Robertson Grant: Privilege — Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee Question of Privilege Regarding Use of Intrusive Powers Within the Parliamentary Precinct Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee Question of Privilege Concerning the Agreements for Policing Execution of Search Warrants and Collection and Retention of Information by the New Zealand Security Intelligence ServiceText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeRobertson Grant: Privilege — Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee Question of Privilege Regarding Use of Intrusive Powers Within the Parliamentary Precinct Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee Question of Privilege Concerning the Agreements for Policing Execution of Search Warrants and Collection and Retention of Information by the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service[Sitting date: 22 July 2014. Volume:700;Page:19344. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central):I am going to take just a brief call on this report from the Privileges Committee looking at “the agreements for policing execution of search warrants and collection and retention of information by the NZSIS”. Comments made already by the Attorney-General Chris Finlayson my colleague David Parker and Kennedy Graham cover most of the material the report has.What I want to talk about are two things. The first is a very specific matter that when I came on to the Privileges Committee I was concerned about in this area and it is that when search warrants are executed—this is not just for Parliament but more generally—nowadays with the growth of the use of electronic information storage it is the practice of an agency to seize the entire hard drive of a person who is involved in an investigation in order to get the particular documents or information that is desired.When a member of Parliament is in that situation there may well be material on that hard drive that is quite separate from what is being sought and that actually could be captured and taken away from a member of Parliament in such a way as to compromise both parliamentary privilege and the general operation of our work as parliamentarians. So I applaud the recommendation that is in this report that actually—and this is the “chaperoning” concept the Attorney-General mentioned earlier—an IT specialist will assist in the execution of the warrants to ensure that our rights as parliamentarians are upheld and that parliamentary privilege is protected within that. I think that that is a small but very important advance for us to ensure that we do not as parliamentarians hand over material that ultimately is privileged and should not be part of those investigations.The other point I particularly want to make is around the question of the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service and its role with Parliament. I appreciate the fact that this report is in fact following on from an interim report of the committee in this area and following on from protocols that were signed off several years ago—Hon David Parker: By Margaret Wilson.GRANT ROBERTSON: —that is right—by Margaret Wilson as the Speaker.There is a fundamental principle that I think needs to be reiterated here and it is that the SIS is not under normal circumstances going to be collecting information about a sitting member of Parliament. As the Attorney-General said once someone becomes a sitting member of Parliament their file is closed immediately. I think it is very very important that we make sure that is on the record of the House as the fundamental underlying principle here.What can happen is that for reasons of national security there may be on occasions situations in which the SIS may want to be looking at the activities of a member of Parliament. The threshold for doing so must be very high because we as parliamentarians need to be able to go about our business unencumbered by the activities of State agencies with significant powers. It is on that point that I want to raise my concerns. They are that a review of the Security Intelligence Service was planned and was never completed. In the maelstrom of all of the concerns about the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) Kim Dotcom and the appointment of Ian Fletcher that review of the SIS was quietly shelved by John Key.I believe it is essential that that review is done. The Labour Party’s policy is that we need a review of both the Security Intelligence Service and the GCSB and in fact of all of the agencies involved in our security intelligence system which also now includes particularly the Organised and Financial Crime Agency of New Zealand as part of the police.In the absence of that review public trust and confidence in our security intelligence agencies has reached an all-time low in New Zealand. For my part I am deeply distressed by that. I am a person who believes that it is important that we get the balance between security and privacy in our society right. In the modern era that is even more important. I understand and the Labour Party understands why we have these agencies working for us. There are reasons. There are people in the world today from whom New Zealand needs to be protected but equally our privacy and our rights as citizens must not be compromised by that and our privacy and our rights as members of Parliament representing citizens must not be compromised by that.At the moment legislatively for the GCSB we now have in my view legislation that goes far too far in terms of that balance and we have lost that balance between security and privacy. [Interruption] That is right. As my colleague David Parker says the absence of the requirement for a warrant and the fact that we have to essentially rely on the assurance of the Prime Minister about how these investigations will be operationalised is ridiculous and is in fact an insult to this Parliament.The SIS sits alongside that operating in operations within New Zealand without the review that was meant to take place. We need that review to happen to restore trust and confidence. In fact for this report to have my full and complete confidence we need to know that review is going to happen. It is noted in the report that the issues that Kennedy Graham has been discussing in his contribution need to be considered whenever the legislation governing the SIS is reviewed. Well my view is that it urgently needs to be reviewed.Having said that the situation we find ourselves in today is that the Speaker is the person who acts on behalf of this Parliament in dealing with these agencies. We must have confidence that the Speaker will act in a way that upholds the rights of all members of Parliament no matter what party they come from. It is also true to say that under the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Act as it stands the Director of Security does need to consult with the Leader of the Opposition from time to time. Without going into any detail about those matters I think they would tend to be at the more general level not at the specific level of what might be happening with a particular member of Parliament. Therefore the Speaker’s responsibility here is extremely high.I do not think we are at the end of our discussion about the role of the Speaker as David Parker has mentioned or indeed about the relationship between this Parliament and agencies with powers such as the SIS but this report represents a series of useful changes to the processes that were originally brought forward. From the point of view of the Labour Party we can support this report but we welcome the idea of ongoing dialogue about the role of the SIS in relation to Parliament. We strongly urge and in fact commit to the public of New Zealand that we will do the review of security and intelligence agencies that is needed to restore public trust and confidence in them.Motion agreed to.