Simpson ScottHon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): Thank you Madam Speaker. I rise on behalf of the National Party in this first reading debate on the Maritime Powers Bill. As has already been indicated by a couple of my colleagues earlier in the debate the National Party will support this bill at least to select committee so that it can undergo the benefit of select committee scrutiny receive submissions and have the benefit of a parliamentary process. But in doing so there are a number of issues that we on this side of the House have with this bill and matters that we will want to tease out at select committee and that we will want to hear from submitters on and they relate particularly to issues surrounding civil liberties.Now there are several basic fundamental principles that the National Party adheres to and has done for more than 80 years now and one of those is to recognise and enshrine the inalienable rights of human beings. We also always rise to protect the sanctity of our unwritten constitution and we celebrate the history of the democracy that is our liberal democracy. When we see legislation coming from a socialist Labour left party that is advancing the powers of the State and giving to a range of interested people powers of search seizure and detention we want to know why and for what justification. No one on this side is arguing that we should not be policing carefully thoroughly and diligently our vast marine exclusive economic zone. We are blessed to have one of the largest marine footprints on the globe and it would be a whole lot easier if this Government actually passed the Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary legislation that's been sitting on the Order Paper now for nearly four years. It's had a select committee process; it just needs a second reading and a third reading and we would be away. But no this is a Government that pays lip service to marine protection and to a sanctuary that could be the fourth-largest marine sanctuary on the planet.So we are worried about some of the civil liberties issues and extending powers of the State when they are extended should be done carefully with full consideration. This is a bill that would give powers of arrest search and seizure and powers to detain to people as diverse as conservation and endangered species officers. Now I'm just concerned and wonder whether they are the appropriate people to be enforcing our vast marine area. Yes we should extend those powers to warranted and sworn officers who have gone through thorough and detailed training. And so I would have thought—and this would be an interesting point to hear at select committee—that we as a sovereign nation would have been better to actually ensure that marine protection services were better resourced better manned and had the ability to do what is being asked now of conservation and endangered species officers.So we'll be looking at select committee to see whether there is sufficient justification for this. And it's bizarre: it's a long time since I studied law at the University of Auckland but the people that taught constitutional law—and I'm thinking of Tim McBride for instance—would be just apoplectic at the thought that a Labour Government would be introducing laws of this sort that extended the powers of the State to what appear to be unwarranted untrained officers and to give them such wide-ranging powers. It used to be the socialist Labour left that were the ones who were the apparent bastions of civil liberties and human rights and the protections that the State should not extend into people's lives. So yes by all means protect and police and make sure that our marine space is guarded but do it with people who are appropriate who have been properly trained and properly resourced. So we'll be looking at those sorts of issues closely at select committee and we will support it through to select committee.