Power Simon: Mercenary Activities (Prohibition) Bill — Second Reading 
Power Simon: Mercenary Activities (Prohibition) Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:617;Page:12828] 
SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) 
: 
 I state for the record that the National Party opposes this bill athough it does not in any way condone mercenary activity as was pointed out in the select committee process. The Minister was kind enough during the course of his explanation to the House to acknowledge that there were still some doubts about and difficulties with regard to the definition of “mercenary” but he said he believed it was a “good first step”—to quote the Hon Chris Carter. That may be the case. We on the Opposition side of the House certainly acknowledge that the amended definition is an improvement. I acknowledge that the intent of the legislation is in its purest form the right step to take. However in our minority view—together with New Zealand First—there are three major areas about which I still have grave concern. 
The first is the definition of “mercenary” although we acknowledge the intent of that and the improved definition brought forward by the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee after what was a long involved and complex discussion with legal advisers from many departments about the way in which “mercenary” should be defined. There was a UN special rapporteur’s report that regarded the original definition as inadequate in operational terms. Whether or not that special rapporteur has had the opportunity to comment on the amended definition I say countries should proceed with caution before ratifying international conventions when reports such as the special rapporteur’s report consider the original definition to be inadequate. We go on to state in the minority report that in our view the amended definition does not address those concerns. Although as I said earlier we acknowledge that the intent is there and that this legislation is a step in the right direction I am concerned about any legislation that attempts to define what a mercenary is in for the sake of argument two paragraphs—those contained on pages 2 and 3—when the select committee then feels compelled to include two larger definitions of what is not a mercenary. It seems to members on the Opposition side of the House that that is no way to draft law when we consider these issues. 
The other concern that we have is of course that the signatories to the UN convention concerned do not exactly represent the countries that we have traditionally had a security or defence relationship with. In particular the US the UK and Australia have not ratified or in fact signed the convention. That is quite an important point to make—they have not even signed let alone ratified the convention. 
I also worry about—and we made this point as the third point in the minority report—the issue that we continue to place into our domestic law international conventions that in many ways have marginal relevance to our domestic circumstances. Whilst Opposition members do acknowledge that the intention of the legislation is pure the issue is the workability of legislation that has as its core definition—in an attempt to put in place for readers of the legislation a clear understanding of what a mercenary is and bearing in mind that members of the House have just heard the Minister say he acknowledges that the definition is less than satisfactory—a definition of “mercenary” that is smaller than the definition of who is not a mercenary. That cannot be a good basis on which to create certain and clear law. 
On the basis of that and the other two points I mentioned in the course of my speech National will oppose this bill.