Barclay Todd: Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeBarclay Todd: Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 20 May 2015. Volume:705;Page:3516. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]TODD BARCLAY (National—Clutha-Southland): It is a pleasure to speak on the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill. I would just like to acknowledge the chair of the Law and Order Committee Kanwaljit Singh Bakshi and the Minister of Justice the Hon Amy Adams as well as the other members of the committee particularly those who have spoken already.This was one of two of the first pieces of legislation that I was privileged enough to work on in the Law and Order Committee and I have to say that it was certainly a piece of legislation around which I think all parties involved and all representatives across the House were certainly on the same page regarding the importance of this legislation. By and large we were all on the same page when we were talking to officials and submitters from the various representative agencies on the legislation and the importance of it.I just want to acknowledge a couple of the agencies and organisations that provided a lot of work and guidance on this particularly the Ministry of Justice the Police the Police Association the Privacy Commissioner and Transparency International. I acknowledge their guidance with regard to the international protocols and experiences around how other countries have adopted and implemented this legislation. I would also like to acknowledge the New Zealand Bankers’ Association and the three banks that submitted separately—ANZ Westpac and BNZ. Collectively for those organisations as well as for the agencies involved there was a high level of constructive productive and pragmatic engagement and I think everybody at the heart of it wanted the best piece of legislation that could come out.We have already heard from the Minister and a number of other members tonight about some of the changes that have taken place in response to the concerns that were raised by the various submitters in order to make the legislation the very best it can be. We have already heard from Mr Goff about the value of money-laundering as reported by the departmental report at $1.5 billion. That is a serious aspect of the economy that could provide obviously dangerous flow-on effects to some vulnerable New Zealanders. Although we are talking about why this legislation may have taken a little bit longer to progress than it could have while we are looking at vulnerable New Zealanders we have passed other pieces of legislation that have tried to protect them as well such as that resulting from the White Paper for Vulnerable Children and a number of education amendment bills.So I think that we have given this piece of legislation the priority it deserves. One of the advantages potentially of implementing the legislation behind some of the other countries that ratified the UN convention is that although we may have been one of the first to sign and one of the last to eventually progress the legislation it means that we have had the luxury of being able to look at how other countries have articulated the challenges that were raised as they were progressing the legislation in their respective countries. We have been able to take those perspectives and craft our own unique legislation which draws on the challenges and inconsistencies that may have been experienced by others. So I think there is an advantage in that and it means that New Zealand has truly got a piece of unique legislation picking the best from other countries that we compare ourselves to.There are just a couple of points that the Minister has raised that I think are important given that that probably draws into another reason why it has taken a little bit longer to progress the legislation and that is that a number of aspects and indeed the changes that have been incorporated through the select committee process are minor and highly technical in nature.As we have heard from a number of the banks such as the Banks Association ANZ and Westpac the nature of the systems and software that these organisations already have in place and already provide reporting mechanisms to the police is complex and unique and takes time to change. I think as a committee we did this legislation a lot of justice by taking the time to get a greater understanding of some of those complexities. Westpac articulated that it provides banking and insurance and investment services across a broad range of industries to a broad range of clients. It estimates that it has around 1.4 million customers. When this legislation does finally progress and the regulations have been implemented it estimates that it will be required to report around 2000 transactions per day. So we have got a duty to be able to make sure that if it is having to do this we have got the right frameworks in place from the outset so that when it spends millions of dollars on developing its software to meet the requirements of Parliament and the regulations that follow that money has not been wasted and it is not having to go back and repeat and redo the software based on changes we may have to make later on down the track.BNZ is in a similar situation. Internationally it expects that across the world it will have about 5 million to 7 million reportable transactions annually. They are not small numbers and given the threshold of payments that are reportable—as low as $1000 and most of these are electronic transactions and they happen numerous times on a daily basis—I think that if these organisations are going to be reporting these to the police they need to be able to have some clear understanding of what is actually necessary from a police perspective and the collection agency of these transactions. They need to have a clear understanding of what is actually required from the outset because it will be a hugely costly exercise to ensure that both sides of the spectrum have the necessary software to be able to take on board the transactions that come about.The Minister and other members have also reported that obviously this is a borderless and global environment we are acting within. I do not think I can remember the last time I actually gave a cash sum of over probably about $100. If you look at most members of this House we do use our banks’ online mechanisms to make payments so it is very important. As we have heard from a number of members tonight the organised criminal networks—Jacinda Ardern: You use cash?TODD BARCLAY: Cash? I use cash every now and again. I use an Eftpos card a credit card from time to time. I do not use credit cards on undesirable things. I do not use my parliamentary credit card where I should not either.The all-of-Government response to organised crime has been an important aspect of this and we have heard that the Ministry of Justice has played a huge role. Another aspect that the Banks Association raised in its submission on the billwas that it felt that the bill did not adequately identify the form of information reported that should take the proposed method of delivery. It specifically raised an issue with new section 48B of the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act where it requires that the nature of the transaction be reported. The association raised questions as to what kind of analysis is needed to be undertaken to make sure this determination was clearer. That is an example of an aspect within the bill where the Ministry of Justice went back and looked at it and took into consideration the views of the Banks Association.Another aspect was the time of implementation. The bill initially set down that after 12 months following the implementation of the Act the requirements will come into force. But as we know the regulations will take a long time following that to implement and the Ministry of Justice was quite clear that it—Hon Ruth Dyson: It’s OK to not take the full 10 minutes.TODD BARCLAY: I am enjoying this Ms Dyson. It is very fascinating. The ministry basically said that it will look at the legislation and will implement it as soon as the banks and everybody are in order.When Mr Goff was reflecting on money-laundering and why facilitation payments were not included I just wonder what hat he was wearing—whether he was wearing his hat as a member of the Law and Order Committee a former Minister of Justice or a former Minister of Trade. If this was such a huge aspect of this bill that absolutely needed to be included I am not sure why he did not feel compelled to pass the legislation himself when he was the Minister of Justice and take a world-leading step as he said we should be here. Obviously as a former Minister of Trade he will know more than many of us that it is of the utmost importance that we ensure that our businesses are not disadvantaged on the global scale. We are already disadvantaged by the tyranny of distance; we do not need to be disadvantaged by other aspects that are just in the general course of doing business overseas.Mr Bakshi has reflected that there were 20 submissions and 11 were heard orally. Particularly within two aspects of the bill the money-laundering side as one and organised crime as the other the themes that were coming through were incredibly consistent. We are comfortable that we have struck the right positioning of this bill to provide the best legislation for all parties involved to ensure that we are adhering to our obligations under the international treaties that we have ratified. Thank you very much. It is great to be passing this very important legislation and commending it.