Macindoe TimHon TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West): Kia ora Madam Deputy Speaker. It isn't often that I find myself endorsing all of the comments of the Hon Ron Mark but on this occasion I'm happy to do so wholeheartedly. May I thank him for his generous acknowledgment at the start of his comments of the fact that this is work that began under the previous Government because for about 20 minutes last year I had the great privilege of being the Minister of Customs—Simon O'Connor: What a 20 minutes—what a 20 minutes. Hon TIM MACINDOE: Thank you Mr O'Connor. Yes it was a very fine 20 minutes. I'll work on the principle that less is more and try to take some credit for this measure. But in all seriousness this was a measure that I and others were working on at this time. There is no question at all that serious drugs such as methamphetamine cocaine and other hard drugs are doing enormous damage in communities the length and breadth of New Zealand. It is incumbent I think upon all of us as members of this House to do everything we can within reasonable parameters to ensure that our authorities have the ability to do the job and to rise to new challenges which are actually increasing almost on a daily basis at the moment. So in the spirit of that generous acknowledgment could I acknowledge the Hon Kris Faafoi who has of course recently taken over the role as Acting Minister of Customs. I wish him well in that role for however long he may hold what is just such a superb portfolio and what a great privilege it was to be the Minister of Customs. Could I acknowledge the Minister for the excellent address that he made in introducing this second reading and say that my only disappointment was that I had so greatly hoped that I would have been the one who would be delivering it but never mind. I shall get over that and move on. I note that the coalition Government has eagerly embraced the bill and they're claiming it as their own and that's fair enough—they are now the Government—but as I say this is a measure that has had its gestation in our time in Government. So I am delighted to see it return to the House having had thorough consideration by the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee. As the Minister who spoke before me has done I too acknowledge my committee colleagues under the excellent chairmanship of the member for Tāmaki Simon O'Connor who has steered this bill through the select committee. I also want to acknowledge the officials who give us always such good advice on that particular committee but also the men and women of the New Zealand Customs Service and the Defence Force who do such an outstanding job in protecting our borders. We cannot overstate how much gratitude we owe them nor can we overstate how well they do their jobs because this is a very serious issue. So I'd just like to pick out a couple of comments—given that this is an interrupted debate and there'll be members of the public who will be listening tonight who won't have heard the speeches last week—just to draw attention again as the Minister did to the fact that the purpose of the bill is to amend the Customs and Excise Act of 2018 and the Misuse of Drugs Act of 1975. People may be surprised to hear it's the Customs and Excise Act of 2018 but we've only just finished that piece of work which also began under the previous National Government and this is an important part of ensuring that the changes in the Customs and Excise Act can work to their best effect. The aim is to provide a clear domestic legislative framework for responding to drug smuggling activity in international waters beyond New Zealand's territorial sea. In years gone by those sorts of incursions were fairly rare. Now they are very common and while we are a small country—in fact because we are a small country—the area of international waters that we have to protect is huge. In fact it is a very daunting task and those who wish to deal in this pernicious trade of smuggling drugs have in some ways quite an easy role because it's so easy for them to detect capture particularly if we can only go out to the edge of our contiguous zone. So I welcome very much the extension of powers that this gives. Monitoring our maritime borders is of course a very challenging area for policing. Drug trafficking by small independent marine craft offers a number of advantages to drug traffickers and criminal groups have the flexibility to manage and disguise the routing and timing of their voyage to avoid official attention. Ships can land at remote locations or mother ships can transfer drugs to smaller craft and that is probably happening right now as we speak in this House. They then bring the drugs to shore and boy it can be a bit like looking for a needle in a haystack. So if detected the traffickers have the option of trying to outrun enforcement vessels—sometimes they have craft that can do that—and they can move outside our country's maritime jurisdiction with relative ease. The aim of this bill is to plug some of those gaps in our legislation because smuggling drugs has always been a great risk to our nation and as I mentioned at the outset probably never more so than it is today. Over the last two years it's become apparent that organised crime groups are employing this option more often. There have been 16 reported seizures of illicit drugs using the mother ship method that I mentioned a moment ago in the South Pacific region with at least four this year alone. So we are talking about a very real serious and increasing problem. Some of those drugs were destined for us here in New Zealand; others were destined for Australia. Because this is a second reading debate I think it's customary and appropriate to acknowledge those who made submissions on the bill and also as I mentioned before the work of the select committee. I do as I say acknowledge the valuable assistance of the officials. We actually received only three submissions on the bill and that is one of them. [Holds up submission] It's admirably brief in its support of the bill and I do commend the submitter and thank him nevertheless for having made it. There's probably not a lot that I can say other than acknowledging he was in support but I would like just to comment briefly on the other two because they came at it from a slightly different perspective. One of those made the point that rather than pursuing this bill the Government should focus on identifying local production of harmful drugs such as methamphetamine and reducing the harms caused. Now it's an interesting point of view and I understood it but nevertheless I think it probably ignored the vital point that here we are talking about how many frankly pretty despicable creatures are out there trying to penetrate our borders. While it's appropriate naturally that we put as many resources as we can into dealing with the drugs once they're here—and the Customs Service and others in the police do a fine job in that regard as well—this is about prevention. It's the fence at the top of the cliff approach which is much much better and a much safer option for everybody. The other submitter who I want to comment on recommended that additional funding should be directed towards enhanced naval combat and offshore patrol capability to ensure New Zealand has the capability to respond to drug smuggling and wider maritime security matters and I'm sure that was a matter that the Minister of Defence in particular took careful note of. We were advised that this particular bill will not substantially increase the demand on the New Zealand Defence Force's resources and I think it's probably encouraging to hear that because the Defence Force already provides support for customs' responses to drug smuggling operations and this is coordinated through the maritime coordination centre. So I just wanted to acknowledge those three submitters and as I say thank them for making their submissions. While we're not actually recommending changes to the bill as a result of them we certainly took careful note of their opinions and we thank them for doing so. As I've mentioned there have been numerous attempts over the last few years to penetrate our borders with this vile trade so what we are looking at here is stepping up efforts offshore to disrupt the flow of illicit drugs through greater collaboration with international partners. In addition to relying on specific intelligence we are also through customs able to monitor vessels approaching New Zealand and to determine suspicious movements. We already do that. This will give them the powers to go further out and to broaden their effectiveness and at the moment there is no legislative basis for them to do that. We're a little bit out of step with some of our other international partners with whom we often compare ourselves and I welcome the fact that this bill is looking to plug that gap. The changes proposed in the Maritime Powers Extension Bill build on the Customs and Excise Bill as I mentioned earlier that was passed earlier this year and will again be a useful tool in the tool box for those who are doing this important work. It's fiendishly difficult but when we look at how serious the problem is of drug abuse is and the distribution of hard drugs which is undermining communities the length and breadth of this country everything that we can do to give our authorities the power to stop that pernicious trade is welcome. I have a personal view that those who smuggle and distribute hard drugs should be treated the same way as murderers because frankly they are destroying lives. They not only destroy the lives of those who receive the drugs but they actually destroy the lives of their families and their communities. So to my mind it is very serious and I strongly welcome this bill.