Twyford Phil: Customs and Excise (Prohibition of Imports Made by Slave Labour) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Twyford Phil: Customs and Excise (Prohibition of Imports Made by Slave Labour) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:656;Page:5297] 
PHIL TWYFORD (Labour) 
: 
 Our world is becoming smaller and our lives more interdependent as the forces of globalisation draw us together. Through travel through modern communications and more than anything else through the power of global markets almost every one of us every day—when we put on our clothes in the morning drink a cup of coffee pull on our sunglasses or reach for the cellphone to make a call—is touched by the lives of workers who made the products. That is the case whether those workers are garment factory workers in southern China coffee farmers in Ethiopia or child miners in the Congo extracting the cadmium that goes into the batteries of our cellphones. Globalisation has unleashed huge economic potential but our humanity surely demands that we consider the ethical implications of that interdependence. 
The Customs and Excise (Prohibition of Imports Made by Slave Labour) Amendment Bill brought to the House tonight by my colleague the Hon Maryan Street asks us to do just that: to consider that products from certain countries where modern slavery continues should be kept out of New Zealand as a protest against the persistence of this plague which most of us thought had finished in the 1800s. Cocoa from West Africa rubber from West Africa for car tyres underwear made in Burma and jewellery and handmade rugs from South Asia—all of those products come into New Zealand today and each of them carries the significant risk that it was made by slave labour. Surely in the 20th century we can take a strong unambiguous stand against slavery by banning the fruits of forced labour from our shores. 
It is extraordinary to say it or think it but according to Anti-Slavery International more than 12 million people in the world today are living in slavery whether they are workers on cocoa plantations in West Africa or child labourers working in the carpet industries of Nepal India and Pakistan. Slavery is unambiguously prohibited by international law and is considered to be a crime against humanity yet it continues. There is hereditary slavery in Mauretania and Niger and debt bondage in India Nepal Pakistan Bolivia Paraguay and Peru. In Haiti only last month the UN human rights rapporteur said that thousands of unpaid child labourers are trapped in a form of modern slavery. There are regular reports in the news media of parents in China selling their children into slavery. 
The bill amends the Customs and Excise Act to make goods produced in whole or in part by slave labour prohibited imports. It will require some research into which products are made by slave labour. Our foreign affairs officials told the Foreign Affairs Defence and Trade Committee when it was considering Trade Aid’s petition that doing such research would be too difficult a hurdle to get over. It may not be easy but we currently have a ban as my colleagues have pointed out on goods made by prison labour which is allowed by international trade laws. Surely having that is sufficient precedent to convince the doubters and the nitpickers. 
I congratulate Trade Aid—New Zealand’s fair trade movement—on its campaign on this issue. I also congratulate my colleague the Hon Maryan Street on sponsoring the bill and Charles Chauvel on drafting it. I urge colleagues on all sides of the House to consider the magnitude of evil represented by modern slavery and then to consider what is being asked of this House here and now. Can we not do our bit as global citizens to marginalise and stigmatise those who would trade in the products of slave labour? Is it really so difficult to do what is right? 
I listened to the Hon Tim Groser tonight wax lyrical about the complexities of global supply chains and the fact that many products today comprise component parts from different sources. I listened to Todd McClay talk about “blood diamonds” and how it took the entire world coming together to find a solution. No one is saying tonight that trade bans can solve every problem. No one is saying it would be easy or simple to make a difference. But this measure would send a powerful message in that New Zealand would be joining the US and Belgium in taking a stand and putting this ban into legislation.