Parker DavidHon DAVID PARKER (Labour): I want to take a call on the Wildlife (Powers) Amendment Bill. I sat on the Local Government and Environment Committee and heard the submissions. Can I begin by thanking the Minister in the chair the Hon Maggie Barry for bringing this bill to the House—I think you are absolutely right. I was convinced by the speeches that you gave in earlier readings and also by the evidence that was presented at select committee that there is a need for greater enforcement powers to protect our wildlife—particularly our lizards geckos tuatara and also our birds—from unscrupulous people particularly from overseas who are trying to steal what are endangered species to add to the collections both alive and dead of people from overseas who think that they have got a right to come into our country and take what is ours and to put at risk the viability of some of those populations.I know from down in my own patch in Otago with the giant skink—there are very very low numbers of these animals. We all know where they are. They are in a small number of reserves which are often fenced these days to protect them from predators around Macraes near Alexandra and up behind Earnscleugh. It would not take much for those populations to be completely cleaned out and for us to be responsible for the extinction of another species. It is absolutely right that we give the Department of Conservation (DOC) officers the power they need to properly prevent that and therefore I am absolutely supportive of these additional powers of search and seizure that have been given to the Department of Conservation. I thank the Minister for bringing this to the House in the hope that we can make offences less likely or less frequent and that these abuses of New Zealand law will be detected and prevented. So thank you for doing that.Can I mention a submission that was made by the New Zealand Fish & Game Council. Fish & Game New Zealand of course have a delegated responsibility for looking after our game birds in New Zealand amongst other things. The Department of Conservation does not do that in respect of introduced game species—ducks and the like. The fish and game councils throughout New Zealand have been given that role by Parliament they fulfil an important function of managing those species and they do that in a number of ways: they protect habitat—in fact they do more to protect the habitat of those sorts of animals than anyone else; they police bag limits; and they police seasons. So they came along and said that they should have the same powers as are extended to the Department of Conservation. The advice from officials was that they should not. I agreed with officials that they should not have all of those additional powers although not with the logic that was used for that reasoning.The department came and said that because the Department of Conservation are government officials they are bound by a code of conduct which means that it is more appropriate for them to have these extended powers than the Fish & Game Council. I do not think that is a justification. Parliament has seen fit to give this area of power to fish and game councils and if they needed those powers of search and seizure then they should have them. They are bound by the statute and I did not think that the fact that they were not government officials was a point of difference that was relevant.What I did think though was that they did not need powers. So although we do need powers to protect our lizards and geckos and things from being stolen and taken offshore—I have not heard many mallard ducks being targeted by overseas smugglers—I was not convinced that the Fish & Game Council whom I have high regard for and have done a lot of legal work for over the years needed the additional powers. And on the basis that you should not give any government official—whether it is the Fish & Game Council under its delegated powers or the Department of Conservation—any broader powers than they need I did not think they should have the additional powers.But there is one exception and it is one that relates to my Supplementary Order Paper 243. It arises from the fact that under the prosecutorial guidelines for a prosecution to be laid in the courts by the New Zealand Fish & Game Council it has got to include the date of birth of the person who is being prosecuted. Under the prosecutorial guidelines that bind the Fish & Game Council—and it has to comply with—it cannot bring a prosecution for someone hunting without a licence or out of season or with an excess bag limit or using the wrong firearms if it does not know the person's date of birth.It is an absolute nonsense that it has not got the power to require people to give their date of birth. I did not agree that the Fish & Game Council needed the broad suite of powers that had been given to the Department of Conservation. It absolutely does need the power to ask for someone's date of birth; it is not enough that it can get someone's address and name. As Paul Foster-Bell said at select committee he has at periods lived at the same address as his father who shares the same name.Paul Foster-Bell: No it's my grandad.Hon DAVID PARKER: Grandad—your grandfather. Thank you. Sorry Mr Foster-Bell. Therefore in order to differentiate from him and his grandfather in a prosecution sense you have got to be able to have the date of birth. Otherwise you might serve the information on the wrong person. And even if you did not serve it on the wrong person you could not file the prosecution anyway—because the prosecutorial guidelines say that you have got to have the date of birth.So it is an absolute nonsense that the Fish & Game Council have not got the ability to require someone to give them their date of birth because it cannot otherwise meet its statutory duty which we have in Parliament conferred upon it in respect of game birds to have that date of birth. The officials at the time said to us—and it is recorded in the report of the committee; the whole of the committee recorded it—that it would be a useful power for full-time fish and game rangers but it would not be necessary to extend the power to honorary fish and game rangers because honorary rangers are generally accompanied by full-time fish and game rangers.That is what we were told by our departmental advisers. It did not seem right to me and you will see that the minority said that it was not convinced that they should not have the power to ask for or require the date of birth to be given. Sure enough after our report became public Fish & Game contacted I think virtually every member in Parliament to say: Well actually the advice from officials is wrong anyway because most of the prosecutions are carried out by honorary rangers and they're the people who give the infringement notice out." They are good members of civil society. They go through the same training as full-time rangers. It is very similar to the training that is given to DOC rangers—we have had that evidence at select committee that there was no lower quality of training or somehow irresponsible conduct on behalf of honorary rangers. If that was the case we would be taking away the existing powers that they have to get a name and address.So although I did not agree that they should have the power to seize cellphones or other things which we are giving to the Department of Conservation I do agree that they need the power to require someone to give their date of birth to comply with the Government's requirements that they do provide that information when they file information that is charging someone with an infringement. So that is what my Supplementary Order Paper does: it actually gives the power to honorary rangers to ask for a date of birth. I hope that Government members are going to support that because—[Interruption] The Minister shakes her head. Minister I am disappointed. It is an absolute nonsense. It is an absolute nonsense that they have got the power to prosecute they need the power to get a date of birth in order to be able to prosecute and the Minister is saying we are not going to trust them—Paul Foster-Bell: Vigilantes charter.Hon DAVID PARKER: Vigilantism—ha ha! Mr Foster-Bell yes; I am sure that is said in mirth. This is a farcical situation. This is like Yes Minister.I was disappointed that the select committee would not make this common-sense recommendation itself unanimously. If the prosecutorial guidelines require a date of birth it is obvious that those people who are actually doing the prosecuting or writing out the infringement notices that form the basis of the prosecution have to be able to gather the evidence that is required by the Government to be submitted at the time the information or the infringement notice is put into court—which is the date of birth. I do not think that is an infringement of civil liberties. I think it is ridiculous to think that DOC needs that power but that Fish & Game New Zealand does not."