Goff Phil: Passports Amendment Bill Customs and Excise Amendment Bill New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill — Third ReadingsText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeGoff Phil: Passports Amendment Bill Customs and Excise Amendment Bill New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill — Third Readings[Sitting date: 09 December 2014. Volume:702;Page:1260. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill):Two weeks ago we embarked on the process of considering a piece of legislation that was frankly unbalanced. It failed to get the balance right between our responsibility as a Parliament to keep New Zealanders safe and equally our responsibility as a Parliament to ensure that we do not allow unnecessary and unwarranted intrusion into the private affairs of New Zealanders or cut across their basic rights. The process frankly began as a travesty. To get legislation through in 2 weeks with just 2 days for New Zealanders to prepare and give submissions to the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee was appalling. I hope that that never happens again. But I want to pay tribute to all members on the committee who tried to make the best they could of the situation.When we first met with officials—and I also want to acknowledge the role of officials—we asked that the legislation be given as early as possible to key organisations and we demanded that if any cooperation was expected from Labour there had to be a process of hearing submissions. That happened before the bill was introduced. I will give credit to the Minister in charge of the NZ Security Intelligence Service; he listened to the points that we made. The committee members worked really hard right through Thursday Friday night Saturday morning Monday and Monday night. We tried to do justice to the New Zealanders who wanted to be heard. I know that the Minister deeply regrets his comments about “chit chat” and he apologised for them—and I always welcome an apology. We are still waiting for John Key’s apology for the misuse of the SIS for political reasons but we have at least an apology from the Minister. I give him credit for that.The process of submissions was really important. We heard very strong submissions from the Legislation Advisory Committee the Privacy Commissioner and the New Zealand Law Society. And we heard compelling submissions from New Zealanders many of whom had never before in their lives made a submission to a select committee. Labour did something that was fairly unprecedented as well: David Shearer and I produced a paper for the select committee. We went through the Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill part by part and we said which amendments we felt were necessary for this legislation to be acceptable and for it to get our support. I have a copy of the paper in my hand here. It is quite an interesting read. If this were an exam I think we would get 95 percent. I would always prefer 100 percent but we will settle for 95 percent. We got that because the Government was prepared to entertain arguments that said this legislation goes too far that it is not balanced and that it needs changing.I think the overriding argument was that if there was an argument for this legislation at all under that sort of urgency it was for a very narrow range of threats that were posed by an emerging organisation called the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). Yet the bill as introduced was going to give powers that encompassed the wider scope of the SIS’s authority. I think the most significant achievement of the committee was to narrow the scope of the additional powers of visual surveillance and warrantless emergency surveillance only to those matters that pertained to a terrorist threat. If that was the justification for bringing in the legislation in the manner it was introduced then that was what the bill should be confined to. The Law Society and the Legislation Advisory Committee headed up by the president of the Law Commission Sir Grant Hammond both said that the threshold for visual surveillance which is incredibly intrusive and for unwarranted emergency surveillance which was an unprecedented granting of power to the SIS was much lower for the SIS than parallel powers were for the police. The police powers were specific and focused on serious crime meriting prison sentences of 14 years or more. The Security Intelligence Service’s powers were very broad based on the gathering of intelligence. So we pulled back the powers that we deemed unacceptable.I think that when the Government does its review next year it needs to consider very seriously whether it wants to broaden those powers or whether we should keep the powers of the SIS as narrow as they can be while it carries out the vital function of providing intelligence information that might pre-empt any terrorist attack. We do not believe in having a surveillance society; we believe in giving the Security Intelligence Service the powers that it needs to protect us and no more. That is a really important principle that we need to consider.We considered the question of passports. Under our New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights there is a fundamental human right called the freedom of movement—people can come to and leave their country without unnecessary restrictions. We accepted that there are people in New Zealand for whom that right to freedom of movement needs to be curtailed because their declared intention is to fight for an organisation committing crimes against humanity and war crimes. I accept that. I accept that we have an obligation under United Nations Security Resolution 2178 to do what we can to stop people from contributing their manpower to a terrorist organisation that I am utterly opposed to. But what I do not accept is that we should take that curtailment of a fundamental human right the freedom to travel and cover other areas where we think it is unwise that a New Zealander goes to—for example New Zealand Syrians wanting to go to Syria to fight for the Free Syrian Army against al-Assad or members of the New Zealand Kurdish community who might go to join the Peshmerga against ISIS. But actually we do not have the right to stop them in those instances just as a generation ago we did not stop those men who went to fight against fascism and Franco in Spain. That was unpopular at the time but within a couple of years we recognised that what they were doing was the right thing.The 5 percent of changes Labour did not get included the extension of the 3-year period when you can withhold a passport. We learnt at the committee—and the Minister repeated it in the House—that there have been nine passports I think removed from people since 2010. That is a very small number of people. Not one of those people has applied to get their passport back and if they did the Minister of Internal Affairs would have the power to decline them for another year and the year after that. So what we did not accept was that there was an argument under this form of urgency to withhold passports for a full 3-year period after the first year and I remain unconvinced of that.We also got the changes to the amendments to the Customs and Excise Act that the Privacy Commissioner had recommended. His involvement in the process should have the effect of ensuring that those powers are not misused and that access to data is restricted to the same data that the Customs Service staff themselves have and not beyond that.So when I look down the list of our recommendations we achieved just about everything that we wanted to in terms of changing the bill and it would have been churlish of us having got the changes that we said were minimally necessary to make it acceptable to then not accept the bill. This legislation comes out of this House—and I think that all of my colleagues on the committee will agree with this—in a better state than it came into the House and that was vital.I want to make a couple of general points. The real protections against terrorism lie not in legislation—although this legislation may help—but in having a harmonious and inclusive society; they lie in our moderate Muslim community which is responsible and does the right thing; and they lie in our reputation internationally as a country that acts independently and has a sense of good international citizenship. During the course of this debate there have been things that have worried me. On a Q+A programme I listened to Stephen Franks—a former member of the ACT Party and still a National Party member I think—saying that we should not be bringing people in from Pakistan. I know that Kanwaljit Bakshi would not agree with that. That is a racist comment that casts a slur across an entire community because one or two people might be miscreants. I heard the Prime Minister talking about there being beheadings in the street—I hope that he has reconsidered saying that; it was a foolish and unwise thing to talk about—and I know of the sort of fear that that engendered. I heard the New Zealand First Party talking about it being a mistake to bring people in from the Middle East when some of us have got many people from the Middle East—Ron Mark: No I didn’t say that. Tell the truth.Hon PHIL GOFF: Read the Hansard Mr Mark and you will see it. We all heard it. David Bennett heard it because he followed it up as the next speaker. What I am saying is that we should not cast a slur on any individual because of their ethnicity and their religion. If we can create a decent society that does not marginalise and alienate any of our communities then we will not have the problem of terrorism—Ron Mark: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I am going to say to you Mr Assistant Speaker that I take offence at the allegations and assertions from Mr Goff. I—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): No. [Interruption] The member will sit. [Interruption] Order! This is a debate. It is a strong rebuttal point. Those comments are fairly reflected in this House and I am not upholding your point of order.Hon PHIL GOFF: I want to finish on this point: it is one thing to go through this process and come out with a piece of legislation that is in a more acceptable form but what is critically important is to have in the review that is going to take place a strengthening of the independent powers of the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security and I believe a strengthening of more independent oversight of the Security Intelligence Service by our select committee without the conflict of interest that currently exists there.