Nash StuartHon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Thank you very much Mr Chair. Unlike the last member David Bennett I'd like to just talk about a couple of issues in the bill. I just have a couple of questions around process really that hopefully the Minister will answer. I mean I agree with the previous member—Hon Amy Adams: No you don't. You're filibustering—be honest. We can see it.Hon STUART NASH: Leadership bid started already. We're going to hear it. They're all going to line up and they're all going to have a go every time there's something on. Get the face on TV and go hard—go hard Amy. Here we go. In the Hansard—filibustering.There's no leadership bids going on here; I actually have some real genuine questions for the Minister.Ian McKelvie: Ask him after hours.Hon STUART NASH: Are you going to put your hand up for the leadership as well Mr McKelvie? Go hard. Or does it mean because he's sitting beside Amy that he's—he's asking Amy at the moment What can you give me if I vote?" Here we go. It's all beginning. And then he's going to go and someone else is going to come and sit down. We're going to have this all night. They're going to come in and out. It's going to be the best show in town.Anyway anyway here we go. Back to the bill—and thank you very much Mr Chair; I was just a bit distracted by that member having a go and I thought—anyway. Clause 233 talks about "Notification of certain matters".Hon Member: Yeah that's important.Hon STUART NASH: And it is important because what it says here is the director-general—and this is important—"… must—(a) publish the notice or notification that it has been issued in the Gazette;" and this is how notices have been communicated to the general public in the trade for time immemorial. But what it does say here it talks about "where the Director-General considers it practicable cause the notice to be brought to the attention of persons likely to be affected … by [the] notice [ by] publication in any newspaper or trade journal".The question I have here is what is the test when we talk about "considers it practicable"? The reason I ask that is that it is very easy for the director-general to say to any notice "Let's just put this in the trade journal or let's put it in a little public notice in any newspaper." The concern I have about these notices is they do affect the health and well-being of a business. If someone has made a decision based on a certain regulation or something then the director-general issues a notice—and they should be looking in the Gazette but I actually think this should be published; this must be published in trade journals or we must do whatever we can to actually get that information out there to people who are likely to be affected.And again what is the test around "likely to be affected"? Is that a test that the director-general him or herself is going to make? Or is it actually an objective test? But we can move away from this if we say that they must be published in trade journals or in newspapers. It is not a hard test—or even if we specify a newspaper over a readership of say 100000 so we know it's going to go in the Dominion Post or the New Zealand Herald etc. It's not hard to give effect to. The last thing I would want to see is these notices just published in the Gazette when it would've been really easy for the director-general just to direct his or her staff to put it in trade journals. It just makes it a lot easier. It is very important as the last member alluded to for the integrity of the system that people have the ability to get the information required to undertake business.Another point I'd like a bit of clarification on is new section 118A inserted by clause 234. This talks about "Automated electronic systems". I'm assuming—and I could be wrong here—reading new section 118A we're talking about an email system. But I'm not too sure if my assumption's correct. It says here "The Director-General"—and again I'm quoting—"may arrange for the use of an automated electronic system to do the actions" and the actions are "(a) [the] exercising a power: (b) carrying out a function: (c) carrying out a duty:" so they're quite important. But again under what circumstances or what safeguards are in place to ensure that the director-general's actions are actually communicated and received?If we go to new section 118A(4) subparagraph (a) and (b) it says "The Director-General may make an arrangement only if satisfied that—" and I quote "(a) the system has the capacity to do the action with reasonable reliability;". And this is where my concern rests. What is the definition of "reasonable reliability"? Is it the fact that the director-general has communicated with this person or this organisation more than once and got a reply? Or is it an assumption because someone has got an email address that they're going to receive the message? What is the test around that?What it does say is it talks about and I quote—this is new section 118A(4)(b)—"(b) a process is available under which a person affected by an action done by the system can have the action reviewed"—I know I'm going on a bit here but it's important—"by a person described … without undue delay." Again I'm not too sure what the definition of "undue delay" might be. Because we're talking about notices here that can have an impact on someone's business. Is "undue delay" within 24 hours? Is it within a week? Is it within a month? So just a little bit of guidance around what undue delay actually represents. The reason I ask these questions is I would hate for the judiciary to have to interpret what these are because someone comes forward and says "I did not receive the notice. You might've sent me an email but I was out of the country." or "That email isn't used." and the Ministry for Primary Industries says "Well we believed that you'd received this without undue delay and we expected you would get it within a day." and the person says "I was in Uzbekistan. I wasn't back for a week—I was negotiating some sort of trade deal—undue delay?" So I just think a little bit of a clarification around that.The other thing it says and this is quite interesting because what it does say—Ian McKelvie: You've got to remember this speech'll be on record.Hon STUART NASH: Mr McKelvie will be interested in this—Hon David Bennett: We want to hear about Greg. Greg O'Connor's cowshed is better than this.Hon STUART NASH: —and certainly Mr Bennett will be interested in this because I know that Mr Bennett's passion as a dairy farmer is food safety. For the first time I heard someone from a former Government talk about "Brand New Zealand"—from the dairy industry. How ironic now that we're putting all this sort of stuff in place. Mr Bennett used to give me a lot of gyp about talking about "Brand New Zealand" but here we are.So this is new section 118A(6) and it says and I quote—Hon David Bennett: Say "Brand New Zealand" again. Say it with a deep voice. Say it like a man.Hon STUART NASH: A dairy farmer—talk about "Brand New Zealand". They're the ones that get the benefit and yet some of them—not Mr Bennett; he's a dairy farmer that acts I know with integrity but some don't and I would like to see Mr Bennett hold more of them to account.Anyway we're talking about the previous bill or the bill before the bill. But anyway what it says here—and this is most interesting—and I quote "The Director-General must consult the Privacy Commissioner about including in an arrangement actions that involve the collection or use of personal information." So what does this actually mean? So does this mean that every time the director-general goes out to a supplier or a customer or someone who is involved in this and asks for personal information—I mean I'm assuming personal information is also about business information and where do you live what's the address of your company etc.—that they're going to have to consult the Privacy Commissioner? Or is the Privacy Commissioner going actually to come up with a ruling that states that this is the sort of information that the director-general can collect with impunity? I would suspect that every time the Privacy Commissioner sent out an automated electronic notice or request—i.e. let's assume it's an email—that asks for personal information it will be incredibly onerous if they have to go to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner and get a ruling on whether they can actually collect the information they're asking for.The reason I ask this is that we are operating in the 21st century. I am all for automated electronic systems. We need to move to the 21st century where electronic systems are the norm they're the way of doing business because let's be honest about this writing letters and that sort of carry on isn't the way forward. So we've got to just get this sorted. Whenever someone asks you know "Mr McKelvie's a farmer can I collect information from him?" going to the Privacy Commissioner to ask if they can actually collect this information I would've thought could be quite onerous.I'm just after a little bit of clarification about what this actually means but also what we're trying to achieve here. We have got systems like the New Zealand Business Number for example on which a supplier a business or a sole trader can enter all the information required. So I'm just sort of wondering what sort of personal information we're trying to collect that would require a trip to the Privacy Commissioner. The Privacy Commissioner is an office we hold in high integrity—there's no doubt about that. The Privacy Commissioner must and I totally agree be satisfied that the information that is being requested is done so for a proper reason.Hon Member: Oh of course.Hon STUART NASH: Absolutely. So I'm just seeing where we're coming from on this. The interesting thing the last point I'll make in the last 13 seconds is in new clause 118B(2) inserted by section 234 it says "An action allowed or required by this Act done by the system—… (b) is not invalid by virtue only of the fact that it is done by [a] system." I look at this and I wonder what this actually means."