Mahuta Nanaia: Video Camera Surveillance (Temporary Measures) Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Mahuta Nanaia: Video Camera Surveillance (Temporary Measures) Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:676;Page:21825] 
Hon NANAIA MAHUTA (Labour—Hauraki-Waikato) 
: 
 I am pleased to take a third reading call on the Video Camera Surveillance (Temporary Measures) Bill and to have been a member on the Justice and Electoral Committee. The contributions to this debate from the first reading to now have been thoughtful and a lot of issues of principle have been brought to the House to consider. 
That is not to mention at the outset the issue of retrospective law change. When this bill was introduced I said in this House that as a parliamentarian I found it difficult to entertain retrospective law changes because I believed that the threshold was quite high and that we should err on the side of caution when we make any consideration of that sort. When this bill was introduced with the wider ambit of retrospective law change I had a big pause and thought no we need to think further about this. 
My colleagues Charles Chauvel and David Parker have both outlined the Search and Surveillance Bill as being the broader framework by which search and surveillance powers could be better addressed in an ideal world. That bill has been delayed for far too long in this House. 
I say from my perspective in the time I was Minister of Customs in the last Government that the search and surveillance powers of border agencies need to be far more sophisticated than many lay people will ever know. It is not about just domestic crime; it is about the international crime networks that New Zealand must be in a position to respond to. When we were considering the prospective powers of police to utilise covert video surveillance we were very clear on the Labour benches that they need those types of powers going forward to ensure that they can enforce the law as it is intended to be in order to keep our communities and our citizens safe. We were very clear about the prospective powers of the police going forward. 
Again at the first reading we raised the issues of civil liberties. Whenever one ascribes powers to the police they must be balanced with protections for the public. We were very mindful that the bill was somewhat lopsided ascribing powers to the police without adequate protections for the public. That matter had to be considered somewhat through the select committee process. I am glad that we had that process. 
The other issue we needed to question was the Government’s claim at the time it introduced this bill that 40 or 50 cases would simply lapse or have to be released as a result of these changes not going through. Well in fact when we got to the select committee and heard submissions from the New Zealand Law Society the police and some legal experts what they were saying was that provisions within the existing law could deal with those types of issues. They all urged us to reconsider retrospective changes which did not need to be applied to these particular cases. 
One of the benefits that I had from the expertise that came to the select committee was to understand the nature of the difference for those people who have already been convicted and are currently serving time. We gained greater clarity as a result of the select committee process to make clear that those cases should be left alone and that they should remain untouched and be treated as the law was understood to have applied prior to 2 September. 
This is a temporary fix. I am glad that the time has been shortened from 12 months to 6 months. It does put urgency on the next Parliament to pass the Search and Surveillance Bill. No matter who is on the Government benches the general public needs to know that that bill has already gone through a full and comprehensive select committee process. It has some support across the House and it addresses this issue of balance of interest between the public good and powers ascribed to enforcement agencies but also it is very prescriptive as to which enforcement agencies should have certain powers. I regret that in the solution that has been agreed to by the House today the warranting method of ascribing powers to the police for covert video surveillance was not able to be achieved but this was somewhat offset against shortening the time for this temporary measure to go forward. 
There was nothing more compelling for me in the select committee than two lots of evidence. The first bit of evidence was from the legal profession and it affirmed in my view the view that Labour took at the very outset with this bill that there must be a strong balance between the rights of citizens and the rights of the police that that balance must be made clear and that retrospective law change is not a solution in this particular instance. The second compelling bit of evidence was from a member of the public who was caught up as a third party to covert video surveillance. She spoke quite evocatively about the emotional stress and pressure of being in that situation. Again that reaffirmed to me the caution that we as parliamentarians should have when we are considering these types of measures and that we need to consider the civil liberties of individuals and society at large whenever we are addressing the question of more powers for those who are required to enforce the law in order to keep our communities and society safe. 
I thank the clerk of the committee the Parliamentary Counsel Office Crown Law and my colleagues Charles Chauvel and David Parker for the thoughtful contributions they made at the select committee. I certainly thank all those submitters who in a short time frame made submissions to the select committee.  
My last comment is really to the Maori Party. Given the legal expertise the Maori Party has I urge its members to look at the changes to the bill and at some of the recommendations of the select committee which I think got to a reasonable way forward to ensure that we have a safe society that the police can carry out lawful activities and that we have been very clear as legislators to ascribe the types of powers that the police should have for the short period before we pass the Search and Surveillance Bill. Kia ora koutou.