Locke Keith: Immigration Bill — In Committee 
Locke Keith: Immigration Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:657;Page:6692] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 It has been quite useful to listen to the tales from Lianne Dalziel and others on the immigration cases that come before us. I think one thing that humanises all members of Parliament is that each of us has immigration cases. We all have to show our real compassion when dealing with those cases and when making our submissions on them we have to try to get the Associate Minister of Immigration to show that compassion. 
I think that in the case of clause 52 which has been referred to by other speakers it is very useful to take into account the many varied circumstances that people and families find themselves in. Unfortunately that seems to be a little countered from another direction in the New Zealand Immigration Service and that is through the immigration profiling group which seems to go to great lengths holding up a lot of quite valid cases for temporary visas or other visas. Although it is very good to have this provision on exceptional circumstances in clause 52 it really should not be up to the Minister to correct so many wrong decisions of the New Zealand Immigration Service. 
The other type of visa I would like to talk about a little bit and which is included in Part 3 is the transit visa. I think New Zealand has got a bit carried away with transit visa procedures over the last little while and that is upsetting many people particularly in the Indian community. There are a whole range of countries particularly richer countries whose citizens have visa-free entry to New Zealand and therefore can arrive and just come in. 
Transit through New Zealand does not create a problem if someone is coming from Europe and stopping off in New Zealand before they go off to Niue Fiji or wherever. But it is a particular problem for people from some other countries such as India where people now have to trot down to the high commission in New Delhi or wherever to get a transit visa just to be able to sit for one hour in a lounge at Auckland Airport having come in on a plane that happens to stop in Auckland on its way to Niue Cook Islands or wherever it might be. It is just bureaucratic madness really. There might be a very slight security ground for it but I think we must have a balanced system of procedures and must not exaggerate threats. So the procedures for transit visas are creating a problem. 
In respect of temporary visas it is true that often people do not understand quite what a temporary visa is. But that being said I think that about 180000 people are here on work visas and only a smaller proportion of them are on work-to-residence visas. A lot of those people have their whole family with them. They have come over here to try to start a new life and they think their skills are needed here. When they have employment they have a future ahead of them; then all of a sudden there is a bit of a recession they get laid off and—bang—they are kicked out. 
I think the Government and the Minister should put in place systems to cater for the recession so that people can have extensions particularly people who have been here for a while on work visas. That is another side of our compassion and it has a practical use too because when there is a bit of an upturn all of a sudden we turn around and say: “We need these skilled people. Where are they? Oh they’ve disappeared overseas; we kicked them out.” Working out ways to allow more skilled people to stay here is quite useful. Thank you.