Dunne Peter: Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Dunne Peter: Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:615;Page:11245] 
Hon PETER DUNNE (Leader—United Future) 
: 
 I want to make two points with regard to the title clause of the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Amendment Bill. Firstly I want to respond to some of the comments that have just been made and to draw the Committee’s attention to relevant sections of the explanatory note. This bill implements New Zealand’s commitments under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. It is part of that agreement which we signed in October 2002 but have not yet implemented by ratification. The agreement sets out in detail—and I quote from the explanatory note—“the privileges and immunities that the International Criminal Court (the ICC) its Judges and others associated with the court enjoy while in the territory of a State Party on ICC business.” In other words the inclusion of the range of provisions that the member who preceded me referred to is not a matter of New Zealand arbitrarily acting to include certain people; it is a matter of New Zealand recognising the commitment it entered into when it signed the agreement in October 2002 to be party to the establishment of an international criminal court. That is the beginning and the end of that issue. So any talk of a need to amend the title of the bill in that instance is in my view spurious. 
The second point I want to make though does relate to the title of the bill particularly given Supplementary Order Paper 190 which now brings diplomatic officers of the European Union within the ambit of this legislation. In the second reading debate on this bill I raised a concern that we were dealing with only a part of the issue because there is a companion piece of legislation to the Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Act called the Consular Privileges and Immunities Act which is word for word identical to that particular Act. 
Stephen Franks 
: That’s not for crooks. 
Hon PETER DUNNE 
: If the member bears with me he will get the point that I am coming to. I was about to say before he interjected that this issue is not so much of relevance to the International Criminal Court as to the amendment to the bill that comes in by way of the Supplementary Order Paper relating to the European Union because that amendment does potentially introduce the issue of consular representation by the European Union. 
Stephen Franks 
: That’s fine. 
Hon PETER DUNNE 
: I agree with the member that that is fine. But if the member just bears with me he will find the point I am making is that in bringing a provision into this bill that deals with diplomatic privileges and immunities it may well be in time we will need to make a similar amendment in respect of consular privileges and immunities with regard to any officers of the European Union. In that event it would seem to me more logical that the entire Diplomatic Privileges and Immunities Act and the Consular Privileges and Immunities Act which are currently separate pieces of legislation be brought together as one because the provisions in them are broadly identical. 
I make the point that if there was to be a change in the title of this bill it should be to reflect the fact that this legislation deals potentially with consular privileges and immunities as well as diplomatic privileges and immunities which is what the bill contains. That is not particularly relevant with regard to the provisions of the bill as they relate to the International Criminal Court and I do not imagine even in its most extreme flights of fancy that it will open anything of the equivalent of consular offices anywhere. But it is relevant potentially in the context of the extension of the provisions in the Supplementary Order Paper to include the European Union and any moves that that union may make once it establishes its office in Wellington—for example to establish sub-offices as it does in Auckland Christchurch or other parts of the country. At that point we would need to consider the issue of any potential privileges by way of consular immunity to be extended to those staff and as the law stands at the moment this Parliament would find itself having to pass separate legislation to give effect to those privileges. 
So my point is that maybe we ought to consider at some point in the future— and the title gives rise to the debate—wrapping the two pieces of legislation up in one and having a “Diplomatic and Consular Privileges and Immunities Act”. That would then allow all those things to be dealt with in one place rather than in the piecemeal way that inevitably is the case at the moment. Every time we wish to extend recognition to a country we do so firstly by way of extending diplomatic privileges and then at a subsequent point we determine whether we want to extend consular privileges. That seems to me to be an unnecessarily protracted process and I think the time is overdue for a review of it. That does not mean the Government would automatically extend both privileges to a country but it would have the option of extending either privilege.