Peters Winston: Urgent Debates — Dotcom Case—Inquiry into Government Communications Security Bureau Actions 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Peters Winston: Urgent Debates — Dotcom Case—Inquiry into Government Communications Security Bureau Actions 
[Sitting date: 27 September 2012. Volume:684;Page:5765. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 I think the best illustration of the Government’s position today was the speech by the Attorney-General because that has got to be the weakest defence of colleagues and a Prime Minister that this Parliament has seen for a long long time. But just to make sure that he felt he was judicially superior to the rest of us he warned us not to go into the legal details here or offshore because we would be walking what he said was a very fine line. Well right now we are not walking any line at all because we do not know what is going on and the Prime Minister is the most guilty party in that level of State ignorance. 
There will inevitably be a diplomatic fallout with the US surrounding this case. This is a Government that keeps on going offshore and talking about punching above our weight and being able to be carved apart in foreign affairs in terms of our numbers and yet still perform and still be efficient and the first time that there is a test internationally of its ability it comes up found wanting. It is going to leave us as a laughing stock on the international stage. The FBI on the other side of the world and the New Zealand Police knew more about the residency status of Kim Dotcom than our top-notch intelligence agency. It is a shame to say this. These two agencies the SIS and the Government Communications Security Bureau are meant to evince the word “intelligence”. It means “information” and the capacity to gain it and acquire it in the national interest. Do they deserve such a name? 
All this bungling means two things are going to happen. First of all there needs to be a full-scale inquiry because the Neazor inquiry does not answer any of the questions that now the public and the media are screaming out to have answered. The second thing is the Prime Minister had better face up with his Cabinet to the fact that their bungling and incompetence on this matter leads to potentially tens of millions of dollars of compensation going from the hard-working New Zealand taxpayers whom they pretend to be on the side of to a man called Kim Dotcom. 
I am not going to waste the speech on the rest of that but say this: this is a very profound issue. Public faith and confidence in our Government and its agencies has been deeply shaken. It is a long time since I have seen a media scrum where they are in total unanimous disbelief that this could be happening in their country. The junior whip can frown over there as though it is of no moment. Well it is of big moment down in Taupo I can tell you because they will be paying out this compensation in time and they are as concerned as everybody else that we look like a First World nation but I have never seen a media scrum so—not confused—bewildered that this could be the way you handle an issue like this. Internationally our friends must be scratching their heads in bewilderment. What on earth has been going on? 
The unlawful action of the GCSB is an issue that goes to the heart of our democracy. This is because the agencies that guard our freedom and security are given exceptional powers and we do that grudgingly. They are given exceptional powers grudgingly. This is because they guard our freedom and security. We put immense trust in them to follow due process and observe both the letter and the spirit of the law. What the unlawful GCSB surveillance has revealed is that there has been systemic failure across a whole range of agencies—not just one but a whole range of agencies—and most important the ministerial oversight has not just failed it seemingly never existed. It never existed. 
What we have had from the Prime Minister on this issue is simply dereliction of duty another example of his “spray and walk away” approach to politics—“spray and walk away”—as though that will fix it. Of course he should resign. If any other Minister had been that incompetent this Prime Minister would have fired him. And we are saying “Prime Minister fire yourself.” That is how bad your performance has been. The public has been expected to swallow a most astonishing tale. Everyone but the PM knew what was afoot and what was going on. The most powerful man in the country claims that he was in the dark. Just down the road from his electoral office is one of the most plush mansions in the whole country with one of the biggest characters this country has ever seen and the office had been visited twice by Kim Dotcom’s staff and the Prime Minister did not know. They have a massive $500000 Guy Fawkes in Auckland and the PM the man who always has his finger on the pulse did not know. Seemingly all his colleagues over there did not know either. Who believes that? His negligence evasion and incompetence mark a new low in prime ministerial performance. Can you imagine Holyoake behaving like that or Norman Kirk or Muldoon or for that matter Bolger or Clark? Can you imagine them taking those views and treating those responsibilities in such a cavalier fashion? Can you imagine them behaving like that? 
The public wants and is entitled to plain speaking and straightforward answers. We must now have a full-scale inquiry with no stone left unturned with all agencies involved. The police the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet the SIS Crown Law the Government Communications Security Bureau and all the relevant Ministers must be asked to account fully for the part they have played in the fiasco. You cannot say it is a matter of the law—that they did not understand the law. Crikey! You have got all manner of immigration agencies and junior lawyers handling immigration matters and they all understand what a permanent resident is. Even this man who cannot speak English all that well but he is acquiring a lot of knowledge now that he is living here as a permanent resident—he is a foreigner—understands the law better than our intelligence agency. Is that possible? Well it defies credibility. 
The Neazor report answers nothing. It raises more questions than it answers. What is at the heart of this fiasco? A Prime Minister who is a CV Prime Minister. He does not take the job seriously but he loves travelling with all the security agents. He goes off to the mansions in Hawaii with a whole planeload of New Zealand security guys and at whose expense? Well I am talking to them right now if they are watching TV. We are all paying. He goes for a coffee uptown along with four security officers. It is unbelievable. I have never seen that before. He loves the job but when it comes to the responsibility—that is the hard yards of doing the research doing some work—no no no. This is a typical Merrill Lynch wide boy. 
Denis O’Rourke 
: Smile and spin. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Oh smile and spin and move on. Decision this hour move on next hour next hour move on—never take responsibility because you do not have to have an enduring principle of accountability when you are a Merrill Lynch man. He would not read the police report on John Banks. He said he knew nothing about his rail shares. He had 15 meetings with the Government Communications Security Bureau this year—15 meetings—and we are asked to believe that Kim Dotcom never came up. Well what on earth did that was more important? What were the other things that came up that were more important than Kim Dotcom given that our relations with the United States are important? 
It all comes down to the question of responsibility. Now is the time for our Prime Minister to take full responsibility and resolve this issue clearly and have a full-scale inquiry. Every time he has answered questions in this House he has been found wanting. “Mr Spray and Walk Away” the man who loves three-party handshakes the man who will go to the opening of an envelope the man who loves mincing on the fashion walks but when it comes to defending the integrity the reputation and the character of our country he thinks it is of no matter whatsoever and that he should not even bother even though he sits there with the warrant for both the SIS and the Government Communications Security Bureau. No substance is what the Prime Minister is evincing and indicating now and the sooner his colleagues wake up the better because I am afraid that more of this behaviour means it is goodnight nurse for you at the next election.