Border Security Bill

At last I have the opportunity to stand and speak in favour of a part of this bill. Let me just acknowledge the fine work of the Government Administration Committee and the officials. The officials grappled with some of the difficult issues around civil rights and powers to detain, and that type of thing. Part 2 amends the Immigration Act. It is quite different from the measures we have been debating, and it addresses quite a different issue. It is all about what happened on 9/11, and how a small island nation like New Zealand can protect itself against terrorists. It is all about supporting what the Ministers and various speakers have said earlier about our support in the US: getting our products to and from the US, and getting passengers in and out of New Zealand. The National Party looked carefully at these provisions. I was not at the select committee for the entire debate. I came in at the end of it, but I know that the members listened to the submissions, and that by and large, the submitters were in favour of this part of the bill. Some concerns were raised. Most of them were addressed through debate in the select committee, and at the end, despite some concerns about civil rights, there was an overwhelming desire to go ahead. I think the Government may have struck the right balance. The Opposition will certainly watch and see. I know that the officials said that is probably what has happened.

The bill gives the chief executive some powers that may cause some raised eyebrows, but at the end of the day how do we stop terrorists from invading our shores and wreaking havoc of the type we have seen around the world? We looked at those issues, listened to the advice, took counsel from civil libertarians—who raised some legitimate issues—and looked at how this legislation ties in with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. After taking advice on that, we managed to convince caucus colleagues that, on balance, this was probably the right approach to take. I know that my colleague Lindsay Tisch took a very close interest in this part of the bill, and there are some lawyers in our caucus who raised a few concerns. At the end of that process, we concluded that we should take the advice of the officials, and allow this part to pass.

It is just unfortunate that the whole bill has had to be sullied by the debates that have gone on earlier about the pledge on the Labour Party’s pre-election pledge card in 1999 that it would “Create jobs through promoting New Zealand industries and better support for exporters and small businesses.”, and then on the 2002 pledge card that it would “Work with all sectors to create an innovative, growing economy with more jobs.” It is just unfortunate that Labour campaigned on that, because most New Zealanders would sign up to that—and the majority did—and has now introduced this sneaky tax, which has put a real dampener on what otherwise would have been a very good piece of work, in terms of tightening up our borders and enabling our exporters to go through the “green lane” in getting exports into the US, which the Ministers have been keen to talk about tonight. We want to have a speedy process for imports and exports, with some confidence that it can take place without the added cost of security that is being put on all small nations and all exporters and importers as a result of this recent phenomenon, and as a result of the 9/11 attacks in the US.

It would be interesting if one of the Government members, or one of the Ministers, would take a call tonight and explain to the Committee, and to those listening to the radio broadcast of this debate, why it is that the Government was able to listen to officials with regard to Part 2 of the bill, take their advice, and come up with a very reasonable compromise, but in Part 1 it had to introduce the sneaky, backdoor tax that has been so vigorously opposed in Parliament here tonight. I look forward to those contributions, I look forward to this legislation finally being amended so as to exclude that sneaky tax, and I look forward to the Ministers on the Government side of the Chamber realising the error of their ways. They have partly done that, in acknowledging that requiring exporters to pay $8 million was the wrong thing to do, and they have reduced that now to $4 million. Why do they not admit they were totally wrong—which clearly they are—and admit that it is a security cost they are trying to enforce here, and not a trade access cost?

This is a tax. It is no more than a tax, and it is being imposed at a time when the Government has record surpluses. Why does it not acknowledge that? Why is the Government not big about it? In fact, it would probably gain something politically from doing that, because New Zealand overwhelmingly rejects the notion the Government has put forward that somehow or other, this measure is an industry good, and not a national good or a taxpayer good. Why does the Government not acknowledge that, go the whole hog and accept that it is wrong once again, do a U-turn—as it has done in the past—and drop the silly tax?

Labour members over there on the other side of the Chamber will be glad to hear that New Zealand First is going to support this part of the bill. That is simply because we have been consistently strong in advocating a tightening-up of our immigration law. We have been very, very consistent on that. When we came to this Parliament after the last election, we told the Government in no uncertain terms that the immigration law had to be tightened up. This segment of this bill does that to a small, but positive, degree.

I remind members that but for the results of our efforts, we would still be letting people into this country who could not speak a word of English. There are 300,000 people in this country now who cannot speak English. So the Government has listened to us. I have to say “Fair go.”, because the Government listened to us and toughened up the English-language test. We advocated loudly and strongly that immigrants to this country should have a job to come to. Oh, the former Minister is over there on the Government benches, and she knows—[Interruption] The former Minister is sitting there on the Government benches, and she knows the emphasis we put on immigrants having a job to come to here. She listened to that. It took a long time, but she listened and changed the law. Now, an immigrant to this country must have a job to come to. We advocated that there should be health-screening checks for all immigrants. We advocated that, loud and long, and I have to give the Minister her due: she listened to us, and screening tests are now to come in. We advocated that immigration consultants should be registered, and the new Minister—there he is, standing over there in the Chamber—listened to us. Now he says on the radio that immigration consultants should be registered.

💬 Lianne Dalziel: I was saying it before you.

I remind the member that New Zealand First went into the election with three issues. Immigration was one of our major issues, and the Minister has listened to us. In particular, had my leader, New Zealand First’s leader, the Rt Hon Winston Peters, not made the good former Minister’s life hell at times—he made it an absolute hell—we would have got nowhere. But she listened to us and tightened up the immigration law.

We want to say to the Government members that we want the law to be tightened up even more. We do not want people to come into this country, after destroying their documents on a plane, because they think they can stay here forever and a day, use taxpayer-funded services to get legal aid, and make appeal after appeal to stay here. If they destroy their documents and come here, then out they should go!

💬 Lianne Dalziel: Why didn’t you do something about it when you were at court?

I tell the former Minister that there is another step New Zealand First wants the Government to take immediately. I say to Mr and Mrs Immigrant that if they commit a crime in this country, then out they should go. People who commit crimes should go back to where they came from, I tell Mr Worth. And those crimes includes offences on our roads. We will not stand by and let people come here, commit offence after offence—like having no driver’s licence, or like that guy the other day who killed an innocent New Zealander, after being disqualified from driving goodness knows how many times—and be tolerated here. No, if a person commits an offence on our roads, as far as New Zealand First is concerned, out that person should go. We put a question on that issue to the Minister a year ago, and the answer was something along the lines that the Government was looking into it, and would be doing something about it. That was over a year ago, and nothing has happened. Had the Government acted on that issue when we first raised it in this Parliament—it was my colleague Ron Mark who raised it—the lady who died the other day would still be alive. That shows the seriousness of this issue—and there have been other events like that.

New Zealand First will support this part of the bill, because we want the Immigration Act to be toughened up. This is a beautiful country. It is a tremendous country, and we are not going to stand by and let any Tom, Dick, or Harry come here.

I will take just a short call. This is the more sensible part of the bill, and, when we reflect on it, I cannot help but wonder—and perhaps members of the Committee might be able to help me—who it was who said: “We live in a benign environment, 12,000 miles away from the hot spots.” Who was that person? Ah! Yes, it is all coming back. It was, of course, the Prime Minister. And now we have a bill designed to tighten up this benign environment we live in. We would like to live in a benign environment. I am sure the world would like to live in a benign environment. The truth is that we do not, and it is entirely appropriate that those undesirables who have come to regard New Zealand as a soft touch under this Government—an absolute soft touch, a gateway to Australia and further—think they can come to our country and fool the security systems here. It is a piece of cake. In they come, and the Government is not doing anything about it. We have been waiting 5 years for the Government to tighten up on those restrictions.

I am not entirely sure that this legislation would do anything about the Ahmed Zaouis in this country—in this prison we have somewhere. I invite the Minister to take a call and tell the Committee whether this particular part will stop the Ahmed Zaouis from coming into this country, or at least say whether it will stop them, turn them round, and send them back to where they came from. It is not at all clear. I am not at all sure that that is the case, but if we are going to tighten up let us tighten up on the undesirables. Some would say that some civil liberties would be trampled on. Well, ACT party members, being classical liberals, are entirely in favour of civil liberties. There are times, of course—and we live in those times—where we have to ensure that civil liberties sometimes—

💬 Shane Ardern: This is a new sensitive side.

Well, we have to take liberties with some liberties—sometimes. But that might be necessary.

I think this whole question of border security has been well illustrated in Border Control, a programme shown relatively recently on television that captured the imagination of the public of this country. Apparently, applications to join the Customs Service rose dramatically as a result of that programme, and I think the public saw that the job customs officers are doing is a hugely important one. But they were not backed up by this Government’s softly, softly approach to, as I say, the undesirables who have come here in relatively large numbers, knowing full well that entry was almost assured in New Zealand.

So it is with some pleasure that I support this particular part of the bill. As I said earlier, I am not at all certain that it will ensure we turn round the Ahmed Zaouis of this world, but at least it is a start. We do at least recognise there is a problem.

I move, That the question be now put.

I now believe I have heard everything, tonight. Contrary to my colleague Peter Brown’s advice, I can vividly recall that Lianne Dalziel was completely untroubled by New Zealand First for most of this Parliament. It had nothing to do with New Zealand First, and I think we should set the record straight on that point.

The other thing I am intrigued about during the debate on Part 2 is Gerry Eckhoff’s declaration on behalf of the ACT party that ACT is actually the “Civil Libertarian Party” in Parliament. That is certainly news to me as well.

I thought I would do something unique in respect of Part 2 and actually look at it, because it strikes me—and it may just be that it is lost on everybody else apart from me—that in the debate on Part 1 the Government was very quick to point out, with regard to the levies and costs to be landed on exporters, that there was no public good in respect of that side of border control, but that Part 2 is all about public good. For the life of me, I cannot understand how those two things coexist side by side. I feel no more sure of this legislation, and I sleep no easier at night, knowing that Rick Barker is in charge of the New Zealand Customs Service and our borders, over the course of the next short while. This is a serious issue that requires a serious Minister to be in charge of what the Prime Minister described—I inform Mr Eckhoff—as “an incredibly benign strategic environment”, a statement that was backed up on a number of occasions by Mr Goff and Mr Burton in their roles as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Minister of Defence.

Part 2 is a security issue. There is no other short and succinct way of putting that. It sets out very clearly the provisions of the Advance Passenger Screening system, under which those passengers will be removed from the aircraft before they depart from their initial port on the way to New Zealand. The commentary states that the system is already being used by Air New Zealand and on international flights of other airlines, on a voluntary basis. We in the National Party say that that part of the legislation is worth supporting.

Mr Eckhoff does raise an interesting point because, with regard to new section 125AB, inserted by clause 29, there is a specific clause removing the right of an individual caught under those provisions to seek judicial review. That is quite a serious and onerous clause. One accepts that in the current, non-benign strategic environment liberties must be removed by the host nation of New Zealand in order to secure the freedom of those who would otherwise be affected. The right to remove the opportunity for judicial review is a serious issue indeed but, in this instance, the public good does outweigh the private, and that is an important issue to raise at this point.

It is worth noting too that the restrictions on the need to give reasons for boarding decisions are contained in clause 125AB(8) and (9). The justification for the removal of liberties at that point is that a decision must be made quickly, prior to the alleged offender boarding an aircraft, so as to avoid the type of situation that Mr Brown outlined. It is essentially the Ahmed Zaoui sort of situation that we want to avoid—from what I can tell from the section, having had a quick glance at it.

Having said that, in the event of an airline being directed to refuse boarding permission, it is likely that the reason will be conveyed to the passenger through the airline. Presumably then, the airline has the responsibility for turning away the passenger at the point of boarding. We need to ask the serious question in this House tonight whether that is satisfactory in the context of a security environment. Is it satisfactory for us to allow airlines and airline staff to make decisions relating to matters of international security? That is quite a serious issue.

I move, That the question be now put.

Part 2 is a contradiction when we consider that all the clauses in Part 2, which National supports, deal with protecting New Zealand. The Government has a responsibility to protect our shores and our citizens, and that is exactly what is dealt with in Part 2, “Amendments to Immigration Act 1987”.

The contradiction is that when we debated Part 1 National said that the Government has a responsibility to protect New Zealand—all indicators show that; even the Auditor-General’s remarks on managing threats to domestic security highlight those points—but the Government does not see that it has the responsibility to protect New Zealand shores. Rather, it will impose a tax on our exporters and importers to cover those security costs. National argued—in fact, I had two amendments that would have clarified the point very succinctly—that this bill should be about public good. There is no private good—it is about public good, and Part 2 states that in detail. Although it is unfortunate that National could not support Part 1, we do support Part 2.

I also want to acknowledge the work that the advisers did for the Government Administration Committee on the whole bill. Much in-depth research has gone into this bill. I pass on my thanks, as Shane Ardern did, to the advisers for the work they did. I appreciate it.

I want to pick up on what is significant about Part 2. It requires people in charge of commercial craft to come up with a system that does checks and balances with immigration documentation, and to look at alerts before passengers board a craft travelling to New Zealand. That is significant. If we are to protect our borders, there should be a requirement to vet people before they come here. Once they are here it is very difficult to take action. Part 2 gives our Immigration Service the opportunity to vet those people before they come through. The cooperation of the airlines in doing so is certainly something that National encourages.

I want to look specifically at clause 28, “Residence permit holders temporarily absent from New Zealand”. Although clause 28 does not seem to contain much, I think it is significant, and we should highlight what clause 28 actually does. I will quote from the officials’ paper to the select committee on their clause by clause analysis, because I think it succinctly covers a very important point. The clause will repeal section 18(b) of the Immigration Act. This “will require all refugees recognised by New Zealand who have been granted residence, and who are travelling on New Zealand - issued refugee travel documents, to hold a current returning resident’s visa when returning to New Zealand.” That is very, very significant because the current provision states that passengers returning to New Zealand can hold an expired residence permit in their refugee travel documents. This clause is saying that they are required to hold a returning residents visa. Of course, that provision is the same for us if we travel out of the country, as well. So this is a significant tightening of the borders, and National members support clause 28. Surveillance will be available through the Immigration Service with its Advance Passenger Screening office, particularly the one at Auckland airport on a 24-hour basis.

Clause 29 is a significant clause, as well. A number of submissions queried its import. There were a couple from the Board of Airline Representatives of New Zealand, there was one from Business New Zealand, and another one, which was significant, was from the New Zealand Seafood Industry Council. It wanted to know whether “craft” in new section 125AA(1), inserted by clause 29, included seafaring craft. It was concerned about the definition of “commercial craft” and whether that included commercial fishing vessels, which do not primarily carry passengers. The result was that they are included in the provision. That was one of the major areas of concern in that industry.

Overall, National is happy to support the clauses in Part 2, and we think it is the right move. It is just unfortunate, as I said earlier, that we could not support Part 1, which deals with private good versus public good. Our position is very clear: it should have been about public good, as Part 2 is, which deals with and supports public good.

The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 220 in the name of the Hon Rick Barker to clause 29, and the following amendment in his name to clause 29, be agreed to:

to omit paragraphs (a) to (c) of section 125AA(4), and substitute the following paragraphs:

(a) in the case of a carrier, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or to a fine not exceeding $20,000, or to both; or

(b) in the case of a person in charge, to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 3 months or to a fine not exceeding $10,000, or to both.

Amendments agreed to, and Part 2 as amended agreed to.

Clauses 1 and 2

LINDSAY TISCH (National—Piako): The debate on clause 1, “Title”, with the change in the Standing Orders, is a peroration of all those things we talked about in the debate on Parts 1 and 2. I reiterate the point I made during the earlier debate on Part 1 that the original bill did not have a mechanism for cost recovery, and that submitters did not have the opportunity to submit on that. When cost recovery was included at a latter stage there was outrage from the export sector. Only 2 hours were set aside for the select committee to hear submitters express their views.

Progress reported.

The House adjourned at 9.56 p.m.