Nash Stuart: Customs and Excise (Joint Border Management Information Sharing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Nash Stuart: Customs and Excise (Joint Border Management Information Sharing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:666;Page:14042] 
STUART NASH (Labour) 
: 
 I rise in support of the Customs and Excise (Joint Border Management Information Sharing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill at its first reading. I support this bill because the measures outlined are designed to protect our borders against threats and risks without compromising trade and travel standards. I would like to talk specifically about two separate areas in more detail. Firstly I will talk about why this bill is important. Secondly I will outline a couple of measures proposed in the bill. 
We are a country surrounded by a large natural moat called the Pacific Ocean—15000 kilometres of it in fact. So everything that comes into New Zealand does so by sea or air. However the challenges this brings are substantial—from both humans and pests and sometimes human pests. The crooks are getting smarter and rewards for illegal activity are getting larger and more and more tempting to certain undesirable sectors of the travelling populace. We need to keep up and fight against the scourge head-on with all the resources we can muster. We also need to act smarter. 
This bill is important in this day and age as it recognises that there is a need for more effective and enhanced collaboration between agencies at the border as well as a need for greater value for money by eliminating duplicated services. What I mean by this is that the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry the police the Inland Revenue Department and the Customs Service etc. need to be linked in a way that avoids duplication whilst promoting efficiency and cooperation. It is nonsense that Government agencies cannot connect electronically in any way that provides a higher level of security and minimises the risk to the wonderful people of New Zealand at this point in time. So funding has been made available for the first stage of the joint border management system which at this stage will be an integrated computerised system to provide border management services for the Customs Service and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. 
The reason why we are debating this bill is that legislation is required to implement the proposals that will firstly develop a legislative framework to oversee the future sharing of information between border activities and agencies. And let us face facts—there are some privacy concerns over this bill. When Government agencies have the ability to share information relating to all New Zealanders we need to eliminate the perception that this is Big Brother in action. My colleague William Sio spoke at length on this about 10 minutes ago. The legislation will secondly enable the Customs Service to have overall stewardship and management of the integrated border management system and hence mandate the operation of this system. Thirdly it provides an interim legislative framework to support the immediate sharing of information for two short-term projects. 
The amendments proposed in the bill have a range of objectives and these include enhancing coordination between the Customs Service and other Government departments in reducing duplication of processes and enhancing risk management. I would like to outline the current situation and the basic but not the only problem this bill seeks to address. Information sharing between border agencies is currently governed by a complex web of law. The sharing of information is permitted by specific laws. These laws typically apply only to a narrow range of information or a narrow range of situations. Other exchanges are permitted on a case by case basis within a framework created by the interface between the Official Information Act and the Privacy Act. This is a complex and onerous process. 
The efforts of the Customs Service in recent years to focus on greater collaboration with other agencies at the border have relied on these sets of laws and protocols. The existing provisions have allowed the Customs Service to develop good partnerships—great partnerships in fact—with other agencies but they have also highlighted the need for a simpler clearer and more transparent regime of more general application. I doubt that anyone would disagree with that. 
What we are proposing here is to amend the Customs and Excise Act to provide for the making of regulations in future to specify agencies that can access information held by the Customs Service including specific conditions on the use of the information by accessing agencies. For example no one will be able to access information to check on a prospective neighbour or a daughter’s boyfriend. I make light of this but privacy is a very important issue and I will be very interested to read the submissions on this aspect of the bill if the House refers it to the Justice and Electoral Committee. 
The reality is that the option of requiring law changes to be made to each specific information-sharing need identified is simply too onerous. This is due to the expected substantial delays caused by the lengthy legislative process and resource demand. This framework is the preferred option. It will have sufficient flexibility to deliver additional processes effectively in the future. It properly considers privacy interests that arise through requiring regulatory changes to be discussed with the Privacy Commissioner. It ensures ongoing parliamentary oversight through the Regulations Review Committee. This is an enabling provision that will have no initial impact on business. However when regulations are made under this provision the impact on business will be considered as part of the regulatory change process. 
I would like to briefly elaborate on the joint border management system. This management system is designed to achieve substantial benefits from automating information storage and sharing across the border sector. As mentioned the current law for information sharing on a case by case basis is not sufficient in the 21st century to cover the quantity of information sharing between the Customs Service and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. 
The preferred option to address this issue is to amend the Act in order to firstly give the Customs Service overall stewardship and operation of the system; secondly to mandate the accessing by the Customs Service of the information stored in the management system that will be allowed under the Act; and thirdly to mandate the accessing and use by the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry of the information stored in the joint border management system that is allowed under the Biosecurity Act. This amendment is required to allow access to the common set of data required by the Customs Service and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. 
The proposed approach is a logical option to enable the Customs Service and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry to share this information without duplicating the collection process. This proposal is to enable the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry to access potentially broader classes of information held by the Customs Service that the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry requires to undertake its border management role as it transitions from 100 percent screening to risk management. The proposed management system and trade single window will allow traders and other commercial entities to enter information once and that information will then be accessible by both the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the Customs Service. This is common sense in this day and age. It is absolutely necessary if we are to protect our borders going forward. It will also reduce compliance costs to industry. It enhances the effectiveness of border agencies by reducing the costs of capturing and assessing information. 
I have talked about why this bill is important. We need to work together to work smarter and to use the technology that exists to create a border protection system that will provide us with a very powerful tool in the battle to keep New Zealand and New Zealanders safe. I also spoke about the development of the joint border management system which requires legislation for its implementation. We are supporting this because we believe that it is vital in the development of information sharing and for efficiency between the various Government agencies. It is only between the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry and the Customs Service to start with. However this is hopefully just the beginning of the networking of the system of government needed to protect our borders. Labour commends this bill to the House. Thank you.