Cosgrove Clayton: Immigration Bill — In Committee 
Cosgrove Clayton: Immigration Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:657;Page:6766] 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 I want to make a couple of brief comments on this part as we have an alumni of former and obviously current Ministers of Immigration. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: It’s a big club. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: It is a big club as my colleague says. The issue of deportation is dealt with in Part 6 and as a former Minister of Immigration I participated in and I believe signed off a few deportations. I say to Keith Locke that every immigration decision—and I am sure the Minister will agree—is a unique decision. None that I dealt with was a mirror copy of another. 
When it comes to deporting human beings in respect of national security I have to tell that member that I support the clauses in this bill. And if it came to a decision—and I was party I think to one—I would err on the side of the defence of our country even if I got it wrong. The worst that could happen I have to say in deporting a person where there was evidence—and the member cited a case that he believes was wrong—is that somebody an individual is deported. I recall the case the member was talking about and I do not believe the decision was wrong. But let us just for a moment say hypothetically that it was wrong. Well when it comes to the balance between minimal damage to an individual or his or her reputation and protecting the people of this country I know where I stand. I put New Zealand before that person. 
The member says that it is possible even with the safeguards of going to Cabinet and to the Governor-General for an Order in Council—and I sat in on one of those particular cases—for a decision to be wrong. Politicians and departmental officials are only human so it is possible that information may be wrong. Information provided by intelligence agencies to officials to the Minister or to Cabinet may be wrong. But somebody at some point I say to that member has to make a call. 
I say again to the member Keith Locke that he ought to think very very carefully about the comments he makes. Maybe one day in the future he will be placed in a position where he is required to make a decision and have a role in such a case. I have to say to that member that if it came down to it again I would not change a thing. A Minister is reliant as is a lay person on the information provided. I do not think that many former Ministers of Immigration have ever been experts on immigration. In fact I suspect that many of us have never been experts in either the portfolios we hold now or the ones we have held previously. We have to make decisions—and when it comes to the national security of this country I would not change a thing. I would not change a decision I have made. 
The counterfactual is pretty simple. If a Minister does not believe the intelligence or the advice from officials who generally are the specialists and the Minister lets a person stay and the decision goes wrong who pays for that? I suspect that it will not be Mr Locke me or the current Minister. Nobody in this Parliament would personally pay for that decision. It would be the innocent folks outside this Chamber the innocent families outside this Chamber who would be on the receiving end of potentially a terrorist act. 
So although I respect Mr Locke’s view I have to say—as one who has sat in the Minister of Immigration’s seat along with colleagues who are former Ministers of Immigration and Minister Coleman who sits in the seat now—that these decisions are not made lightly. These decisions generally take an exhaustive amount of research and we have to rely on the intelligence we get. I again ask Mr Locke to think through the practicality of his stance on this issue. 
I recall speeches made by Mr Locke after 9/11 and I recall saying to Mr Locke that I would have liked him to just occasionally make comments in remembrance of the 3000 innocent individuals who died at the hands of terrorists. I challenged Mr Locke at the time— 
Keith Locke 
: I did—several times. 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE 
: The member said he did; I take him at his word. But I ask him to put himself in the shoes of the people who are on the receiving end. 
I conclude by saying again to Mr Locke that if I was in the seat that Minister Coleman is in now and if I received evidence and intelligence that I believed was credible and if it was a decision about removing somebody on the basis of the information I was given and protecting the citizens of this country I know where my duty lies. I know where it lay and I know where it would lie in the future. The duty of every politician in this Chamber is to protect New Zealand’s citizens. If that means getting it wrong because we are human so be it. 
The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 31 in the name of Keith Locke to clause 152 be agreed to.