Naylor Jono: Harmful Digital Communications Bill — Referral to Justice and Electoral Committee Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeNaylor Jono: Harmful Digital Communications Bill — Referral to Justice and Electoral Committee Second Reading[Sitting date: 24 March 2015. Volume:704;Page:2546. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JONO NAYLOR (National): When the previous speaker Kris Faafoi was referring to all of the people who would be watching at home tonight I thought we were going to get a “Hi mum.” out of him actually to be honest because his mum and my mum might be the only ones who are watching—if they are not watching the cricket.Kris Faafoi: No no she’s definitely not watching.JONO NAYLOR: No I do not think mine is either to be fair. But anyway the Harmful Digital Communications Bill is a really important piece of legislation and I am really happy to stand and take a call on it. I think one need look no further than the purpose at the beginning of the bill to be able to agree with this bill and to be able to get behind its intent and what is trying to be achieved here. Clause 3 states that its purpose is to “(a) deter prevent and mitigate harm caused to individuals by digital communications; and (b) provide victims of harmful digital communications with a quick and efficient means of redress.”I think it is really important that we do these things. So often in the past things like bullying were swept under the carpet. In fact in days gone by it was perhaps almost an accepted part of society and I think we have moved on as a society to say that we are not going to accept that. But over the passage of time that bullying has been around and even—as the previous speaker alluded to—in the short space of time since I left school things have moved on. Technology has moved on and our legislation for dealing with the ill-effects of bullying also needs to keep up with those changes in technology. I was thinking about when I was at high school a couple of moons ago that if somebody wanted to circulate—Carmel Sepuloni: A couple of moons?JONO NAYLOR: Yes at least a couple of moons.Hon Member: A blue moon.JONO NAYLOR: A blue moon—no it was not that. It was a long time ago anyway since I left school. If you wanted to circulate some sort of offensive picture of somebody—of something that just happened to happen—you would first need to go and find a camera then go and take a picture of some description then wait until your film was finished then go down to the local chemist shop and get the photo developed then either put it on a Gestetner machine or perhaps a little bit further on go to the photocopying place photocopy it and then go and distribute it to as many people as you could find. There was not a lot of that going on in those times; but nowadays of course it is simple. If somebody sees something that they think could catch somebody in a compromising position they can simply whip the phoneout of their pocket—which most people carry—take a photo and instantly have that compromising photo or whatever circulated right around the globe.So although in the past we had this stuff going on as I said it took multiple steps; we can do it quickly and easily now. It was no less harmful in the old days if somebody took those measures but usually as has been alluded to previously by speakers old-school bullying if you like—that is the way to describe it—was often instantaneous and easy to deal with instantly. But actually in this digital age things can be said circulated and control lost of the offending statements or pictures or whatever. They can be spread far and wide and that maintains the harm over a longer period of time for the victims.I spent a period of time as a high school guidance counsellor and although at times my office felt like an episode of Dr. Phil with some of the types of things that kids used to come in and talk to me about there were at times some very serious issues that I had to deal with. Those were often to do with bullying and the impact of young people’s behaviour on one another. Even 15 years ago—it was only the start of the cyber age I guess; texting was just becoming a bit fashionable—we were starting to see that kind of thing come into play. I saw firsthand the impact of such behaviour on young people. I think then it is beholden on us to ensure that we have things in place to protect those young people and to deal with those issues when they are confronted with them.There has been a lot of focus today on and tonight I have heard people talking about the criminal aspects of this and how it is going to laden the District Courts with more work and all that kind of thing. Well if that is what is required in order to clean it up and if we are not going to pass laws because they are going to make courts busier boy are we on a slippery slope as far as making legislation is concerned. This is not just about complaints that can be taken to the District Court and I think that is the beauty of this legislation. At the moment if somebody does want to make a complaint really it is very hard to deal with it other than by formally going to the police and going through the court system to get it dealt with. But this legislation empowers the establishment of an agency that is able to deal with these matters in a more timely way—and perhaps a more appropriate way—than going through the District Court system.I have heard people on the other side of the House saying: “Well we don’t know what this agency is going to do. We don’t know how much funding it’s going to have.” We do not always have to set those things up before we pass the legislation to empower it to be set up. We need to actually pass this legislation. We need to keep it moving through the process so that we can empower an agency to be set up and we can sort out the details once we have got this foundation stone—which is the legislation on which to build this agency—firmly planted in the ground.I believe the agency itself will provide a buffer when addressing some issues. It will mean that you do not have to go directly to the police or directly to the courts and go through all of the strict legal process involved with that. I think that the processes and powers that have been given to the agency by this legislation are sensible and that they deal with things appropriately. The functions and powers of the approved agency will be firstly to receive and assess complaints about harm caused to individuals by digital communications—that is good. Secondly the agency will investigate complaints—well of course complaints need to be investigated. I think this is an important factor that has been brushed over a little bit in the dramatic debate happening on the other side of the House. They are saying that it is going to impact on the courts and that it is just going to make criminals out of all sorts of people. Clause 8(1)(c) is incredibly useful because the agency is empowered “to use advice negotiation mediation and persuasion (as appropriate) to resolve complaints:”.As I alluded to before in the experiences that I used to have in my high school guidance counsellor’s office there was sometimes dramatic action that needed to be taken and appropriate authorities that needed to be notified in cases of sexual abuse or otherwise and there was a process to go through. Sometimes as I said my office looked a little bit more like a Dr. Phil episode and so you needed to negotiate and mediate and persuade and resolve complaints as required. And so for those offences that are on the lower threshold of the types of behaviour that we are talking about in this legislation that is entirely appropriate.I want to commend this bill to the House. I also want to say that the establishment and provision within this process of professional leaders in schools is also a really important part of the puzzle. Young people—and there have been lots of talk about this lately—do not always have the confidence to go and lay a complaint themselves. It can be a big deal if you have been bullied if you have been the victim of this kind of behaviour to necessarily stand up and say it is not OK and to go and try to take some sort of action about it. In the past professionals like teachers and principals or otherwise have been able to support students to take those actions. They have been able to encourage them to take those actions. But this legislation with the consent of the student involved actually allows that professional leader within the school to actually go and lodge the complaint themselves on behalf of the student. I think this is a critically important piece of this bill because what it does is it takes the onus off the young person from having to step up to actually put themselves forward and perhaps face further humiliation and enables them to come in behind the protection of a professional leader who will act on their behalf.This bill is sensible. This bill is exactly what we need to do to start working harder to keep our young people safe and to improve outcomes for young people in Aotearoa New Zealand. Thank you.