Locke Keith: Aviation Security Legislation Bill — Second Reading 
Locke Keith: Aviation Security Legislation Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:641;Page:11505] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party will be supporting the Aviation Security Legislation Bill because a number of its clauses improve security at airports and on aeroplanes. We support the Supplementary Order Paper in the name of the Minister the Hon Harry Duynhoven to stop the portrayal of people in an unclothed state when they pass through the screening devices or in the words of the Supplementary Order Paper an officer may not use “an aid or device that produces an unclothed image of the person.” We certainly support the restriction in terms of that intrusive technology. 
In the first reading the Greens indicated our big concern about the presence of armed air marshals on airplanes or inflight security officers. In the Committee stage we will put forward an amendment to remove any ability for officers on planes to be operationally armed. We want to remove the ability for them to use arms on planes be it local inflight security officers as projected in the bill or foreign inflight security officers—that is those coming in and out of New Zealand airports not necessarily on a flag carrier an Air New Zealand plane. 
In the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee the airline pilots expressed strong concern about provisions to have armed inflight security officers on board. The New Zealand Air Line Pilots’ Association submission talked about “substantial latent risks involved in the ability to deploy inflight security officers on New Zealand - registered aircraft”. It “believes that any time that an armed person or persons board an aircraft the risk of an adverse event occurring is heightened”. It said due consideration must be given to the increased level of risk posed by armed inflight security officers. It says that rather than reducing the risk—and presuming these officers will be regularly on flights as happens in the United States—they actually increase the risk. In oral submissions it was said that although bullets may not necessarily pass through the shell of a plane they could affect the hydraulics and so on that line the plane. So those things could be affected by armaments being used on an aircraft. The association in its submission strongly objected to the deployment of foreign inflight security officers—armed or otherwise—on board any New Zealand - registered aircraft. 
The New Zealand Air Line Pilots’ Association took a fairly strong stand in the select committee and I think we should listen closely to its views. Air New Zealand itself took a strong position too. It was of the view that if there was any security threat to a plane then that plane should stay on the ground. Its written submission stated that Air New Zealand adheres to the principle that the most effective and efficient response to aviation security risks is the quality of protective security measures implemented on the ground that is pre-flight. It further stated that Air New Zealand’s current operational policy is that it would give serious consideration to cancelling any flight for which the security risk was so high that the airline would be required by any Government direction to place inflight security officers on board an aircraft. I think that is the right approach—if in doubt keep the plane on the ground. 
There was also the submission by the Human Rights Commission. It was worried about not only firearms but also Tasers being used on planes. It stated that the commission’s view tended towards the exclusion of Tasers from the weapons available to inflight security officers. So there were quite strong criticisms from a number of submissions about these armed air marshals. 
The Government of course in justifying the provision is trying to have a bob each way. It says to people: “Well we understand your concerns so we won’t put the provision in to authorise an immediate lodging of air marshals on planes but the bill is just future-proofing.” So at some future time if it wants approval to put these armed inflight security officers on a plane be it foreign security officers or domestic officers it can. When we look through the fine print we see that in future the decision would be made by Cabinet. Well we all know that Cabinet meets about once a week so it would not take too much to implement this legislation very quickly without much public discussion. 
There is no requirement for public discussion except for one provision that has been added to the bill. It talks about consultation taking place with people involved in the airline industry about some of these matters. There was a concession that the select committee put in the bill—that there would be some consultation with the industry generally but the specific decisions on particular cases would in fact be made by Cabinet. That is not a terribly good control in the whole situation. 
The other question that the Human Rights Commission raised in its written submission was in relation to security checks. Obviously nobody is objecting to security checks as such and the bill contains some good provisions about people being told they are being subject to security checks and that there is an adverse security check against them. So those people could take the matter a bit further in an appeal process. That was a good provision but as is the case in a number of bits of legislation coming through this House when it is the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service doing the security check and putting a red cross on the person then there is not so much come-back. 
The Human Rights Commission was right to be concerned about that. At least under the bill the person who gets an adverse check will be told whether it was a Security Intelligence Service red cross or whether the red cross came from somewhere else. But that is not the full story. As the Human Rights Commission says there should be the provision of a summary of the information on which the recommendation is based—that is the recommendation from the Security Intelligence Service. The Human Rights Commission was not demanding that the whole of the information be provided by the intelligence agency but the idea of a summary is to give the person so affected some idea of the nature of the accusations so that he or she can say: “Well it is all very well to say that I committed a crime in America some years ago but in fact I have never lived there or been there.” If people have some idea of the nature of the charge they have some ability to rebut it if it is an unjust charge and that is very good. 
I am disappointed that the Human Rights Commission submissions were not fully taken account of by the select committee. The discussion in the select committee was a very serious one. I think that the way in which the Supplementary Order Paper preventing unclothed imaging came out of it was positive but we have some way to go. As I indicated I will be putting forward amendments at the Committee stage to remove the ability to have armed air marshals on our planes or on planes coming in and out of New Zealand. I think that that is what the public wants too. It is dangerous and the dangers outweigh the benefits. I think the airline pilots are right there. There can be all sorts of situations where because these armed security officers will probably be incognito people who might have some dangerous intent will be pretending to be armed inflight security officers. And how would we necessarily tell the difference particularly if flight attendants were in a different part of the aircraft at that particular time? So there are more problems than solutions I think. In the period in which air marshals have been operating in the United States I do not think they have had any great success. Thank you.