Copeland Gordon: Immigration Advisers Licensing Bill — First Reading 
Copeland Gordon: Immigration Advisers Licensing Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:628;Page:1013] 
GORDON COPELAND (United Future) 
: 
 I rise to signal that United Future will be supporting the Immigration Advisers Licensing Bill. Indeed we believe that this licensing regime for immigration advisers is well and truly overdue. I was interested to hear earlier the speech from the Hon Lianne Dalziel which informed me as I was not here at the time that this matter was raised in 1999. For goodness’ sake we are now in 2005! I would like to point out to Lianne Dalziel and members of the Government that they have actually had 6 years since 1999 which proves the point that this bill is well and truly overdue. So I hope it will be passed by this House rapidly and that we can get on and put a licensing regime in place. 
It is a very very important area of our immigration law. It is time that New Zealand cleaned up its act when it comes to immigration. It is a well-known fact that the current Minister of Foreign Affairs the Hon Winston Peters has actually built a political career in part by opposing immigration. But the fact is that immigration does and will continue to play a vital role in the future of this nation. That is the reality. Incidentally talking about reality I would have found Keith Locke’s protestations about people say of Middle Eastern origin who are New Zealand citizens being held up at the border a lot more convincing if I were unaware of the fact that the perpetrators of the bombs on the London Underground and buses in July were not just people with permanent residency but also people who were actually born in Britain. 
So it is important I think when we talk about these matters that we talk about the real world not some idealised version of the world. I would love it if this globe was peaceful and there was love and harmony between all members of all races. That is one thing that many of us would like to work towards. But in the meantime we have to look at the realities and be sensible. We need to remember that one of the functions of Government—its principle function some would argue—is to protect its own citizens. That includes protecting them against people whether or not they are New Zealand citizens who might want to commit acts of terrorism against their fellow citizens. We have to get the cowboys the fakes the frauds the thieves the incompetent the irresponsible and the greedy out of the immigration loop in terms of people wishing to come to this nation. 
Such people are actually scumbags. They prey on the innocent they prey on the needy and very often they prey on people—who are desperate for good and sound reasons such as persecution at home on religious grounds and who are fleeing areas of the world that are affected by warfare poverty or discrimination—who chose to make this country their new home. In those situations it is all too easy to set oneself up as an immigration adviser to claim that one has all kinds of connections—even in a recent scam with the Prime Minister herself—and to say such things as: “You come to me. I’ve got some say with the Prime Minister and I’ll get you into New Zealand.” We really need to ensure that the system eliminates all those things. 
I would also like to say that this is actually a very very important matter in terms of policy formation. As a result of scams run in this country the Government recently changed the business migration scheme. There were scams of people bringing $1 million into New Zealand living here for just a few days and then going back offshore; the same $1 million brought in a whole stream of immigrants through totally illegal and shonky but very cleverly thought-out immigration schemes. So the Government reacted to that by saying: “If you’re a business migrant now we want you to bring in a million bucks and we’ll have it lodged with the Government and only with the Government and furthermore we’ll pay you an interest rate that is insignificant.” Since that new regulation came in there have been two—yes that is right two—business migrants who have come into New Zealand. 
The whole Government setup we now have in terms of the way that money is utilised is of course the exact opposite of any sense of business acumen or entrepreneurship because anybody who is able to have made $1 million in the first place and therefore is able to bring it into our country obviously has business acumen and those people see the whole scheme as patently ridiculous. I want to tell the Government today that there is an opportunity for it once these immigration advisers are licensed properly to revisit that policy in the interests of bringing more business and entrepreneurial people into this country. God knows we need them! 
I would also like to draw the House’s attention as we are debating this subject today to the write-up in today’s  
Dominion Post  
about the East Asia Summit which our Prime Minister Helen Clark has been attending. Some members may know that this summit now embraces all of the nations of Asia including China India and Japan and it also embraces Australia and New Zealand. The Prime Minister of Malaysia said that he did not know how the Australians—or New Zealanders for that matter—will regard themselves as east Asians. I thought that actually displayed an understandable ignorance of the history of immigration into this country. As Dr Pita Sharples has pointed out the founding people of this nation were Polynesians whom we call Maori. What sort of people are they? The answer is that they are east Asian people; that is actually their point of origin. 
Metiria 
Turei 
: What? 
GORDON COPELAND 
: That is exactly right. The Polynesians came originally from east Asia. Dr Pita Sharples and I have just been talking about this and he thoroughly agrees with the point I am making. From that point of view we are therefore genuinely an east Asian country to the extent that we were populated by east Asian people. 
Dr Pita Sharples 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I want to correct one comment. I definitely stated that we are the same people; we derive from the same language family but it does not mean we are from there. 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: That is for another time thank you. It is not a point of order. 
GORDON COPELAND 
: I am sorry. I meant that the original inhabitants of New Zealand the original human inhabitants were of east Asian origin in the same way that I am of European origin. That is the point I was making and I think it is factual and non-controversial in reality. The Indian diplomat at the summit also had the same problem. He also questioned how it was that New Zealand could be regarded as part of east Asia. 
I think it is also very important to focus on the fact that Asia is therefore not only a very important part of New Zealand’s past but is also a very important part of our history. I was privileged yesterday to be the guest of honour at the Victoria University graduation ceremony for commerce graduands. To be perfectly honest as I have not been to one of those ceremonies since I graduated myself about 40 years ago I was absolutely staggered because I would estimate conservatively that 70 percent of the graduates in commerce from Victoria University yesterday were Asian. I think that is a good illustration of the role that immigrants to this country are playing and what a fantastic contribution these young men and women are going to make to the future of our country. 
The licensing regime for immigration advisers has many many ramifications for this country—all of them extremely positive. I would venture to express the hope in this Parliament that once the licensing regime is in place the Minister of Foreign Affairs might himself in that new role—that very important role of representing our country—open his mind and heart a little bit to the great potential that new immigrants can make to the fabric of life in this country and that we can rid ourselves of xenophobia and put out the welcome mat especially for overseas students. I believe that the best immigrants we could possibly have coming to New Zealand would be students who have come here from different lands who study at our universities who graduate from our universities and then decide they want to become citizens of our country. That is the brain drain in reversal and we do need it because as we are all very aware we also have the other side of the equation which is the migration of some of our best and brightest from our shores to other parts of the world. 
With those remarks I signal our strong support for this overdue bill.