Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill

I move, That the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill be now read a first time. I nominate the Law and Order Committee to consider this bill. Organised crime is a global problem. It undermines public safety, economic development, good governance, and national security. Unfortunately, New Zealand is not immune to the threat posed by both international and domestic criminal networks, which operate on many fronts—for example, criminals use money-laundering to disguise their illegal activities and to profit from crime. Money-laundering involves transforming money from illegal activity, often referred to as “dirty money”, into funds that appear to come from a legitimate source. Other organised criminal activities include identity theft, people-trafficking, and a range of acts that fall under the umbrella of bribery and corruption. This bill tackles all of these.

If we are to combat a global problem, we need a global solution, and New Zealand is committed to playing its part. This bill benefits New Zealand in three main ways: it improves our ability to combat crime domestically, it improves our ability to coordinate with other countries to combat crime internationally, and it improves our international reputation by ensuring compliance with international obligations. This bill gives law enforcement agencies greater powers to deal with organised crime and corruption and to cooperate with our international counterparts in the fight against transnational crime. It also enhances New Zealand’s compliance with a number of international agreements and allows for the ratification of others. This will help maintain and enhance New Zealand’s reputation as a trustworthy trading partner with a strong, reliable financial sector.

This bill demonstrates the Government’s ongoing commitment to tackling organised crime and corrupt practices in a number of ways. The 2011 all-of-Government response, Strengthening New Zealand’s resistance to organised crime, outlined a number of initiatives and new laws that this Government had introduced to target and disrupt organised crime. However, we recognised that we could not afford to rest on our laurels. The report also indicated areas where we could further enhance how we are tackling organised crime, and this bill addresses many of those areas that require legislation. It also responds to calls for reform to New Zealand law made by intergovernmental bodies that we play an important role in, such as the Financial Action Task Force and the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions, and it enables ratification of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption.

I will now briefly outline some of the key reforms in the bill, which is an omnibus bill amending 12 Acts. The bill amends the money-laundering offences under the Crimes Act and the Misuse of Drugs Act. The changes address practical law enforcement difficulties and corrects deficiencies in our laws required by international agreements. One of the changes clarifies that the intent to conceal is not necessary in order to prove a money-laundering offence. This requirement was never specified in the legislation, but over the years New Zealand courts have read it into the law. The bill also removes the requirement that laundered proceeds stem from an offence carrying at least 5 years’ imprisonment. This will address a practical enforcement difficulty for police in establishing the specific criminal act from which the laundered proceeds are derived. These two changes will ensure that criminals can be more readily prosecuted for money-laundering and will help deter those who exploit the current limitations.

In addition, the bill amends the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act to improve our ability to detect and investigate money-laundering. Reporting requirements are introduced for two high-risk classes of transactions. Financial institutions will need to report to police all international wire transactions of over $1,000 and physical cash transactions of $10,000 or more. We know that criminals use such transactions to launder money. Better reporting will enhance the effectiveness of our efforts to detect money-laundering. Banks already collect identity information from their customers, so they should not notice any difference from these changes. The amendments I have just outlined align New Zealand law with the laws of other countries and with best-practice recommendations from the Financial Action Task Force. This task force is the intergovernmental body that guides international efforts to combat money-laundering.

The bill also adds new identity offences to the Crimes Act and the Customs and Excise Act. A range of offences currently cover situations where criminals use false identity documents to commit dishonest or deceptive acts. However, currently there are no specific offences that prohibit criminals from selling or distributing unlawfully obtained identification information, nor is there any offence of making or possessing goods intended to facilitate identity crimes, such as credit card skimming devices. This bill closes those gaps in the criminal law. It also adds these goods to the list of prohibited items under the Customs and Excise Act.

Other important amendments in the bill expressly provide police with the power to share appropriate personal information, including fingerprint information, with international counterparts. These provisions will enable the implementation of the agreement with the United States on preventing and combating crime. These amendments are subject to strict restrictions and a Cabinet directive for police to consult with the Privacy Commissioner.

It is also worth noting that this bill includes several safeguards to protect the privacy of New Zealanders. The main safeguard is that the personal information may be disclosed by New Zealand Police only when two conditions are met. The first is where the information is being disclosed to a corresponding overseas agency that performs one of the functions that the New Zealand Police performs, and the second is that the disclosure is reasonably necessary to enable the corresponding overseas agency to perform that function. It is only after these two requirements are met and subject to any other enactment that the information can be disclosed in one of four circumstances. In the event that these conditions are breached, individuals may, of course, complain to the Privacy Commissioner.

The Office of the Privacy Commissioner was consulted on the proposals of this bill, and will be closely involved in its implementation, including keeping a watching brief to ensure the statutory criteria for information sharing are being adhered to. These safeguards are important in balancing the privacy of New Zealanders.

In addition, the bill makes amendments to the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act and the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act to allow DNA data bank information to be provided to assist criminal investigations and prosecutions overseas. The Attorney-General’s approval will be required on a case by case basis before any DNA information can be provided. Both sets of amendments will enhance international law enforcement cooperation and capability. The sharing of information with our counterparts is critical if we are to combat a global problem. However, concerns around open data-sharing are also important. Although the bill outlines key restrictions around what information can be shared and with which overseas agencies, I am certainly keen to hear from the select committee in this regard.

A range of other amendments fall under the bribery and corruption umbrella. This Government remains committed to ratifying the United Nations Convention Against Corruption. New Zealand has already implemented several of the convention’s obligations by enacting the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act and the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act. Further amendments are required to the Crimes Act, the Secret Commissions Act, and the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act to bring New Zealand into full compliance with the convention. All those necessary changes are included in this bill. Other amendments in the bill will enhance compliance with the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions. Collectively, these bribery and corruption amendments will ensure that New Zealand has a robust legislative framework that complies with international best practice in deterring and holding offenders to account.

Let me conclude by briefly mentioning two other sets of reforms in the bill. The bill amends the Crimes Act offence of people-trafficking. It extends the offence so that it applies to people-trafficking within New Zealand, not just when the victims are moved in or out of this country. It also introduces an exploitative purpose—for example, prostitution or slavery—for trafficking of persons. Again, the amendments bring the legislation into line with international best practice in fighting this very serious offence.

Finally, I will address amendments to the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act. The changes will extend the time frames for foreign restraining orders and will allow those orders to be registered without notice. The proposed amendments will ensure that criminals cannot conceal or dispose of assets before the relevant court proceedings conclude.

The wide range of amendments in the bill will ensure that New Zealand has a robust, fit for purpose legislative framework to combat organised crime, bribery, and corruption. The bill will further enhance this country’s compliance with international instruments, and our ability to implement or ratify others, including, as I have said, the Agreement on Enhancing Cooperation in Preventing and Combating Crime, which was signed with the US, and the United Nations Convention Against Corruption. This will ensure that New Zealand maintains and improves its already high reputation as a trustworthy trading partner with a robust financial sector. The bill signals this Government’s commitment to combat organised crime and corruption everywhere and on every level. I commend it to the House.

Labour will support the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill. It is good to see the bill has finally made its way to a first reading. We will support this bill. It is an omnibus bill that will enact 12 different Acts and it will strengthen the law to combat organised crime and corruption.

The bill, as you heard from the Minister of Justice, will allow New Zealand to ratify the United Nations Convention Against Corruption, it will allow the implementation of the Agreement on Enhancing Cooperation in Preventing and Combatting Crime, which was signed between the Governments of the United States and New Zealand, and it will also improve New Zealand’s compliance with a number of other international conventions: the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions, the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, and the United Nations anti-trafficking protocol. These are all important amendments.

This bill was first looked at by the Government in 2011. In 2011 the Government agreed to an all-of-Government response to organised crime. It has taken some time for it to get to Parliament for its first reading—in fact, the then Minister of Justice, Judith Collins, promised that the bill would be introduced in 2013. That did not happen. But it has been longer in its gestation than that. In fact, way back in July 2008 the previous Labour Government announced the Organised and Financial Crime Agency of New Zealand—which, as people will know, is a discrete agency hosted within the New Zealand Police—which was to take a whole-of-Government approach. That work started right back in 2008. I suppose you could say that it has taken almost 6 years for the Government to move on some very serious issues.

It is well acknowledged—and I agree with the Minister—that New Zealand has a strong legislative framework to obstruct organised crime. We do have robust domestic laws and law enforcement and we have strong partnerships internationally. But, as the Minister also said, that does not mean that we are not perceived as an easy target. I want to mention a little later on a growing area of concern, and that is domestic human-trafficking. So we are a target, and we should not think that because we are at the bottom of the world and nobody really knows about us, we would not be an easy target for organised crime networks.

We do have a strong and very proud tradition of being an honest nation. We take a strong stance against organised crime. We are consistently ranked amongst the least corrupt countries in the world. Of course, every year we look forward to Transparency International bringing out its report. For those who are not aware of what Transparency International is, it is a global civil society organisation. It is there to lead the fight against corruption. We eagerly look forward to its annual report ranking countries and territories based on how corrupt their public sectors are perceived to be. It does this on a scale of zero to 100, with zero meaning a country is highly corrupt and 100 meaning it is perceived to be very clean.

New Zealand has consistently been in the top two countries, with scores in the 90s. That tradition, I believe, comes from our being the first country in the world to have legislation promoting human rights. It is also down to legislation such as our Public Service Act 1912 and our Official Information Act of 1982. In Transparency International’s latest report, New Zealand came first equal with Denmark for being the least corrupt country in the world. Australia came 9th, the United Kingdom came 14th, the United States came 19th, South Africa came 72nd, China came 80th, India came 94th, and, at the very bottom, Somalia came 175th. So we are very proud that we have maintained our position in Transparency International’s rankings over many, many years, and we are determined we will keep that status. It is good for this country and good for the Public Service of New Zealand to know that we are seen to be the least corrupt in the world.

We also have a branch of Transparency International here, Transparency International New Zealand. It is our representative in Transparency International. In 2013 it released a report called the Integrity Plus 2013 New Zealand National Integrity System Assessment. In December 2013, when it was released, it was called a landmark report, and it revealed that “serious and urgent action is needed to protect and extend integrity in New Zealand.” It also said: “Recent incidents and investigations of corruption, and increasing public concern, provide a compelling case for a more pro-active approach to these issues.” We have our own branch here in New Zealand of an international organisation saying there is a compelling case, so we cannot rest on our laurels and our reputation going back many years. There is a case to have a more proactive approach on these issues.

It is almost a year since that report, and finally we are getting a first reading of this bill. I think it is time because there have been more incidents—one that I will talk about later—that mean we need to be more proactive.

I want to mention just some of the things that make us very transparent and open and support our good reputation. These include the Official Information Act and the ability to tell the public of New Zealand what is happening in terms of our Public Service—to release information provided by our Public Service to a Government. But we have seen a decline in that Act being used in the most appropriate way. I believe that these issues are important to us as a country and as a Parliament. We cannot allow any Government—I do not care what colour it comes from—to use delays, obstructions, and tactics to stop official information being released.

It was very concerning when the leader of the Government in New Zealand, the Prime Minister, said only a couple of weeks ago that the Government often uses the delay in releasing information for political purposes. It is unheard of for that to be said by a leader of the Government of New Zealand—the use of delaying tactics for political purposes in terms of the Official Information Act.

There are a number of issues I want to raise, but one of them in particular has to be around the disclosures that have come out of Dirty Politics. I think we, as a Parliament, need to take them very seriously, because although—

💬 Hon Dr Nick Smith: What about Nicky Hager?

—it may not be of interest to the National Party—and we immediately hear from Nick Smith that he does not want to hear this—we are watched internationally. We are watched internationally as to how well we work. And when we have people working in Government departments and Ministers’ offices providing information that undermines professionals, academics, and leaders in New Zealand, then we need to be very worried about what the public and the international community says about that. I am disgusted that there has been denigration of people who are health professionals working in our public health sector, who are being worked against by officials working in Ministers’ offices. That will be known internationally, that will be seen internationally, and the question will be asked: “Just how clean is the New Zealand Public Service—those who work in the highest offices of this Parliament, in Ministers’ offices?”. We need to be very vigilant when it comes to matters that go to the heart of our openness and transparency.

In conclusion, I want to mention the amendments in respect of the trafficking of domestic persons in New Zealand. I am pleased to see this, because we had had no experience of human trafficking. But you need to know that only a few weeks ago we had the first prosecution of human trafficking in New Zealand. If we think we can avoid these sorts of issues, then we are very much mistaken. We are part of the global community and we need to strengthen these laws to ensure that we have the best in place.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker Mallard, and I will take this as my first opportunity to officially acknowledge your promotion to the position of Assistant Speaker. I hope that goes very well for you. The Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill is an omnibus bill that seeks to amend 12 Acts. I will pick up on the points that the Hon Annette King has just made about the fact that New Zealand is not immune to some of the most abhorrent organised crimes that we see going on around the world. As the member has rightly pointed out, people-trafficking is one of them. Globally organised crime obviously knows no boundaries. As the world moves forward and we become technologically advanced, so too do criminal activities, organised crime, and corruption.

This bill really is an important part of New Zealand’s obligations to meet international and United Nations conventions in terms of strengthening our ability as a nation to ensure that organised crime—organised criminal entities, corruption, money-laundering, people-trafficking, and so forth—can be fought on the many levels that it needs to be. More and more often, New Zealand is being called upon to cooperate and participate in international inquiries and investigations. One of the opportunities that globally organised criminal entities look for in terms of their enterprises is the gap between different jurisdictions. They exploit those gaps. They exploit the fact that some countries do not talk or share information well with one another, and where those gaps exist is where there are opportunities. Clearly, this is something that this bill, and the international conventions that the bill seeks to address, will go to the heart of.

Organised crime and corruption is increasingly more sophisticated, and it is fair to say, I think, that New Zealand enjoys a reputation for being—as Annette King pointed out—one of the least corrupt countries in the world, but that is not going to stop people trying. Certainly, we have seen that with drug trafficking, where over the course of the last 10 or 15 years New Zealand has become an end-user destination. It has become quite a significant part of drug trafficking in, say, methamphetamine. There are methamphetamine transactions on a large scale—in multiple millions and billions of dollars, in fact—and we also see a lot of money-laundering and so forth going on underneath that. These criminal entities and networks are able to overlap and work with one another in a very, very sophisticated way. That is something that I think New Zealand enforcement agencies have to work very, very hard to combat, and it is very hard to do that without the appropriate legislative framework.

I will just run over a couple of the key points in the time that I have left. A couple of the key measures in this bill include requiring banks to report all international wire transactions over $1,000 and all physical cash transactions of $10,000 or more to the financial intelligence unit within the police. There is the redrafting of the money-laundering offence to specify that the intent to conceal is not required. The bill is introducing new offences to address identity crime including the selling or passing-on of unlawfully obtained identity information, something that is certainly increasingly more sophisticated and in common use. There is the amending of people-trafficking offences so that they apply to such activity in New Zealand, not just to when victims are moved in or out of this country. It is amending the Policing Act 2008 to expressly provide police with the power to share information with their international counterparts. As I mentioned, this is one of the areas that these more sophisticated organised criminal entities absolutely exploit—the gaps that exist between jurisdictions, their inability to share information or the lack of the capability to do so, and, certainly, the lack of a sound legal nexus between jurisdictions. There is the revising of the foreign bribery offence, including clarifying the circumstances in which a corporation is liable for foreign bribery, and the increasing of penalties for bribery and corruption in the private sector to bring them into line with public sector bribery offences.

That runs over just a couple of the key points. It is an important piece of legislation, I think. It is a big chunk of work that amends 12 Acts, as I said. I look forward to hearing submissions as this process proceeds. Thank you.

I rise to speak in support of the first reading of the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill. Labour will support this bill going through to the select committee and is looking forward to the ongoing debate around these matters.

New Zealanders should rightly be proud of the fact that we regularly rank very, very well in international studies and surveys when it comes to transparency, lack of corruption, and so forth, but there is no room for complacency, as those who have spoken before me have already mentioned. We are consistently among the least corrupt countries in the world. However, there are certain warning signs to suggest that we should take this matter very seriously—for example, we are seeing a lessening of transparency from this Government. My colleague Annette King mentioned in her speech before the open admission by the Prime Minister that the current Government does not take the Official Information Act seriously—that it will wilfully break the law when it comes to the Official Information Act. That Act is one of the most important instruments we have in our constitutional arrangements to ensure transparency and, basically, a governing process that is free from corruption. This Government willingly breaks that law, and the Prime Minister himself has admitted it.

We have the Official Information Act because of the old adage that sunlight is the best disinfectant. When all of the workings of Government are public, then people will be forced to act in a way that is honest, that is open, and that is decent. That is a very good thing. It is not a good thing when the Government does not lead by example and when it willingly flouts the law in the way that it has been doing with the Official Information Act.

I went and looked, in preparation for this debate, at the Oxford Dictionary’s definition of the word “corruption”. It is defined as “dishonest or fraudulent conduct by those in power, typically involving bribery”—dishonest or fraudulent conduct by those in power. There are many, many examples where some of the behaviour that we have been seeing is, if not fraudulent, certainly dishonest. Take, for example, the conduct of the Minister who introduced this legislation to the House, the Hon—oh, no, she is not honourable any more. Judith Collins introduced this legislation to Parliament. The irony of that is that Judith Collins introduced this legislation around the time that she took a trip to China to talk about reducing corruption, and yet she was surreptitiously visiting Oravida to promote her husband’s business interests. Of course, we know that Oravida then gave money to the National Party. I know that people at home will be able to draw their own conclusions about whether or not any of that kind of conduct might fit within the definition that I just mentioned from the Oxford Dictionary.

We know that there has been a corruption of the political process in New Zealand because it has been spelt out in great detail in the Dirty Politics book. It is simply a disgrace. For example, the cadre of people—and that is the only way you could describe them—with links to the National Party have been engaged in what can only be described as destructive and offensive behaviour that most New Zealanders, including New Zealanders who support the National Party and possibly even those who are members of the National Party, would find simply disgraceful, and yet that is all spelt out here. That is exactly what has been going on within John Key’s National Government.

These are the same people who referred to the Christchurch earthquake victims as scum. They referred to the victims of the Pike River mining disaster as feral. These are the people whom John Key and his Government Ministers personally like to associate themselves with, and I think those members should hang their heads in shame about that. They have targeted public figures, non-governmental organisations, political opponents, and anybody who gets in their way. They have been targeting them, denigrating them, smearing their private lives, and trying to dissuade them from speaking out publicly. Those are not the actions of a Government that is committed to openness, transparency, and fighting corruption. Those are not the actions that New Zealanders should be expecting from their current Government. It has been revealed that not only have the Prime Minister’s staff been involved directly in supporting that kind of behaviour but, in fact, Ministers themselves have been involved directly in supporting those kinds of activities.

It should be very concerning to all New Zealanders, when we are debating measures to fight corruption, that those kinds of smear campaigns were used to undermine regulators like the Serious Fraud Office and the Financial Markets Authority. If we are really serious about being an open, transparent country that is free from corruption, the Serious Fraud Office and the Financial Markets Authority should be able to go about their business without having the Government or its surrogates smearing the activities of those who are doing their jobs, and yet we have seen spelt out in black and white clear examples of where that has happened.

Ultimately, it cost Judith Collins her ministerial position, and that is right and proper. But have we ever seen any concrete action from the Prime Minister to put an end to the activities that underpinned her resignation? No, we have not. Let us be clear what this was. This was the Minister of Justice being involved in a smear campaign against senior officials in the Serious Fraud Office. That is simply—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! I would just like to ask the member to come back to the bill and to warn him about going too far into the facts of something that is currently being investigated by the police. I think the member could narrow himself back.

I am happy to do that. To return to the bill, I want to turn to Transparency International’s definitions and descriptions of what corruption involves. This is from Transparency International: “Corruption generally comprises illegal activities, which are deliberately hidden and only come to light through scandals, investigations or prosecutions.” One of the reasons that scandals arise in New Zealand and investigations and prosecutions can take place is that we have a very open system of Government now. We have an Official Information Act that allows New Zealanders to get access to information. Many of the scandals that have been unearthed have used those mechanisms of Government like the Official Information Act to unearth the very behaviour that this bill seeks not just to limit but basically to stop from happening.

Therefore, it is incumbent upon the Government of the day to lead by example when it comes to making sure that there is transparency around its activities. Yes, some scandals are bigger than others, but scandals will typically be unearthed only when somebody either seeks out the information—digs for the information and puts all of the pieces of the puzzle together—or blows the whistle. They are not going to be doing that if their access to information is shut down because people willingly do not follow the law when it comes to things like the Official Information Act, or if the people whose job it is to enforce those laws and regulations are smeared or actively undermined, whether it be from within or from without the Government. So it is very important that we continue to be vigilant when it comes to those things. I think we have seen some very clear examples just recently of where the current Government has not lived up to the type of behaviour that New Zealanders should, rightly, be able to expect from their Government.

I want to say that the Labour Party will be supporting this bill going through to the select committee. It is going to be an interesting debate, and I think that we will be getting into this in much greater detail as it progresses. We should feel fortunate in New Zealand that we are a country that is relatively free from corruption and that we regularly rate very highly in the international surveys and studies that are done. That is something to be proud of, but it is not something to be complacent about. New Zealand should continue to rank highly in those surveys. We will do that only if we continue to maintain our vigilance. That is one of the many reasons that the Labour Party will be supporting this bill.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak during the first reading of the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill. This legislation will further strengthen our reputation as one of the least corrupt countries in the world. Our law enforcement institutions are dealing with regular requests from counterparts across the globe to provide or contribute to information. We have come to learn that the people who want to funnel money illegally look for loopholes in the system to do so. For New Zealand, this National Government is working tirelessly to maintain our corruption-free brand name. National recognises, however, that there is a still a risk of organised crime, therefore we take it very seriously and understand we must remain vigilant. However, despite our best efforts, we will need to continuously be vigilant towards preventing organised crime.

The current legislation will ensure we will comply with international legislation in this area. The bill also brings New Zealand domestic law into line with the United Nations Convention Against Corruption and the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions. Further, this legislation provides us with the instruments to deal with international as well as domestic crime circuits. Regardless of how much we do, criminals will always try to cheat the system. Therefore, we must constantly keep ourselves a step ahead of our competition in dealing with such matters operationally and legislatively.

There are two points that I would like to bring your attention to. This bill will be amending the people-trafficking offence so that it applies to such activities in New Zealand and not just when victims are moved in or out of the country. This bill will be amending the Policing Act 2008 to expressly provide police with the power to share information with their international counterparts. This is very important because sometimes the timely passing of the information may stop a crime. With these words, I commend this bill to the House.

I rise to support this bill’s referral to the select committee, as well. I would like to start by associating myself with the comments made previously by the Hon Annette King and Chris Hipkins on the possibility of creeping corruption in New Zealand politics and the need to remain vigilant. New Zealand has an excellent reputation and has great standards in this area, but that is no reason for us not to continue to raise our standards, to modernise them, and to keep our eye on the ball.

I particularly want to reinforce the comments that the Hon Annette King made in reference to Transparency International. I just want to acknowledge that it has an incredibly important role to play in keeping an eye on corruption around the world and in New Zealand. Many years ago when I was working at PricewaterhouseCoopers, looking at what kind of role the assurance industry had in this field, I was delighted to be able to interview the late Jeremy Pope, who was at that time the executive director of Transparency International based in London. He was a very fine New Zealander.

There are three things that I just want to make some brief comments on. I will keep this a fairly short call because many of the comments I was going to make have already been made. I do want to reinforce the point about people-trafficking. It is an absolutely extraordinarily terrible offence, and overseas many thousands and tens of thousands of women are trafficked and find themselves at the mercy of gangsters and the mafia. It is vital that New Zealand does all that it can to stamp out this scourge. It is slavery by another name. It is simply a modern form of slavery. We need to do everything we can to play our part in eradicating it.

The comment has also been made that the perception of being corruption-free is important for business, and it is incredibly important for that. Again—based on my experience internationally—knowing that I came from New Zealand, people often remarked that it was a great place to do business because the people were straight up and they were fair, you could rely on that kind of a deal, and your money was going to be put to the purposes for which it was intended. It is incredibly important that we maintain that.

This bill also brings us up to a modern standard, and this is a good thing. We originally signed the United Nations Convention Against Corruption in 2003, so it has taken more than 10 years to get us to this point where passing this legislation will enable us to ratify that convention, along with many of the other conventions that Annette King referred to. As we do so, we have to recognise that the ground is moving underneath us. As we pass this bill through the House, we just need to be very mindful that the things we are up against are also continuing to move, enabled by technology in a globalising world, and that we will need to not stop with this piece of legislation but keep our eye on further developments.

The Green Party supports this bill through to the select committee. We do have some things we want to keep an eye on. We have got some practical concerns that we would like to be addressed—notably the requirement under the anti - money-laundering rules to report transactions of $1,000 or more. That has to be an absolutely enormous number of transactions. Again, through my own business, I know, being based in New Zealand but having a company based in London and clients based in other parts of the world, we are doing transactions all the time. I am a very, very small-business man. If you multiply that out across the number of businesses in New Zealand that are trading internationally, we just need to keep one eye on the practicalities of how we are going to manage that.

Another one is around information sharing. This is an ongoing, developing concern in New Zealand that has had some publicity over the course of the last 12 months. I would like to refer to another bill here, which is one that was passed last year, the Taxation (Annual Rates, Employee Allowances, and Remedial Matters) Bill. It enabled the United States to look into the bank accounts of New Zealand citizens living in New Zealand if they also happened to be US citizens and were liable to pay US tax. That was an information-sharing agreement that we had with the United States, but it is a huge invasion of the privacy of people who are doing absolutely nothing wrong other than living in this country. We are giving a foreign Government the ability to look into the bank accounts of New Zealand citizens in this country and into New Zealand bank accounts as well. We want to keep an eye on that. We understand that information sharing is absolutely critical to being able to stamp out crime, but it is one thing we wanted to keep an eye on.

We support this bill and will be doing everything we can to ensure that the legislation does not infringe on New Zealanders’ rights. We will be looking forward to seeing how this legislation meshes with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and any other concerns on how it will impinge on civil liberties. Having said that, we are very supportive of the aims of this bill.

New Zealand First is supporting this bill’s referral to the Law and Order Committee. Any bill aimed at strengthening the law to combat organised crime and corruption is very welcome. The aim is to improve New Zealand’s ability to collaborate with international efforts to disrupt organised crime, and that is also very welcome.

New Zealand has an enviable reputation for being a corruption-free society, and international indexes commonly place us first or first equal among the least corrupt nations. That reputation has, of course, been hard-won, but it is much more easily lost. The effort to keep New Zealand corruption-free requires, I think, at least three things: first, a culture in which the people themselves reject and suppress corrupt practices and embrace honest and fair dealings; second, a robust legal system to outlaw corrupt practices, backed up by effective policing; and, third, good leadership from the top down.

We have a superb legacy that has bequeathed us a largely corruption-free society, for which we can thank our forebears. We have good legislation, especially the Crimes Act, which is soon to be enhanced by this bill. The worrying element, of course, is in the quality of our leadership. I, and many others, have been deeply concerned about the revelations in Nicky Hager’s Dirty Politics. It shows that the likes of Cameron Slater conduct smear campaigns, tell the filthiest of lies, and conduct other guttersnipe activities against politicians, civil servants, and others whom the current Government does not like. Not only that, but he is paid for it—paid by companies with vested interests to pursue, and paid by others with a political agenda.

It is perfectly obvious that the Prime Minister’s office and, in my assessment, the Prime Minister himself, are involved in these activities. John Key makes no secret about his regular conversations with Slater, and he says that he does so not in his prime ministerial capacity, but few would be so gullible as to believe that. It is unfortunate that Mr Key is now able to claim a mandate to continue his dirty politics ways. He will now live for ever in our nation’s history not only as Prime Minister but also as the “Minister of Dirty Politics”. On that issue the buck certainly stops with him. His obfuscation about his dealings with Slater only confirms his utter lack of leadership when it comes to good practice. He is, indisputably, the leader of just the opposite.

Despite that failing and the risk to New Zealand’s reputation resulting from the Prime Minister’s dirty politics activities and those of former Ministers, especially Judith Collins, the bill does have some very useful provisions. It allows New Zealand to ratify the United Nations Convention Against Corruption, it enables implementation of the agreement between the United States and New Zealand, and it facilitates compliance with a number of other international conventions.

Particularly welcome are the changes made to the human-trafficking offence in the Crimes Act. The transnational element of the offence has been removed to ensure trafficking can be prosecuted regardless of whether the crime crosses a border. There are also amendments to address gaps in New Zealand’s identity offence framework to ensure that the selling, transferring, distributing, importing, exporting, or otherwise making available of unlawfully obtained or manufactured identity information is a criminal offence. Similarly, the making, possessing, selling, exporting, and disposing of goods intended to facilitate the commission of identity-related crime are also criminalised. It is so easy with today’s technology to steal information, so we need very strong laws to combat it. I now use a special envelope, especially when overseas, to carry my credit cards because criminals now have the technology to read them just by walking beside you.

Money-laundering is also a booming criminal activity needing the strongest possible deterrent. This bill clarifies that intent to conceal is not a necessary element of the offence, and it removes the requirement that the property laundered must be the proceeds of an offence punishable by at least 5 years’ imprisonment. The ability to detect and investigate money-laundering is also improved through amendments to the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act 2009. Financial institutions will be required to routinely report inherently high-risk transactions to the financial intelligence unit of the New Zealand Police.

The bill also amends the Policing Act to expressly provide the police with the power to share personal information with their international counterparts. The Law and Order Committee will need to ensure that the safeguards are included to ensure that any information sharing is appropriate and will not infringe on the right to privacy of New Zealanders. We in New Zealand First will take a special interest in this part of the bill.

The bill also contains amendments to enhance New Zealand’s anti-corruption legislative frameworks and brings New Zealand into line with international best practice as set out by the United Nations conventions. It will update the definition of “crime involving dishonesty” in the Crimes Act to ensure that those convicted of corrupt offences cannot hold positions of trust in the community. That has been something of a gap in our law that certainly does need to be plugged.

The foreign bribery offence in the Crimes Act is to be amended to remove the dual criminality requirement to ensure that New Zealand can effectively prosecute foreign bribery, regardless of whether it was an offence in the country in which the conduct occurred. There is a new offence too to criminalise the acceptance of a bribe by a foreign public official, and the acceptance of a bribe in return for using one’s influence over an official. The offence of foreign bribery is also to be amended to clarify the circumstances in which a legal person is liable for foreign bribery.

Lastly, it is very heartening to me that the bill substantially increases the penalties for bribery and corruption in the private sector. Some offences will be punishable by up to 20 years’ imprisonment, and there are fines of up to $500,000 for some offences. I look forward to examining the bill further and welcome its introduction with a view to supporting it, if that should prove possible, after it has been examined through the select committee process.

Good afternoon, Mr Assistant Speaker Mallard. This is my first occasion to congratulate you on your very elevated position.

I am very happy to stand in support of the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill. It is a bill that is going to continue to enhance New Zealand’s reputation as being a country in the world that has a very strong and good reputation regarding law and order issues and also a country that protects its integrity around issues concerning organised crime and anti-corruption legislation. It is important to have pieces of legislation like this, which harmonise us with our key trading partners and nations overseas, because, increasingly, organised crime is becoming a borderless global issue.

New Zealand law enforcement agencies are regularly being asked to contribute to overseas investigations of organised criminal activity and, therefore, we need to be up with the play in terms of not only our legislation law enforcement but also the technologies that protect our societies. It is very important that we do this because we know that organised criminal networks and operations are opportunistic and highly adaptable, moving rapidly to any perceived vulnerabilities in legal frameworks or in technology, trade, or financial systems. It is important to have that level of integrity in order that we are not seen as a vulnerable place or an easy place for crime to make its home.

Our comprehensive approach to fighting all forms of organised crime will help safeguard New Zealand’s economy now and into the future, our international reputation, and also public safety. We have a zero-tolerance approach to domestic corruption. New Zealand and its institutions are consistently perceived as the least corrupt in the world. We are highly ranked on several integrity measures, including first equal out of 182 countries in Transparency International’s 2013 Corruption Perceptions Index and first out of 132 countries in the 2014 Social Progress Index. So we can be proud as a nation of those achievements and those standings. We must, however, continue this work that we do in order to protect our country from corruption, organised crime, and money-laundering. I commend this bill to the House.

I am pleased to take a short call on this Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill. Just to reiterate what my colleague has said earlier, the Greens will be supporting this bill through to the select committee because we see that it does achieve some important and necessary things. A number of speakers have made the point that we do have a very, very good international reputation as being a country that, if not entirely free of corruption, at least rates very highly in international comparisons around corruption. But one must never sit resting on laurels, assuming that we are immune to these sorts of intrusions into our society and into our legal practice, in either the public or the private sector. There are provisions around trafficking of people. On the face of it we think that trafficking of people is something that happens in other countries. But in quite recent times we have seen examples at the lower end of the scale where people have been exploited. People have come into New Zealand, found themselves in very unhelpful employment situations, and some of the teeth that this bill will carry will have an influence on managing—or discouraging, should I say—people from going down that road to deliberately exploit people and their labour in ways that New Zealanders simply will not find acceptable in any way.

I am pleased that the provisions, particularly around organised crime, do reflect a somewhat more sophisticated debate than we have had in recent years about organised crime, because for far too long reference to organised crime has immediately brought out references to gang problems in New Zealand. I am under no illusion that, yes, some of the organised criminality in New Zealand is carried out by gangs and gang members—members of some gangs, I should say. But I think that for too long we have simply dismissed the whole business of organised crime and gangs as being conflated. We had this entirely unhelpful notion of suppressing gangs and a misapprehension that by doing so we would suppress organised crime. In fact, more recently, we have seen a much more enlightened attitude, and I just quote the former Minister of Police Ms Tolley, who said earlier this year that we need to accept that you are never going to arrest your way out of the gang culture. She noted in passing, after an overseas trip, that dealing with gangs as a community problem, as a multifaceted, complex set of issues—not simply as a matter to try to suppress—was much more likely to generate more positive outcomes and more useful solutions. So in that sense we do welcome the legislation and it will introduce a much more helpful, sophisticated debate around the nature, the appearance, and the reality of organised crime in New Zealand.

There are one or two minor and not so minor concerns we have about the bill. Clearly there are privacy issues incorporated into some of the provisions, which are always matters that we take seriously, as I am sure other parties do. New Zealanders rate their right to privacy very highly, as indeed we have seen in this very House in relatively recent times. Again, we must never be complacent or assume that privacy measures are adequate to the moment, particularly with the speed and accessibility of electronic communication of all sorts. So although I think in general we can offer significant support for this bill, we do look forward to the select committee process and to encouraging and hearing from people with a level of expertise across quite a whole range of matters and issues that are contained in it, given this is an omnibus bill, and we will actively participate in that and we look forward to further debates.

Carmel Sepuloni, a 5-minute call.

I just stand in support of this Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill, because Labour does support this bill, and it is good to see this bill finally come before the House. It was introduced by the former Minister of Justice Judith Collins, but it was never put forward for debate despite her saying she would do so by the end of 2013. Reflecting on the purpose of the bill, I note that the aim of this bill is to strengthen the law to combat organised crime and corruption. We on this side of the House certainly are in support of that. The bill allows New Zealand to ratify the United Nations Convention Against Corruption, and enables implementation of the agreement between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of New Zealand on enhancing cooperation and preventing and combating crime.

Earlier we heard some of our speakers talk about the importance of the ranking that we get internationally from Transparency International. In the past New Zealand has always ranked very high in terms of having a transparent and accountable Government. We are concerned that, given recent events, that ranking may be negatively affected, particularly given some of the recent scandals that the National Government has been involved in and some of the allegations that have been made against the National Government, including some of its Ministers, and that also implicated the Prime Minister with regard to some behaviour that may not be deemed appropriate for any Government internationally. When the upcoming rankings from Transparency International come out, we will be watching very carefully to see whether or not the National Government’s antics, the National Government’s unhealthy engagement with—what shall we call them? What types of characters are they?

💬 Iain Lees-Galloway: Unseemly.

Unseemly characters. We will be watching to see whether or not those relationships and those connections have an impact on our own ranking internationally in terms of transparency. This is very important in terms of how other countries look at us, in terms of how we are perceived on the world stage, and we have always taken great pride in the fact that we are seen as a country that is not affected by any level of corruption at the Government level. So we will be watching very carefully.

We have a proud tradition of being an honest nation that takes a strong stance against organised crime and corruption. For this we have been rewarded with a consistent ranking of being amongst the least corrupt countries in the world. However, as I said, in recent years this has changed substantially with a lessening of transparency from this Government and multiple flagrant examples of corruption including, to name one of many, Judith Collins’ own trip to China to promote her husband’s company, Oravida, which I am sure we in this House are all aware of, the media is aware of, and the general public are only too aware of. The irony is that Collins was actually on a trip to China to speak about reducing corruption, yet she was visiting Oravida to further her husband’s business ties. National continues to look after itself and the privileged few at the expense of Kiwis. I think we have seen that. There is concern generally across the public about that. That type of behaviour can have an impact on the perception around how transparent we are, whether our Government is living up to expectations, and just whether or not it is living up to the expectations in terms of accountability that you would expect from any First World country.

Nowhere was the concern that the country has around corruption shown more clearly than in recent revelations in the Dirty Politics book. It was a real eye-opener for the whole country, I think, in respect of, for instance, the fact that some friends of the National Party could access Official Information Act requests much faster than the media or other politicians seeking to hold the Government to account. There was concern about the corrupt nature of that. The circumstances surrounding the resignation of Judith Collins are actually a national disgrace, and I think we need to really take that into consideration and touch on that when we are looking at this particular bill, which, ironically, was supposed to be introduced in the House by the former Minister of Justice Judith Collins, but she never got to that point. Thank you.

It is a great pleasure to be able to stand in this House and address you as the Assistant Speaker—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Trevor Mallard): I welcome that, and I am slightly surprised that the member for Rangitīkei is speaking during the Melbourne Cup, but we will just keep going.

Well, I have got to go on to that. Thank you for reminding me of it. I have to say that I am absolutely distraught to think that I am speaking on a bill called the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill right at the very moment the 156th Melbourne Cup is being run down in my office. Unfortunately, the race is not on the screens up here in the gallery, and I do not understand it. Imagine being in Australia if they did not have the Melbourne Cup up on the screens, particularly during a bill named the Organised Crime and Anti-corruption Legislation Bill.

I am very pleased to support this bill on behalf of the Government. I guess I was a little disappointed at the last speech by Carmel Sepuloni. I thought it really emphasised the tragedy that the modern Labour Party is. Obviously, the key message from this bill is that New Zealand prides itself on its place in the world in respect of anti-corruption and, I guess, on the transparent nature of business and order in this country. I think we do very well as a country. This bill will help to reinforce that and will certainly strengthen our position in respect of international respect for our business and transparency in the way we do business. It will also enable us to get control of a whole lot of issues that we are at risk of running into problems with, particularly with money-laundering, international crime, and the way they are treated in New Zealand. I have got a great deal of pleasure in supporting this bill, and with that I will go and watch the Melbourne Cup.

Megan Woods, with a better sense of timing.

It is my pleasure to take a call on this bill for Labour, which is supporting it. I wish the member for Rangitīkei good wishes. He is going back to his office, where apparently the Melbourne Cup is being run. It is all in the use of a comma, which I think could have made quite a difference. So enjoy the race and I hope your horse comes in.

It is a pleasure to speak on this bill and to outline Labour’s support for it, because I think there are some very serious elements to what is a reasonably comprehensive piece of legislation, an omnibus bill that seeks to address a number of measures and has its genesis a long way back. In fact, its genesis was in the previous Labour Government.

If we have a look at this Government’s work on this, in August 2011 Cabinet agreed to an all-of-Government response to organised crime in New Zealand. What we can actually see, if we have a look at the legislation that has been put in place around organised crime and anti-corruption in New Zealand, is a flurry of this legislation in the relatively recent past. We have seen the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act in 2009, the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering Financing of Terrorism Act 2009, and the Search and Surveillance Act 2012. This is a piece of legislation that very much fits in with these bills in making its contribution to controlling this matter.

So what this legislation seeks to do is to establish an effective tool box for targeting organised crime in New Zealand and enabling the law enforcement that our agencies need to be agile and able to quickly and effectively respond to new challenges as they emerge, and I think one of the things that we can see is that new challenges are something that constantly present themselves.

Previous speakers in this debate have spoken about New Zealand’s great reputation. The fact is that we consistently rank really highly in Transparency International’s findings and that we are first equal out of 102 countries. We do, as a country, take a great source of pride—and so we should—about having an open society. But we do have to realise—and this legislation does acknowledge this—that we are not immune to domestic and transnationally generated organised crime.

The police’s 2010 assessment, Organised Crime in New Zealand, documents a wide array of organised criminal markets and activities ranging from drug-use crime to fraud, to intellectual property theft, to cyber-crime, and to environmental crime, and these activities significantly impact on our communities, our international reputation, and our international reputation in international markets. If we take, for example, New Zealand’s methamphetamine market, it is estimated to be worth $1.2 billion per year and contains organised criminal group involvement from production right through to consumption. So these are real issues in our communities that we do need to address.

Although I have outlined some of the legislative measures that we have in this country to combat organised crime, there is a well-accepted acceptance—if I could say such a phrase—that we have many non-legislative mechanisms as well to target organised crime. But what the regulatory impact statement of this bill really does is identify seven key areas where this needs to be addressed. In her address opening this debate for Labour, the Hon Annette King talked about the first case in this country when we had a person on trial for human trafficking.

If we look at the regulatory impact statement for this bill, which was produced in only 2013, we can see that it says that “While this is not considered to be a considerable risk in New Zealand, in recent years New Zealand has come under criticism for perceived gaps in the trafficking in persons offence from the United Nations Human Rights Committee and from the United States in their Trafficking in Persons Report.” So we can see how swiftly we do have to move.

As previous speakers have noted, we do need to be vigilant. Our excellent international reputation has not occurred by accident. It has occurred because we see a great deal of merit and we have taken a great deal of pride in the mechanisms and the transparency that we have at all levels in our country, and that needs to start with our Government. That is where we have to have the utmost levels of transparency, and it is fair to say that in recent months and weeks questions have arisen around the level of transparency that this Government is operating in, and many of my colleagues have gone through some of those matters.

But if we look at some of the mechanisms where we need to have transparency, one of the key mechanisms that we have is the Official Information Act, and that is there to allow individuals and private citizens to find out what is going on with their Government—to be able to find out what it is that the people who wield power are doing.

If we look at the abuse of the Official Information Act system that has been happening under this Government, it is something that is cause for alarm. We have the Prime Minister’s office telling blogger Cameron Slater to “OIA” classified SIS documents, then have the SIS declassify those documents and quickly release them to this blogger. This is not something that we can tolerate from our Government. We have the Prime Minister’s office and other ministerial offices tipping off bloggers when an Official Information Act request is about to be released to an Opposition party or a media outlet and telling them to put in a request for the information in the Official Information Act request, which is then provided.

We have this as a means of quelling criticism of a Government, and that is one of my major concerns here—that if we are going to have a country where we value transparency, where we value anti-corruption, and where we value the fact that we can have people who can speak out and be a critic of the Government, we cannot have an organised ring in which the Government is implicated in stopping that informed debate, and stopping that debate by the denigration of people’s reputations and by seeking to destroy people, not by arguing on the merits and the facts.

We see this when we have 33 of the top health academics and professionals in this country writing an open letter to the Prime Minister to tell him that they are uncomfortable about the perceived conflict of interest around Katherine Rich’s appointment to the Health Promotion Agency because that very person had been part of an organised attack on nutritional scientists at the University of Otago who had put out information that was counter to what her agency wanted to see.

I enjoy debate. I have no problem with any organisation entering into a very robust debate around what is happening and arguing about the facts, but is that what happened? No, that is not what happened. We had the person putting out the information—the person whose research this was—being attacked. We had her reputation called into question, not her science, not her finding, and not even the quality of the writing in her paper, which sometimes academics could be held to account for. No, it was her as a person. This is what we simply cannot tolerate in this country, and we certainly cannot tolerate it when we have our Government and our Prime Minister’s office implicated in it.

So we are very happy to support this legislation going to a select committee. We think there are some really serious issues in here that this legislation will cover off. I agree with a previous speaker who said that at the select committee there do need to be some serious questions and some probing done from all sides of the House around where civil liberties fit in and what protections can be put in place to protect those. But, as a House, we cannot simply pass legislation around protecting ourselves against corruption and putting in place mechanisms for transparency and think that we are immune from those issues as well, because transparency and having an open Government that lives up to the reputation that we as New Zealanders hold dear starts with us in this House. It starts with everybody on both sides of this House, and it is not something that we can afford to let go of.

We have had it said by this organised racket that the people in the city where I live are scum. We have had the family of people killed on the West Coast called feral. We have had academics attacked. We have had teachers attacked. We have had people who dared to criticise attacked. The question for me is who is next, and that is not something that we can tolerate. Thank you very much.

In summary, this bill is designed to combat organised crime and corruption. It will aid and strengthen New Zealand’s reputation as a fair and transparent country and enhance the robustness of our legal system not only for growth for business but on a human rights level. In particular, it ratifies the United Nations Convention Against Corruption and seals our place internationally against corruption.

I am delighted at the cross-party support, despite some of the Opposition’s most colourful examples used to illustrate corruption. But, as such, I am pleased to support this bill’s referral to a select committee.

Bill read a first time.

Bill referred to the Law and Order Committee.