Bennett PaulaHon PAULA BENNETT (Deputy Leader—National): Thank you Madam Deputy Speaker. I stand up and I don't do this lightly—in fact it's after some consideration—but the Minister is not fit to be in his job due to the decision that has been made. I'm sorry but we have not seen the right judgment made right from the very beginning. The fact is that the Minister had a file that came before him and had someone who had drug-dealt in New Zealand—so had been drug dealing—was currently in jail and had proven fraudulent lies that they had told repeatedly at the most serious level and this did not raise his radar even big enough for him to read the file.Brett Hudson: Oh you wouldn't read it would you!Hon PAULA BENNETT: It's actually deadly serious. So his judgment was such that with that file sitting in front of him with a man currently in jail known for lying and fraudulent behaviour and even the Parole Board had not actually given him parole because they were still so concerned that he was not ready to be released into the public—the Minister's judgment at that point was to not even read the file. Within 45 minutes that man—that man being the Minister of Immigration—had decided that this convict was good enough to get residency. So the decision itself quite frankly I'm appalled at and even he quite quickly then came to the conclusion that he'd made the wrong call—there's no two ways about it. But the fact that his judgment was so poor to not even read the file means I'm sorry that he cannot stay in the role. It means that the public will not and do not trust the decisions that he is making in their best interests and that is deadly serious and that is something that actually the public deserve more respect on. We saw an arrogance today quite frankly from the Minister of Immigration after barely nine months in the office that we usually expect from someone after nine years. And we see an arrogance that actually shushes another member down when they're a Minister standing in front of the Chair. And there is—there is more expected from a Minister than there is from other members of Parliament. That's why actually Ministers are paid twice as much. It's why they're given so much responsibility. The fact that his judgment was so poor to not even read the file is absolutely incredible to us all.The Prime Minister herself said we shouldn't judge the Government on how it's handled the affair so far; rather how it fixes up the mess—yeah? So the Prime Minister said we should not judge the Government on how it's handled this affair so far; rather how it fixes up the mess. There are no signs of this mess being fixed up. So what we have is a Minister who is standing here now subtly throwing the officials under the bus. So it's now more of the subtle throwing under—that he's going to fix the system. The only system that was broken was that Minister's decision originally to grant residency to a fraudulent lying criminal drug dealer who was still in jail and did not even get parole. He should stand in this House and offer his resignation for having such poor judgment or at least have the courage of his convictions to actually stand there and admit it. Instead what we got was excuses him going to fix up" the system. It's not the system that's broken Minister; it is the Minister's judgment himself on allowing this person residency in this country. And quite frankly we in the Opposition—and I stand on behalf of so many of the public who cannot believe the decision that the Minister has made and that he was able to actually justify it. So the Prime Minister—remember in the early days—told us to "read between the lines". Yeah we were told to read between the lines. The most open and transparent Government didn't actually have the courage of their convictions of making these decisions—DEPUTY SPEAKER: I just remind the member to be careful.Hon PAULA BENNETT: Sorry yeah—and I do mean it around the convictions. So he did not have the wherewithal to actually give the public the right information. But it's OK to now—yeah perfectly acceptable to read through the file and give bits of the file out now. That's OK! That's all right because it suits their narrative. However it did not suit their narrative a month or so ago when the decision was made but it's perfectly acceptable now. Privacy doesn't matter. They can just put everything that they like out there about the file and read parts of it even. A shame they didn't actually read it four weeks ago but he's reading parts of the file out to us. I do find it ironic from the member who has spoken before me the Rt Hon Winston Peters that actually in his role at first he said he could not pass judgement on whether or not the right decision was made then openly and publicly said he had read the file and he stood by the Minister's decision. Yay—someone finally read the file! That's the good news about that. Again we have a poor judgment as to whether or not residency actually should have been given but we had the then Acting Prime Minister Winston Peters able to stand there and say that he had read the file and that he was very happy with the decision that had been made.So we see absolutely poor ill-thought-out and actually dangerous judgment originally from the Minister in allowing this person residency to potentially go out there and hurt our children again and the Minister cannot stand in this House and say that he believed that he was of good character and good enough to get residency when the Parole Board just a matter of weeks earlier had said that he was not actually of a character and standard to be allowed to be released back into the public. At least one group of people were obviously able to make the right decision—a Minister was not able to do that.I'm sorry but I am going back to my original point: I find it absolutely incredible that a Minister could get a file in front of him that says "Here is a fraudulent drug-dealing person that's currently in jail." and not think they had to read the file and think it was acceptable to actually give them residency. So at the very least he has then grappled around nervously looking for a reason to correct the decision that he actually should have made originally—to actually find a reason to deport him to find a reason to not give him residency—and he has scrambled and those officials have scrambled and in the end they've done a good enough job because everyone knew more than he did and everyone knew more than those officials did it seems. I mean others knew that he'd been back to the Czech Republic others knew that he was a risk others were able to just kind of see that there was absolute danger and hear the cries of an ex-partner who sounded from what I could hear in the media extremely scared of him—others knew all of that but the people that were making the decisions evidently didn't feel that. And I find that appalling.So I'm sorry but to the Minister: your judgment has shown that the public can no longer have trust in the decisions that you're making. To the Minister I say that this is probably one of the most serious issues that I've seen. The right thing to do is to step aside—at the very least from that portfolio. I think it means that actually it's a standard that means you're not ready to actually be in Cabinet. It doesn't mean there's not a path back. You know this place can do this but this is about public safety this is about a Minister's judgment that has been shown at the very least to be negligent and poor—Greg O'Connor: Taupō truck stop!Hon PAULA BENNETT: —but is very very dangerous when it comes to people's actual—you can throw out your little personal insults to try and throw me off Mr O'Connor but that won't do it. This is a Minister who has actually put public safety as a second thought did not have the judgment or his radar did not go off well enough to read a file in its totality has given residency to a man who never should have got it has scrambled around because the Prime Minister probably told him to to find a reason to deport him. Officials have finally come up with one. We've seen a decision that should have been made four weeks ago. We now have the real risk of going through the courts and more expense for the taxpayer when we need not be in this place. The right decision could have and should have been done and made weeks ago."