Twyford Phil: Cluster Munitions (Prohibition) Bill — First Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Twyford Phil: Cluster Munitions (Prohibition) Bill — First Reading 
[Sitting date: 28 July 2009. Volume:656;Page:5191. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
PHIL TWYFORD (Labour) 
: 
 I rise to speak on the first reading of the Cluster Munitions (Prohibition) Bill. Labour supports the bill because it will save lives because it will prevent civilians from being maimed and because it will add another valuable international humanitarian law. It will set the rules of war that protect civilians and make war a less barbaric thing than it otherwise is. We support the bill with pride because it was New Zealand that played a leading role amongst a group of nations that spearheaded the Convention on Cluster Munitions. It was the Hon Phil Goff the then Minister for Disarmament and Arms Control who led that effort. 
Cluster munitions are blights on the planet. When used in populated areas they do not discriminate between civilians and military and their unexploded spawn lie on the ground for decades maiming and killing thousands of civilians. According to the UN 40 percent of the victims are children. Consider a firsthand account of a young man in Laos: “One day in 2003 I took my two boys down to the river to go fishing. I found a cluster bomb in the water and picked it up because I wanted to use it as an explosive to blow up in the river so that we could catch more fish. But it went off in my hands and blew off my arms. Now we are getting poorer because I lost both my arms and I can’t work to support my family. I’m lucky at least because they sorted me out with one artificial arm. My right arm was blown right off by the explosion and they had to amputate my left arm twice because it was infected after the first amputation …. The bomb also blew up right in my face and eyes. I couldn’t see anything. My sight was blurry until I went to hospital again in 2005 when my relatives had saved up enough money again to pay for the operation. My wife and the family earn all the money to support us now. One of my sons had to leave school so that he could help my wife. He’s only 15. I help as I can. I look after the vegetables and sweep the house. I help my wife in the fields a bit but I am not much use.” 
What are cluster munitions? They are weapons that scatter explosive submunitions across a wide area. Concerns have been raised about cluster munitions since the 1960s and 1970s when in the space of a decade the United States dropped millions of cluster bombs on Viet Nam Cambodia and Laos. In Laos over 260 million cluster submunitions were dropped. An estimated 80 million of them remain active and continue to claim victims four decades later. 
Since World War II cluster munitions have been used in 33 conflicts—most recently by the Russians and Georgians in South Ossetia. Large numbers of cluster munitions were used by France the US and the UK in the first Gulf War and by the US and the UK in the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In 2006 Israel dropped more than 4 million sub-munitions into southern Lebanon in the course of a few days. 
I do not propose to reiterate the effect of this bill and its various clauses; colleagues who have spoken before on the bill have done that. I think it is interesting to ask whether the bill will make a difference and whether the Convention on Cluster Munitions will make a difference. Cynics might say that the convention is just a bit of paper that war is war and they might ask how the convention can make a difference. But I believe that there is reason to think that the convention and the bill will make a difference. Already 96 countries have signed up to the convention 35 of which are countries that have used produced stockpiled or exported cluster munitions. Of 28 NATO members 20 have signed up. Fourteen of the signatories are countries that themselves are affected by cluster munitions. 
The convention is off to a good start and there is every reason to believe that like the Ottawa Mine Ban Treaty the Convention on Cluster Munitions will significantly reduce the use of cluster munitions. It will stigmatise their use so that over time this development in international law will lead to the complete elimination of cluster munitions. 
Over the past decade under the Mine Ban Treaty the use of landmines has dwindled to use by a handful of non-State actors rebel groups and one nation State Burma which continues to use landmines against its own people. When as activists we began to campaign for an international treaty to ban landmines in the mid-1990s that kind of success was unthinkable. 
It is sometimes said that politics is war without weapons. The inverse is probably true too. War is intensely political especially so in the modern era when wars are fought and broadcast on live TV. The power of international law rests as much on its ability to articulate the ethics and morality that guide human behaviour as its ability to provide an enforceable code. 
During the Israel and Hezbollah conflict in southern Lebanon in 2006 my colleague David Shearer was the UN humanitarian coordinator in Lebanon. David recalls the political storm that broke out when the United Nations emergency relief coordinator Mr Jan Egeland publicly referred to Israel’s use of cluster munitions and its indiscriminate bombing of southern Lebanon as “amoral”. The Government of Israel was outraged and the world was outraged by the deed being referred to. 
We talk too much perhaps wishfully of New Zealand’s ability to punch above its weight when it comes to foreign policy but New Zealand’s contribution to the Convention on Cluster Munitions is an example of a small nation working strategically with others both nations and civil society to achieve its ends. 
Under the leadership of the Hon Phil Goff New Zealand was an early supporter of diplomatic efforts to achieve a ban on cluster munitions. When the UN’s consensus approach failed the idea New Zealand and 25 other nations called for an international agreement to outlaw cluster munitions. Norway led the charge hence the Oslo process and New Zealand was one of seven nations in the core group that led a series of negotiating conferences. One of those conferences was hosted right here in Wellington in February 2008 and 106 countries took part. It was the last and the most contentious of the diplomatic conferences leading up to the Dublin negotiations. The Hon Phil Goff and Ambassador Don MacKay stared down a group of recalcitrant nations including the US and the UK our former allies who wanted to water down the text. Finally all views were incorporated in a compendium text and over 2 months between Wellington and Dublin a clear consensus emerged in favour of a strong and comprehensive prohibition on cluster munitions. 
One of the features of the Oslo process like the Ottawa Mine Ban Treaty was the active partnership between civil society and like-minded Governments. The Aotearoa New Zealand Cluster Munition Coalition brought cluster bomb survivors and de-mining experts to Wellington to take part in the events around the negotiations. They injected real-life experience into the process. Civil society brought the conscience of global public opinion into the diplomatic negotiations. They helped to make it happen. 
Labour looks forward to discussing the bill at the select committee. There are several textual matters we would like to address. We would also like to see a provision inserted in the bill to prohibit investment in the manufacture and sale of cluster munitions in line with the decision of the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. But those are relatively minor matters in the scheme of this bill which Labour supports unreservedly. 
Finally I acknowledge the Hon Phil Goff for his leadership in this matter; my friend Marian Hobbs former MP and a former Minister for Disarmament and Arms Control; the work of Ambassador Don MacKay and the officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade; Mary Wareham who is in the gallery today—a New Zealander a campaigner and an activist for Human Rights Watch Oxfam New Zealand and other organisations—and who coordinated the work of the Aotearoa New Zealand Cluster Munition Coalition; and the Minister for Disarmament and Arms Control the Hon Georgina te Heuheu for her commitment to bringing the bill expeditiously to the House. No reira tena koutou tena koutou kia ora mai ano tatau.