Dean Jacqui: Harmful Digital Communications Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeDean Jacqui: Harmful Digital Communications Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 23 June 2015. Volume:706;Page:4646. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JACQUI DEAN (National—Waitaki):One of the things I am quite certain that the whole Committee will agree on in this bill although I am sure there will be points of disagreement is that we wish to protect particularly our young people from harm in what is becoming an increasingly complex and fast-moving digital world. A number of aspects of this bill do directly address the impacts of cyber-bullying on young people and it is that one point the principle behind this bill and the very reason for this bill that I am sure we will all find agreement on. I doubt that there will be—and I would expect that there will not be—a dissenting voice amongst all the parents aunties uncles and grandparents gathered in this Parliament and all around New Zealand who take an interest in these things including our teachers and school principals and anybody who has stewardship for a time over children.It is interesting that this bill comes as a result of work by the Law Commission back in 2012 which was asked by the then Minister of Justice to look into the quickly evolving world of cyber-bullying and the terrible impact it was having particularly on young people. If you reflect on the Law Commission’s work it started back in 2012 and here we are in the middle of 2015. I am quite sure the device I am using now is eons more capable of transmitting all sorts of things be they messages videos or pictures than even 3 or 4 years ago. Many many of these devices that we use mostly as a work tool are used also by many people in society mostly for exchange of good communication but not always.Also with your indulgence if I might just very briefly widen out the conversation a little to reflect on what is happening in terms of the cyberconversation about a political party not represented in this Parliament that started with a press release or a press conference and has exponentially exploded into cyberspace. It just goes to show how very quickly things can move these days and once something is committed to the internet via Twitter or Facebook or any form of communication it is there—it does not go away—and that is what a number of young people have discovered to their cost. If you look through Facebook and see some pictures perhaps of young people having fun at a party you would think: “Oh OK.” but it is not so good when you are going to apply for your first job after you have done your degree and your employer or their agent goes through and just has a look at you and your online profile. You might then start to think: “Perhaps there are some things I did—it’s fine I did them but they should not necessarily have ended up online.” That is the genesis of this bill.I was not part of the consideration of this bill by the then Justice and Electoral Committee but I have read carefully the recommended changes that were proposed by the previous select committee and I will start going through them—we have only 5-minute calls in this part of the debate. There are some clarifications and changes suggested by the select committee and also further changes suggested by the Minister which I am sure will also be talked about. There are some pretty basic tidy-ups that the committee did and I commend the previous committee for its diligence and the fact that its members obviously listened to submitters who came to the committee and pointed out perhaps some degree of looseness in some of the provisions.The first one I am going to mention is inserting the same definition of an internet protocol address provider into the bill as exists in the Copyright Act 1994. Of course this means that the definition of an internet protocol address provider will be explicitly included in the bill whereas before as the bill was introduced to the House that was not necessarily explicit. There will be a subclause inserted into the bill to allow the District Court to be able to make an order against an internet protocol address provider to release the identity of an anonymous person’s account to the court. Thank you.