Parker David: New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill Crimes Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Readings 
Parker David: New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill Crimes Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Readings 
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Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) 
: 
 I rise to support the third readings of the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill and its allied bill the Crimes Amendment Bill (No 3). The Labour Party will be supporting both of these bills. 
I will talk briefly about the balance that we try to strike in this Parliament between the rights of the individual and the rights of the community. This legislation strikes at the intersection of those competing interests. We all know that in New Zealand we try to protect against the inappropriate erosion of our civil liberties. Those civil liberties include the right to go about our business without intrusion by the State or arms of the State except where that is strictly necessary. Exceptions are made in various areas of the law. For example if there is an allegation of some form of criminal activity then an arm of the State has the right to apply to the court for various ways of intervening through a warrant process so that people who are being investigated for crimes can have their affairs looked at a bit more closely. That involves an intrusion of the State and whenever there is a suggestion that the rights of the State to intrude on private lives should be extended in some way appropriate scrutiny is made by various arms of civil society. The media the Law Society civil liberty groups and private individuals to name but a few all stand up and say that we should look at these things pretty seriously before we confer additional rights. 
The problem that we have regarding the process that has been adopted in respect of the legislation we are now considering is that it was not as open as it could have been. I am informed that if one looks at the history of the Security Intelligence Service legislation one would see that the last time the Act was amended there was a commitment to openness of process by the then Government under the leadership of the then Prime Minister the Rt Hon Jenny Shipley who ensured that to the extent possible submissions on the bill could be heard in public. If any part of those submissions was sensitive and people thought that it should be secret then they could apply to the committee and that particular part of the submission could if the committee thought it appropriate be heard in secret. 
In respect of this legislation the Government chose a different course. It chose the opposite course. It actually said that instead of having a presumption that this should be done openly it decided in advance that all submissions should be heard in secret. That is an issue that the Labour Party together with other parties including the Greens has been critical of because there was no need for that secrecy in a general sense and that level of secrecy means that people are less well informed and more suspicious of what we are doing in Parliament than would otherwise be the case. 
I have no doubt that most of the submissions that were heard by the select committee could have been heard in public. If they were heard in public submitters could have heard what other submitters were saying to the select committee. Members of the fourth estate would have been able to listen to some of the things that were said by submitters. Submitters would have greater confidence in that process and also members of the fourth estate would be readily able to discern for themselves who was tilting at windmills and what concerns were real and should have real attention paid to them by the select committee. 
However because of the process that the Government under the Rt Hon John Key chose in this instance there was no opportunity to have those submissions heard in public. As a consequence the standard of debate we have had in civil society on the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill is worse than it would otherwise have been. I think that is lamentable. Notwithstanding the fact that Labour supports this legislation as being a fair update of the powers of the Security Intelligence Service I put on record again that I think the process was poor that we have on a number of occasions in this Parliament seen poor process on the part of the National Government and that it undermines public confidence in the institutions that we ought to be doing more to maintain public confidence in. 
In respect of the merits of the changes that are made the main changes have been well summarised by the Attorney-General. I will not go through all of the points that he made. Suffice it to say that in the main this legislation updates the suite of technologies that can be utilised by the Security Intelligence Service. Whenever there is an extension to those powers we should be rightly suspicious in this Parliament that we are not conferring unnecessarily broad powers and therefore unnecessarily intruding into the private lives of New Zealanders or creating some arm of the State that has inappropriate powers. 
We also need to have regard to the fact that some technologies were not thought of when the original legislation was first passed. There are instances where the Security Intelligence Service might be able to exercise unregulated powers without the sorts of controls that we have through this legislation and we uncovered that when the Justice and Electoral Committee looked at police powers of search and surveillance earlier in the year. We discovered that far from necessarily increasing the power of the police in all cases in some cases we were regulating what were then unregulated powers because those powers were not even covered by the original legislation. 
I for one take considerable heart that we have checks and balances on the conduct by the Security Intelligence Service of its duties through oversight by the Prime Minister who has to sign off on warrants— 
Charles Chauvel 
: Only domestic warrants. 
Hon DAVID PARKER 
: On domestic warrants—thank you Mr Chauvel. Perhaps more important the commissioner who oversees warrants is by law required to be a former High Court judge. In this regard I am happy to stand on record and say that I am very proud of the fact that in New Zealand we have a long tradition of a non-corrupt judiciary. Our High Court and upper courts are as good as any in the world. We have no history of corruption in our higher courts of which I am aware and we have only the very occasional incident of misconduct in lower courts. Indeed I would think that in respect of having a non-corrupt judiciary there is no better example of that anywhere in the world than our system. 
Therefore when we appoint a former High Court judge to oversee what is happening in the Security Intelligence Service we can be confident that we are appointing someone of integrity who will go about their duties responsibly with a view to protecting the traditions that we hold dear in New Zealand. Those traditions are that we do not have a Security Intelligence Service that overreaches its mandate and turns into an organisation that spies on New Zealanders in a way that is not appropriate. 
The other point that I will reinforce and that the Attorney-General also made reference to concerns the principles that have been inserted into the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill. The principles were inserted into the legislation at the suggestion of amongst others the Chief Human Rights Commissioner who suggested that the legislation make it clear that when the Security Intelligence Service performs its functions under the Act it “(a) contributes to keeping New Zealand society secure independent and free and democratic: (b) contributes to the participation of New Zealand in the maintenance of international security: (c) acts—(i) in accordance with New Zealand law and all human rights standards recognised by New Zealand law except to the extent that they are in relation to national security modified by an enactment: (ii) in the discharge of its operational functions independently and impartially:”—therefore it cannot become an arm of political purpose if you like—“(iii) with integrity and professionalism: (iv) in a manner that facilitates effective democratic oversight.” 
Perhaps that last point is quite an important one in that if those who are responsible for oversight were concerned that they could not effectively oversee its operations then they could have regard to the purpose and principle sections; they would no doubt say to the Prime Minister that they had concerns and through that we exercise control. 
With the reservations as to process that I have already enunciated the Labour Party supports both of these bills.