague Adrian Rurawhe referring to New Zealand passports as taonga and I recall commenting on that at the time. New Zealand passports are taonga. The value of a New Zealand passport on the international stage cannot be diminished. We have a reputation in this country for being good global citizens and having a sense of responsibility to our fellow global citizens. Our passports are valued in that regard. Our New Zealand passports actually permit us to travel with relative ease around the globe given that they are held in such high regard. New Zealand is considered a safe and secure country so it is right and proper that we acknowledge the significance that we hold as New Zealanders carrying New Zealand passports.When we were previously talking about this the member for Invercargill did make a comment about the huge inconvenience in having to renew your passport every 5 years. I think as I recall it the statement was something like—and I am paraphrasing—it being the “worst thing ever” to have to renew your passport every 5 years. I think that if you put that alongside—Hon Ruth Dyson: First World problems.POTO WILLIAMS: —house price inflation in Auckland the number of children living in poverty and the fact that our health and safety laws in this country mean that you cannot be guaranteed to go to work and come home safe I think yes having a 5-year passport and the inconvenience of having to renew it every 5 years is right up there with that! As my colleague says that is a First World problem.I do want to commend my colleagues the Hon Phil Goff and the Hon Trevor Mallard for their campaign to increase the expiry time of a passport to 10 years so thank you very much for bringing that to the House’s attention. Thank you to the Government for actually taking on what is a very good idea and my acknowledgments to the Government Administration Committee for the hard work that it has been doing on this piece of legislation. There has been a bit of public pressure to ensure that we can now have 10-year passports instead of 5-year passports.I know that it is inconvenient especially to certain people in Invercargill to renew their passports every 5 years. The reason we actually had 5-year passports in the first place was in some part a result of what happened on 9/11 but technology and the ability to track individuals has advanced since those times. We now have amazing technology with our passports which means that we no longer have the requirement to renew them so frequently. But that increase in technology also creates an issue which I think was acknowledged and discussed in the select committee in that technology does move on and having a 10-year passport may mean that we are no longer using the latest technology to protect the holders of those passports.I do want to make a comment on the bill not requiring the physical copy of your passport to be handed in in order to have it cancelled. That could potentially pose some problems. If we cancel passports electronically but do not have the physical document there may be an opportunity to use that document in a fraudulent way.I do not think there is much more to say on this bill. We do support it and I commend it to the House. Thank you.