Robertson Grant: Urgent Debates — Government Communications Security Bureau—Review of ComplianceText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeRobertson Grant: Urgent Debates — Government Communications Security Bureau—Review of Compliance[Sitting date: 10 April 2013. Volume:689;Page:9214. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]GRANT ROBERTSON (Deputy Leader—Labour): I moveThat the House take note of a matter of urgent public importance. New Zealanders can no longer trust John Key. They can no longer trust his word and they can no longer trust that he is acting in the interests of New Zealanders. That is the lesson of Rebecca Kitteridge’s report.John Key knew in July 2012 that New Zealanders may well have been illegally spied upon and he covered up that fact. He stood in front of a press conference in September 2012 and he was asked whether the Kim Dotcom spying was an isolated incident. What he said was: “The advice I have had in 4 years as a Minister is that in no way ever has there been an indication of unlawful spying.” yet he was told in July 2012 that there was a concern about unlawful spying. He covered it up. But what is even worse is that he did nothing about that information. He was given that information in July 2012 and he sat on it.Today in the House Bill English has stood up and said: “Oh no. That’s not what happened.” Well I want to quote to Mr English from John Key’s press statement yesterday: “I was first told of a potential issue in July by GCSB Director Ian Fletcher. Lawyers from GCSB and NZSIS were in correspondence with the Inspector General and Crown Law and I asked Mr Fletcher to keep me informed.” Here is the money shot: “The issue was unresolved …”—the issue was unresolved. So Mr Key knew that there was considerable doubt about whether or not New Zealanders were being spied on illegally and he did nothing. He sat on his hands and allowed New Zealanders to be spied on unlawfully. He is the first Prime Minister to have had that drawn to his attention and he did nothing. The question for Mr Key and Mr English is: how much of that spying went on after July? How much of that spying went on when the Prime Minister had been informed?New Zealanders have been let down time and again by this Government and by this Prime Minister. On every aspect of this issue—the issue of the Government Communications Security Bureau and Kim Dotcom—John Key has had to be dragged up to give us information to give New Zealanders information about how their spy agency is operating. Time and again he has left out details has forgotten information and has been unable to recall briefings. That is not acceptable.We rely on Mr Key as the Minister responsible for the GCSB to be on top of his job and to know what is happening in his job and he has failed. He has covered up and he has failed to manage the bureau in the interests of New Zealanders. He has let New Zealanders down when it comes to his management. His oversight of this agency is lax at best and deliberately misleading at worst. The bureau operates in a space where the fundamental freedoms of New Zealanders are in question—whether or not people will be spied upon—and Mr Key has been lax enough in his oversight that when he was told in July 2012 that the spying may well be unlawful he did nothing. He sat on his hands and he allowed New Zealanders to be spied on unlawfully. He is not up to being the Minister responsible for the GCSB. He has let New Zealanders down. New Zealanders do not know whether they can trust their Prime Minister and there is not much worse than that.But we need to go back a step in this because this fits into the whole Government Communications Security Bureau - Kim Dotcom debacle. It is important to go step by step through the Prime Minister’s role and the extent to which he has been prepared to cover up what has happened here. In 2011 the United States authorities were working with the New Zealand Government on the idea of being able to arrest Kim Dotcom. In December 2011 and January 2012 the Organised and Financial Crime Agency of New Zealand and the Government Communications Security Bureau were monitoring Kim Dotcom. We know that—it has come out. They discussed his residency status.In February 2012 Ian Fletcher came in as Director-General of the Government Communications Security Bureau—and I am going to return to that appointment shortly. On 16 February Ian Fletcher attended a debriefing meeting about the Kim Dotcom raids.Hon John Banks: When?GRANT ROBERTSON: On 16 February. At that meeting Mr Dotcom’s residency status was raised and we know from court affidavits that immediately after that point the bureau believed that the spying was unlawful.On 22 February bureau staff wrote that they believed that the spying was unlawful and we have been asked to believe time and again that Ian Fletcher did not think that this was important enough to talk to John Key about in the numerous meetings that he held with him. Magically 5 days after this someone fathomed up some legal advice to say that actually it was lawful after all. There were five different versions of that legal advice in those 5 days. We have not had access to that because that material was deemed by Chris Finlayson to be legally privileged but somehow at the end of that the bureau thought that it could justify this.Then in May 2012 Paul Neazor raised the question with the Government Communications Security Bureau as to whether its spying was unlawful. He raised that question with Ian Fletcher—that is what the Rebecca Kitteridge report tells us. Somehow or other he waited a little while and then he told John Key in July 2012 that there were concerns that the spying was unlawful. John Key has been a part of this process all the way through.But then mysteriously in August 2012 when it became time apparently for Mr Fletcher to pop across the road to Parliament and say: “We need a ministerial certificate signed to suppress the involvement of the Government Communications Security Bureau in this case.” John Key was not there. He was overseas. So the person who signed that ministerial certificate to suppress information about the role of the bureau was Bill English. Bill English signed that certificate off.I know that the relationship between Mr English and Mr Key is not everything that it could be given their history but we are asked to believe that when Mr Key returned from overseas he did not even talk to Bill English about this. A ministerial certificate that has never been used—the power that has never been used—and Bill English did not bother to tell John Key about it. It defies belief and there are certainly questions to be answered around that ministerial certificate.Then finally in September last year John Key fronted up for the first time about Kim Dotcom—in September 7 months after the bureau identified unlawful spying. And we heard Bill English stand up today and say that as soon as the Government became aware of unlawful spying it stepped in. That is not true. The Government knew in February it was raised again in May John Key found out about it in July Bill English signed a certificate to suppress the evidence in August and John Key tries to tell New Zealanders that September was the first time he had heard about it.That is misleading. That is why New Zealanders cannot trust John Key any longer. This debacle with Kim Dotcom and the Government Communications Security Bureau is at the feet of the Prime Minister. He has let New Zealanders down with his lax oversight of the bureau and he has let New Zealanders down by not being up front with them.I do want to briefly refer to the questions that were not put in this report by Rebecca Kitteridge. There is no mention in this report of what happened in the Kim Dotcom case. That is a remarkable thing given that the Kim Dotcom case is the reason the report got written. Rebecca Kitteridge states in here—and she clearly was concerned enough to write this—that she was not asked to do that. She was not asked to look at that. Well there is a reason for that. It is that the Prime Minister does not want it looked at.The Prime Minister does not want his role to be exposed because there is also nothing in this report about ministerial oversight—about how ministerial oversight should work in an agency like the Government Communications Security Bureau. Thebureau has powers that many New Zealanders are uncomfortable about—powers to spy on people—and there is nothing more important for Mr Key in his job in my view than protecting the fundamental rights and freedoms of New Zealanders to know that they can go about their business and not be spied upon unnecessarily. In this case this report does not go there.It is also very important to look at what this report says. John Key is the first Prime Minister acting under the 2003 Act to have been told that there may be problems with unlawful spying—the first Prime Minister to do that. That is what this says and there is nowhere in here where we actually get John Key fronting up and saying: “Ministerial responsibility is important. I’m acting on behalf of New Zealanders. I’m going to make sure I act in the best interest of New Zealanders and adopt a precautionary approach that says that if I get information that there may be unlawful spying I will inquire into it.”We desperately need as David Shearer has suggested a full and comprehensive inquiry into all the intelligence agencies. It is not good enough for the Government to propose piecemeal reform where it will try to make legal what has been illegal in the past. There are too many questions to be answered about that. Bill English put up a straw man today about the fact that the Security Intelligence Service can spy on people. The point is Mr English—Hon Bill English: A straw man!GRANT ROBERTSON: —the point is Mr English—that the Government Communications Security Bureau is not allowed to spy on New Zealanders. The bureau is not allowed to spy on New Zealanders because it works with foreign Governments. The Security Intelligence Service can spy on New Zealanders because that information will stay in New Zealand. Mr English knows full well that that is why there is a difference between the Government Communications Security Bureau and the Security Intelligence Service.Finally I want to turn to the appointment of Ian Fletcher. John Key was asked direct questions in this House about his relationship with Ian Fletcher and the role he played in Mr Fletcher’s appointment. He avoided those questions. He did not tell the truth to this House about his knowledge of that appointment process.We have been told by Iain Rennie that John Key was the person who scrapped the short list of candidates and that it was John Key who made the phone call to Ian Fletcher that fundamentally changed that appointment process. Ian Fletcher was the only person interviewed for that job 5 days after John Key made that phone call. That is not a proper and fair and transparent process and all that John Key could do in response to that was to blame the messenger and call the media knuckleheads. Well those journalists have done New Zealanders a favour because they have exposed that this is a Prime Minister who cannot be trusted who is more interested in jobs for his mates and not interested enough in the rights and freedoms of New Zealanders. New Zealanders cannot trust John Key.