Sage EugenieEUGENIE SAGE (Green): Tēnā koe Mr Deputy Speaker—thank you. I am pleased to speak for the Green Party in support of the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Finance of Terrorism Amendment Bill. I think the problems with laundering money and the—Hon Ruth Dyson: That's your time nearly up.EUGENIE SAGE: Pardon?Hon Ruth Dyson: Time's nearly up after you say the name.EUGENIE SAGE: Ha ha! The problems with money-laundering and with the financing of terrorism are well recognised by the public and we are very pleased to support the bill. Like others we are concerned that it did take some time to actually get it into the House and we are still only in the second reading because there have been major problems identified by the Financial Action Task Force. As others have commented it is an inter-Government forum that deals with money-laundering. It has got a number of international experts on it it has got the strong backing of Governments and it also looks at the issue of terrorism financing. It was their very damning report back in 2009 that highlighted the potential for fraud here the fact that it was happening and the fact that there was drugs-related fraud theft blackmail and burglaries that were related to the proceeds of criminal action. So that highlighted the need for a major law change in New Zealand.Because of that damning report we did suffer the consequences when we were struck off the white list of the European Union list of countries that had financial integrity and that of course has had consequences for businesses exporting and operating in Europe and has added to their costs of doing business. Phase one was some progress. Phase two I guess because it is focusing on people like lawyers—the people who are the gatekeepers to our financial system and the people who are often perceived as having a great deal of financial legitimacy and therefore can be quite critical in disguising money-laundering and make it much harder to detect these offences. As the regulatory impact statement made clear undetected money-laundering has major consequences for our economy. The police estimated that there is about $1.3 billion worth of disruption costs at the moment and that is probably only the tip of the iceberg. It does reduce the opportunities for legitimate businesses and activities and it has the potential to significantly distort the market by skewing prices and increasing the cost of borrowing. Of course if it is not detected criminals get to enjoy the proceeds of their crime which they may end up reinvesting in further criminal activities. So there are lots of reasons why we need to clamp down on it—not just in terms of protecting our international reputation but because of the activities themselves.This phase 2 has been a long time coming. I think the Law and Order Committee—not being on that committee but looking at the bill as reported back and the number of changes that the committee has recommended—has done a very thorough job. I would note that the Minister of Justice's Supplementary Order Paper picks up some of those recommendations and there were quite a lot of concerns expressed by the Privacy Commissioner and others about some of the definitions in the bill and the breadth of some of the provisions including the ability of agencies to share information and that that would undermine privacy provisions in other legislation. So the committee's recommendation was that phrases like intelligence gathering and analysis" and "national security and defence purposes" where those could be used as the basis for sharing information were far too broad. The recommendations that are being suggested have a much more explicit definition to ensure that the power of the State to undermine individuals' privacy while engaged in the good purpose of trying to prevent money-laundering does not go too far.There were other issues in terms of when the different real estate agents lawyers and others would be subject to the legislation and the concern that this would be done by Order in Council and that that was not in line with normal legislative practice. The understanding I think that I have from reading the bill is that there is a commitment that there will be quite a lot of detailed guidance that is provided at least 6 months before the law applies to those different sectors like lawyers. It is another example I think of where you get out of select committee consideration and the whole submission process significant changes that improve legislation.But we want for the Government to speed up the pace here because not only is there a reputational risk but of course if New Zealand is the weak link in terms of global efforts around countering money-laundering and the financing of terrorism then we are potentially targeted by some of those international criminals. There has been a suggestion that money is being invested in New Zealand in property purchases and the like because of the current weak regime.This bill does need to be progressed to strengthen not only our reputation but also the controls on money-laundering to make the system a lot more transparent and to provide for the ability for this to be detected. This is a bill that the Greens are pleased to support. We commend the select committee for the work that it has done on taking submissions into account and making a number of sensible changes to the bill."