Hayes John: Identity Information Confirmation Bill — First Reading 
Hayes John: Identity Information Confirmation Bill — First Reading 
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JOHN HAYES (National—Wairarapa) 
: 
 It is quite distressing that my colleague Keith Locke across the House feels biometrically violated by the Identity Information Confirmation Bill and I hope that it is not too painful. It was interesting that he reflected on the moves by the administration in the UK to dismantle the system just as the Labour Party is quite keen to dismantle recent changes in our economy by introducing capital gains taxes increased tax rates and other things. I suggest to the biometrically violated member that any increases in tax by those people across the House will violate him to a far greater and a far more painful degree. 
I think that my colleague from the Green Party is not thinking very clearly about the work that he has been engaged in this year. He was a member of the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee when we worked very closely with industry in New Zealand particularly the banks to come up with arrangements for strengthening our anti - money-laundering and counterfeiting legislation earlier this year. This particular bill will help to prevent the use of fake identities and as we have discovered in this House even some of our former members have created fake identities. That is absolutely outrageous. 
The bill will extend the use of the web-based Data Validation Service to public and private sector agencies on a strictly need-to-know basis. I do not think that the Green member should feel biometrically violated at all because that information will be used on a strictly need-to-know basis. Agencies—and by “agencies” I am talking about banks for example—will check whether the identity information presented by a customer is consistent with that held by the Department of Internal Affairs through the citizenship register the passports database and the various registers of the Births Deaths and Marriages registry office. 
My Green colleague will remember very specifically that the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act requires all people who go into the bank to conduct a transaction to take photographic identity information with them to prove that they are who they say they are. It is a critically important tool of our society that we have this information available for preventing identity fraud and for reducing compliance costs. 
At the same time I say the Government is mindful of privacy concerns because it does not want anybody to feel biometrically violated. Any agency using the tool must have the consent of customers. People have to agree to this; they cannot just be violated without agreement. Any agency will require individuals to give their permission. The decision as to whether an individual provides his or her identity is left entirely to the individual concerned and if the individual does not do it he or she will not get a bank account. Agencies must also have an alternative process for dealing with people who do not consent to a check by the service. That means that those people are not forced into consenting. 
With those few words I say I totally disagree with the previous speaker Keith Locke and I totally support the clauses of this bill. Thank you.