Turei Metiria: Oral Questions — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeTurei Metiria: Oral Questions — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 10 November 2015. Volume:710;Page:7796. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]7.METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister in charge of the NZ Security Intelligence Service: Does he stand by all of his answers to Oral Question No. 2 on 5 November 2015?Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (Minister in charge of the NZ Security Intelligence Service): Yes although in response to a supplementary question from James Shaw asking when I was first made aware that the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service had not provided a copy of two visual warrants to the inspector-general I replied: “From memory about a fortnight before the inspector-general released her report.” I have now checked the exact date. I can advise the House I was made aware on 28 October 2015.Metiria Turei: Given that the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Act explicitly states that the director must provide copies of visual surveillance warrants to the inspector-general does he believe that Rebecca Kitteridge breached the law by not doing so?Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: What I certainly believe is that the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service did not comply with a reporting requirement in the legislation but I also need to say to the House that the inspector-general has not raised any issues regarding the propriety or the lawfulness of the warrants themselves. Both the director and the commissioner and I all read reviewed and approved the warrants for issue in our respective capacities. The failure was the failure to comply with a reporting requirement.Metiria Turei: On what date did the Minister first review the two visual surveillance warrants?Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: I do not carry that level of detail around in my head and even if I did I would not say because that would be a sensitive issue that could give rise to issues about who was being surveilled.Metiria Turei: After the Minister approved the two visual surveillance warrants did he immediately follow up with the director to ensure that she had a plan to send those warrants to the inspector-general?Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: I do not think the member understands the procedure. I do not approve warrants. The director makes an application to me. The Commissioner of Security Warrants and I both look at the matter and then sign them out. In answer to the particular question—“Did I say ‘Has the reporting requirement been complied with?’ ”—no. I would regard that as an operational issue.Metiria Turei: Why did he not follow up with the director to ensure she had followed the reporting requirements in his new legislation over the many weekly meetings he had between signing off on those visual warrants and being finally told that the reporting had not been done?Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: I do not think the member listened to the previous answer. I regard compliance with reporting operations as being an operational matter. I have every confidence in the director to attend to those matters. She is now putting in place steps to ensure that there is no repeat of this failure to comply with a reporting issue.Metiria Turei: On what basis does the Minister have confidence in the director when for a number of months during which she had weekly meetings with him she failed to advise him that she had not completed the reporting requirements set out in new legislation that he had passed just a few months before?Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: That is not the correct chronology. The director advised me that she first became aware of the issue on 19 October. When we had our first regular meeting after Labour Weekend she pointed out the issue to me she apologised—as I said in answer to a question from Mr Shaw last week—and she has put in place steps to ensure that this reporting requirement is complied with in the future. That is what I expect of her. She is a very competent and trustworthy person and I expect that this will be done.Metiria Turei: How can the public have any faith in his statements of the competence and trustworthiness of the director when she did not give the inspector-general copies of the warrants as she was required to under his new legislation and she failed to tell him about that failure over many months of weekly meetings or does he blame himself given he failed to follow up and check that the law had been complied with?Hon CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON: The member is choosing to create a narrative to make this into a first-grade federal crime. The fact of the matter is it was a failure to report to the inspector-general. As soon as the director found out about it she told me and has put in place steps. I ask the honourable member to bear in mind that the propriety of the warrants and the steps taken to see that the warrants were properly executed were all complied with under the law. This was a reporting requirement.