Passports Amendment Bill, Customs and Excise Amendment Bill, New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill

on behalf of the Minister for National Security and Intelligence: I move, That the Passports Amendment Bill, the Customs and Excise Amendment Bill, and the New Zealand Security Intelligence Service Amendment Bill be now read a third time. I want to start by responding to some of the comments made about the truncated legislative process. No one is arguing that it was not speedy, but it was in response to urgent circumstances. I do think it is also useful to go through the time line step by step.

The House had its last sitting day on 31 July 2014 before rising for the general election. Parliament was dissolved on 14 August, and, as we know, the election was 11 weeks ago on 20 September. The UN Security Council passed Resolution 2178, the basis on which the Government is proceeding, only on 24 September. The Government was sworn in 8 weeks ago on 8 October. The terms of review that led to this legislation were approved 7 weeks ago. A draft of the bill was released as soon as it was ready, on 23 November, and the bill received its first reading on 25 November. If one accepts that the foreign fighter threat needed to be addressed urgently and that legislation was required, something on which both the National Party and the Labour Party agreed, it is hard to see how we could have done things differently. I really do think it is quite unfair to compare us with the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia, who had full committee hearings. Our legislation goes nowhere near as far as those countries have gone, and, of course, those countries did not have general elections this year.

Mr Shearer made a very interesting series of comments about engaging with representatives of the Muslim community in New Zealand, and Mr Goff echoed those comments. I agree with both of them that this is a very important job. Those comments align with paragraph 16 of UN Security Council Resolution 2178, which says: “Encourages Member States to engage relevant local communities and non-governmental actors in developing strategies to counter the violent extremist narrative that can incite terrorist acts, address the conditions conducive to the spread of violent extremism, which can be conducive to terrorism, including by empowering youth, families, women, religious, cultural and education leaders, and all other concerned groups of civil society and adopt tailored approaches to countering recruitment to this kind of violent extremism and promoting social inclusion and cohesion;”.

Let me say for the benefit of those in the Chamber tonight that I take those matters very seriously, and I pledge to work with local Muslim communities over the next period, including during the period of the broader review. I do not intend to take up too much of the House’s time this evening, because I think the arguments have been very well canvassed this afternoon, but I want to make four comments.

First, as has been made very clear, this is temporary legislation. It will either expire in early 2017 or be replaced by new legislation before that date. Any new legislation, which will be the product of an independent review to be conducted in 2015, will have a full hearing at the select committee. The broader review next year will take a very good look at all the intelligence legislation, and I have noted the comments by Mr Goff and also by Mr Mark and Dr Graham on the definition of terrorism, and I agree that that should probably be looked at as well. We will also look at the public order offences to consider whether there are gaps in Part 5 of the Crimes Act, and I think we also need to look at the procedure and evidence provisions to ensure that, where necessary, the State can prosecute effectively and, of course, the concomitant of that, that defendants can defend themselves properly.

The second point I want to make is on the scope of the changes to the Passport Act 1992. I say to members that this legislation only broadens the scope of the legislation that the last Government put through this House in 2005.

My third point is that the safeguards applying to the legal regime Parliament is amending today are very extensive. The whole regime is subject to ministerial control. There are very clear reporting functions. There are clear lines of responsibility and rules about what can and cannot be delegated. On top of this, everything is overseen by the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, who has very extensive powers.

Finally, I return to one of the primary motivations behind this legislation, which is fulfilling our role as a good international citizen. All members of this Chamber have been horrified over the past 5 or 6 months at the suffering in the Middle East and the sheer and utter barbarity of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. All countries have to do their bit to confront this unspeakable horror. There is no room for moral ambiguity. We have a responsibility to do whatever we can to ensure that New Zealand citizens do not contribute to the problem. So with those few comments, I again thank the select committee, and in particular I want to acknowledge Messrs Mitchell, Goff, and Shearer for their considerable assistance. I commend the legislation to the House.

I thank the Minister Christopher Finlayson for those words of clarification, and, in particular, for the commitment to look at the definition of terrorism when the review goes ahead.

First, I want to start with something that we have not done before, which is to acknowledge the officials and other members of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee. Certainly from this side of the House, we appreciated your support and your hard work. It was a very intense effort, and I think we came out and landed as well as we perhaps could have, given the time constraints. This legislation was always a question of balance—of getting the balance right between, on the one hand, the ability of our security agencies to safeguard our livelihoods, and, at the same time, to make sure that our basic freedoms, our human rights, and our rights of privacy are protected. That is how it was always presented, and, as I said in the second reading earlier today, the issue for us was that the threat was a real one. The threat was increasing. The number of incidents that were occurring was growing.

But, at the same time, we do not want to get too carried away and say that somehow on the streets of New Zealand, in our towns and cities, we are facing some sort of major threat. That is not the case. Our threat level has gone from “very low” to “low”, but it is a trajectory that is on an upward movement. For that reason, after hearing from the SIS and after having the chance to hear actual cases, we believe that there are grounds for supporting this legislation, because there was a very real issue of terrorism. But any law that comes into force should be narrow in its scope and focused on this problem and not anything broader than that.

The safeguards around warrantless surveillance, visual surveillance, the extension of passports, and access to the Customs Service database—the four main areas that we saw as being problematic—have been gone over thoroughly. We brought the SIS back to explain fully, we brought the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security to the select committee, and we have benefited from the wisdom of the Law Society, the Legislation Advisory Committee, the Privacy Commissioner, and many other people who actually gave submissions for the first time. There was not just the usual queue of individuals who normally appear before a select committee; there were a number of people who appeared for the first time, because they were concerned about where things were going. I hope we listened to them as much as we could, and that we got the balance about right.

I am particularly grateful for the Minister’s comments about the Muslim community. I think it is a community that is at the front line—and we keep on saying this—of protecting New Zealanders as a whole. There are 46,000-odd Muslims, and as one of the submitters said to us: “We are not Muslims in New Zealand; we are Muslims of New Zealand. Twenty-five percent of us have been born in New Zealand. We are as worried about the safety of our children and our families as any other New Zealander is.” As any terrorism expert will tell you, the best way to combat terrorism is to actually engage with the community that some of those extremists are going to come from. Nobody is more worried, and as seized with the issue of ensuring that those people are identified and, effectively, that their threat is removed, than the Muslim community. We need to do much better for them than what we are doing at the moment.

The issue around the haste of this legislation is an important one. It is important not just because of the degree of time that we had, in terms of hearing the various submissions and being able to deliberate. It is actually a bigger issue of the confidence that New Zealanders can have in this Parliament to put through laws that are not pushed, and not hurried, but actually do get the right degree of surveillance—if you like to use that word—and scrutiny that enable us to ensure that laws are good laws. We had the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) legislation last year, which was, frankly, a debacle. It was passed through with some urgency as well, and there was a brief select committee process around it. And now we have this bill. This does not give the public—the general public—the confidence that they want and deserve that we are looking after their best interests, while at the same time weighing up their concerns and the issues we need to be grappling with. We need to do much better than we are doing at the moment, and, frankly, I do not accept the Minister’s explanation that this was the only way to do it. A small review of even this legislation could have taken place during the period of the campaign before the election, and we could have had legislation in the House the day that Parliament came back.

That is to do with this legislation. Now we are moving forward into our review period. With regard to the way I see the threat that is out there, I think we are well-catered-for in New Zealand in terms of our relationships with many of the minority groups in New Zealand. That means that we are not at the same threat level as the UK, Australia, and other countries. But I do not believe that we have the oversight right. I do believe that what we have had up to now, both within the GCSB—the review that went through the GCSB, which I believe was good—and, increasingly within the SIS, are the operational capabilities, safeguards, and checks, which have probably been very much upgraded over the last few years. It is the sense that spies, or whatever we want to call them, do not go off and just do what they want to do—that there is a warranted process, and that everything within the agencies follows a very professional way forward. That is at this level.

The second level, as I see it, is the judicial level. This is the ability of the Commissioner of Security Warrants and the Minister to be able to oversee the warrant procedure to ensure that they fulfil the needs of the warrants, that they are not overstepping the line, and that the High Court judge who is appointed to be the Commissioner of Security Warrants is doing their job properly. The Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security impressed us by the way that she submitted her evidence in front of the select committee. As I said earlier, she said that she has the ability to go into the SIS or the GCSB 24/7 with a pass and look at anything she wants to look at, and oversee and check on anything that has gone and happened. She has the ability, with information technology, to follow and track the path by which somebody perhaps opened up a computer and took a look at it. I believe that the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security has an extremely important role, and the beefed-up role gives us a great deal of confidence, but I do think there are some tweaks and improvements that can be made as a part of the review.

Where we fall down, however, is at the political level. The Intelligence and Security Committee—I know, Phil Goff knows; we have sat on that committee—is, frankly, a joke. It is a joke because the same person who heads the intelligence agencies of the SIS and the GCSB is ultimately the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister sits on the same committee that oversees the operations of those two ministries. There is certainly not a country that I know of in the Western World that has the person who is in charge of those agencies also chairing the oversight committee that looks into them—as well as having the additional vote, which ensures that everything that is put up by the other side is immediately voted down. We need to look at that as a matter of urgency within this review. That cannot continue to happen. In the UK, the chair of that committee is actually a backbencher of considerable standing who, I think, is voted on to that committee and chairs that committee—rather than being the person who is in charge of those agencies. That needs to happen here.

The Intelligence and Security Committee needs to be given far more authority than it has at the moment, and a far greater degree of power to be able to look into those agencies, pull things out, and, if necessary, make those issues public. Unfortunately, what we have seen today with both the GCSB and the SIS—with the inspector-general’s report the other day—is that the only time we are looking into those agencies is when there has been some sort of stuff-up, and that is not good enough. That should be looked at as a matter of course, and it should be looked at in the context of the review that is coming. Thank you.

This is my final call on this legislation. Firstly, I want to acknowledge our Attorney-General. It is quite extraordinary the process that we actually went through with this legislation. Most of our hearings were live-streamed, so people were actually able to sit at home and watch them. I think the only hearing that was not live-streamed was the secret evidence of the director of the SIS, which was appropriate; you were able to watch everybody else. People at home tonight can watch this debate live and see our Attorney-General, and see how quickly he can respond and say he has already identified a couple of things that can be folded into the review.

I want to reiterate the fact that this legislation, as he said, has a sunset clause. We did move that sunset clause from April 2018 to April 2017. That was a significant change, which means we are getting the process started a lot earlier. We have included more reporting. We have wrapped more reporting around the legislation, so that now there is a requirement for the director of the SIS to report every 6 months on how many times the SIS has actually had to use this warrantless visual surveillance power. We have changed the time, in terms of actually getting a warrant issued, from 48 hours to 24 hours—another significant change, wrapping more control around the use of this power. We have a much tighter reporting regime, so that now the Commissioner of Security Warrants and the Minister have immediate visibility over it. They have to approve the warrant, but it also now gets forwarded through to the inspector-general, and, as, I think, the Minister alluded to—actually, it might have been Mr Shearer who explained that—the inspector-general and her staff have the ability to go down to the offices of the SIS and check the files, and go through the files and have full visibility. You cannot get much more transparent than that, in terms of having our inspector-general have access to SIS files and the work in the operations that it is currently working on.

We are responding to UN Resolution 2178, which means that it is incumbent on us, as a nation, to take measures to prevent Kiwis from leaving New Zealand to go and take up arms, and start fighting with groups like the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). The Middle East has gone through a radical change. It has been changing a lot in the last 10 years and, unfortunately, the needle seems to have moved in the wrong direction. But what we are seeing at the moment with ISIS is unprecedented. It is a genuine, real threat to global security. We have to be able to respond to that, too. I can tell you right now that terrorist groups out there will be looking to see how we respond, and they will be looking for weaknesses. If they sense that New Zealand is an easy target, then we will become an easy target. I will tell you one thing: I would rather keep the gate locked and the bull inside the cage than have it open and have the bull come charging out, and all of us looking at each other and pointing fingers and asking: “What went wrong?”.

Our threat level has changed. It has changed from “very low” to “low”. It is still low, and that is good, but it means that we do have to respond. Actually, it is incumbent on this Parliament to be able to respond quickly, and that is what we have done, because, as the Attorney-General explained, that is how circumstances led us to what we have done. We have tried to run the best, most robust process that we could. We have given everyone who wanted to come and make an oral submission access to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee. Dr Shane Reti made a very good point when he highlighted the number of submissions that we actually heard—and that was through the dedication and the hard work of the select committee. I want to acknowledge everyone on the committee.

I am disappointed with New Zealand First. I want to acknowledge Dr Kennedy Graham. Although his position was obvious to us all right from the start—and he was straight up and honest and said: “Look, the Green Party is not going to support this bill.”—he had some very good lines of questioning. In fact, sometimes I thought that he was a National MP, given some of his lines of questioning. [Interruption] Well, Andrew had a go at mine, so I guess it is only fair. I have to say that with New Zealand First I acknowledge Mr Mark’s experience and background—but, look, I do not know what the briefing was that Fletcher Tabuteau gave to you, but, as Mr Shearer pointed out, it was way off base. There have been some big changes made to this bill, and there has been some great work done in terms of wrapping more reporting around it and making it much tighter in terms of definitions, and making sure that it is actually still fit for purpose so that our SIS is still able to respond to a change in threat level.

Finally, I just want to say that for me it was actually an honour coming back into the service of my country as a member of our House of Representatives. Although it was a very truncated process, it was a real honour to be part of it, and to be working with other members across the House, in the spirit of making sure that our national security remains a priority to us all. Thank you.

Two weeks ago we embarked on the process of considering a piece of legislation that was, frankly, unbalanced. It failed to get the balance right between our responsibility as a Parliament to keep New Zealanders safe and, equally, our responsibility as a Parliament to ensure that we do not allow unnecessary and unwarranted intrusion into the private affairs of New Zealanders or cut across their basic rights. The process, frankly, began as a travesty. To get legislation through in 2 weeks, with just 2 days for New Zealanders to prepare and give submissions to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee was appalling. I hope that that never happens again. But I want to pay tribute to all members on the committee, who tried to make the best they could of the situation.

When we first met with officials—and I also want to acknowledge the role of officials—we asked that the legislation be given as early as possible to key organisations, and we demanded that if any cooperation was expected from Labour, there had to be a process of hearing submissions. That happened before the bill was introduced. I will give credit to the Minister in charge of the NZ Security Intelligence Service; he listened to the points that we made. The committee members worked really hard right through Thursday, Friday night, Saturday morning, Monday, and Monday night. We tried to do justice to the New Zealanders who wanted to be heard. I know that the Minister deeply regrets his comments about “chit chat”, and he apologised for them—and I always welcome an apology. We are still waiting for John Key’s apology for the misuse of the SIS for political reasons, but we have, at least, an apology from the Minister. I give him credit for that.

The process of submissions was really important. We heard very strong submissions from the Legislation Advisory Committee, the Privacy Commissioner, and the New Zealand Law Society. And we heard compelling submissions from New Zealanders, many of whom had never before in their lives made a submission to a select committee. Labour did something that was fairly unprecedented as well: David Shearer and I produced a paper for the select committee. We went through the Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill part by part, and we said which amendments we felt were necessary for this legislation to be acceptable and for it to get our support. I have a copy of the paper in my hand here. It is quite an interesting read. If this were an exam, I think we would get 95 percent. I would always prefer 100 percent, but we will settle for 95 percent. We got that because the Government was prepared to entertain arguments that said this legislation goes too far, that it is not balanced, and that it needs changing.

I think the overriding argument was that if there was an argument for this legislation at all, under that sort of urgency, it was for a very narrow range of threats that were posed by an emerging organisation called the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). Yet the bill as introduced was going to give powers that encompassed the wider scope of the SIS’s authority. I think the most significant achievement of the committee was to narrow the scope of the additional powers of visual surveillance and warrantless emergency surveillance only to those matters that pertained to a terrorist threat. If that was the justification for bringing in the legislation in the manner it was introduced, then that was what the bill should be confined to. The Law Society and the Legislation Advisory Committee, headed up by the president of the Law Commission, Sir Grant Hammond, both said that the threshold for visual surveillance, which is incredibly intrusive, and for unwarranted emergency surveillance, which was an unprecedented granting of power to the SIS, was much lower for the SIS than parallel powers were for the police. The police powers were specific and focused on serious crime meriting prison sentences of 14 years or more. The Security Intelligence Service’s powers were very broad, based on the gathering of intelligence. So we pulled back the powers that we deemed unacceptable.

I think that when the Government does its review next year, it needs to consider very seriously whether it wants to broaden those powers or whether we should keep the powers of the SIS as narrow as they can be while it carries out the vital function of providing intelligence information that might pre-empt any terrorist attack. We do not believe in having a surveillance society; we believe in giving the Security Intelligence Service the powers that it needs to protect us, and no more. That is a really important principle that we need to consider.

We considered the question of passports. Under our New Zealand Bill of Rights Act and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, there is a fundamental human right called the freedom of movement—people can come to and leave their country without unnecessary restrictions. We accepted that there are people in New Zealand for whom that right to freedom of movement needs to be curtailed because their declared intention is to fight for an organisation committing crimes against humanity and war crimes. I accept that. I accept that we have an obligation under United Nations Security Resolution 2178 to do what we can to stop people from contributing their manpower to a terrorist organisation that I am utterly opposed to. But what I do not accept is that we should take that curtailment of a fundamental human right, the freedom to travel, and cover other areas where we think it is unwise that a New Zealander goes to—for example, New Zealand Syrians wanting to go to Syria to fight for the Free Syrian Army against al-Assad, or members of the New Zealand Kurdish community who might go to join the Peshmerga against ISIS. But, actually, we do not have the right to stop them in those instances, just as a generation ago we did not stop those men who went to fight against fascism and Franco in Spain. That was unpopular at the time, but within a couple of years we recognised that what they were doing was the right thing.

The 5 percent of changes Labour did not get included the extension of the 3-year period when you can withhold a passport. We learnt at the committee—and the Minister repeated it in the House—that there have been nine passports, I think, removed from people since 2010. That is a very small number of people. Not one of those people has applied to get their passport back, and if they did, the Minister of Internal Affairs would have the power to decline them for another year, and the year after that. So what we did not accept was that there was an argument under this form of urgency to withhold passports for a full 3-year period after the first year, and I remain unconvinced of that.

We also got the changes to the amendments to the Customs and Excise Act that the Privacy Commissioner had recommended. His involvement in the process should have the effect of ensuring that those powers are not misused, and that access to data is restricted to the same data that the Customs Service staff themselves have, and not beyond that.

So when I look down the list of our recommendations, we achieved just about everything that we wanted to in terms of changing the bill, and it would have been churlish of us, having got the changes that we said were minimally necessary to make it acceptable, to then not accept the bill. This legislation comes out of this House—and I think that all of my colleagues on the committee will agree with this—in a better state than it came into the House, and that was vital.

I want to make a couple of general points. The real protections against terrorism lie not in legislation—although this legislation may help—but in having a harmonious and inclusive society; they lie in our moderate Muslim community, which is responsible and does the right thing; and they lie in our reputation internationally as a country that acts independently and has a sense of good international citizenship. During the course of this debate there have been things that have worried me. On a Q+A programme I listened to Stephen Franks—a former member of the ACT Party, and still a National Party member, I think—saying that we should not be bringing people in from Pakistan. I know that Kanwaljit Bakshi would not agree with that. That is a racist comment that casts a slur across an entire community because one or two people might be miscreants. I heard the Prime Minister talking about there being beheadings in the street—I hope that he has reconsidered saying that; it was a foolish and unwise thing to talk about—and I know of the sort of fear that that engendered. I heard the New Zealand First Party talking about it being a mistake to bring people in from the Middle East, when some of us have got many people from the Middle East—

💬 Ron Mark: No, I didn’t say that. Tell the truth.

Read the Hansard, Mr Mark, and you will see it. We all heard it. David Bennett heard it, because he followed it up as the next speaker. What I am saying is that we should not cast a slur on any individual because of their ethnicity and their religion. If we can create a decent society that does not marginalise and alienate any of our communities, then we will not have the problem of terrorism—

💬 Ron Mark: I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I am going to say to you, Mr Assistant Speaker, that I take offence at the allegations and assertions from Mr Goff. I—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): No. [Interruption] The member will sit. [Interruption] Order! This is a debate. It is a strong rebuttal point. Those comments are fairly reflected in this House, and I am not upholding your point of order.

I want to finish on this point: it is one thing to go through this process and come out with a piece of legislation that is in a more acceptable form, but what is critically important is to have in the review that is going to take place a strengthening of the independent powers of the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, and, I believe, a strengthening of more independent oversight of the Security Intelligence Service by our select committee without the conflict of interest that currently exists there.

I seek leave to make a personal statement.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): A personal statement on what matter?

On the matter of assertions that I am a member of a racist party, which I took offence to.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! The member will sit. I am just going to seek some advice. The member can make a personal statement on something that reflects on him, but the member cannot revisit the ruling that I have made. Ron Mark—a personal statement.

I just want to assure the House that as the only member of this House who has served an Arab leader in an Arab army, as the only member of this House who has served in an Arab special force unit, who has commanded Arab soldiers, and who has been looked after by Arab soldiers, I am not the sort of person who is blindly racist towards Middle Eastern, Arab, or Muslim people. I am the sort of person who has allowed Muslim soldiers to take charge of my children and protect them. That is all I wanted to say.

Here in my last call I would just like to address a few questions around urgency. The question of urgency was raised many times during the Committee stage. The question was asked as to why the House was sitting under urgency on this legislation, and I would like to summarise some points.

First of all, we have already mentioned UN Security Council Resolution 2178, and that was passed no more than a few months ago by the UN Security Council. It requires member States to act against foreign terrorist fighters. If the UN Security Council has seen the need for urgency to act, so should we. I would like to read verbatim article 10 of that resolution: The Security Council “Stresses the urgent need to implement fully and immediately this resolution with respect to foreign terrorist fighters, underscores the particular and urgent need to implement this resolution with respect to those foreign terrorist fighters who are associated with ISIL, ANF and other cells, affiliates, splinter groups or derivatives of Al-Qaida,” and it goes on. I make my point on the urgency that is conveyed in that clause.

I think the second point is that the Cricket World Cup, as has been commented on, starts on 14 February next year, 2015, and as an international fixture and focus, our internal responsibilities and safety are paramount.

The last thing I would like to comment on is the contextual urgency, because the threat level in New Zealand has risen from “very low” to “low”. It is not a zero risk. The risk is possible, but not expected. So let us put this in a context that we can understand, that New Zealanders might understand. Last week I spoke to an earthquake expert at GNS Science, and it turns out that the moment before the Canterbury earthquake—the moment before the Canterbury earthquake—the risk was “possible but not expected”. We need to live in a real world, with all the challenges and benefits that that brings, and with this bill we seek to work with New Zealanders to offer protection for New Zealanders at home, for New Zealanders overseas, and for the innocents abroad.

In conclusion, as a member of this committee, we have heard evidence in private describing the terrorist risk to New Zealanders, and I am persuaded that this legislation is essential, that it is essential now, and that it is fit for purpose, and I commend it to the House.

This legislation has had a tortured life as it has gone through Parliament. Although the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee collaborated to good effect, this masked an underlying lack of political consensus that should have been a precondition of its passage. Three parties, it seems, are opposing its final adoption. I just want to make some quick points in response to the four points that the Minister made in his comments on the third reading.

With regard to the first point, he stressed that this was simply temporary legislation, to which we would respond: “Yes, true. But that is part of the problem.” It is creating constitutional precedent, and qualitative change is often justified in this way—on a temporary basis, subject to subsequent review. With regard to the fourth point, that one of the primary motivations is that New Zealand should be a good international citizen, and that there is no room for moral ambiguity, yes, I agree with that, as well. But it is equally important that we are not artificially clear-sighted in our moral self-perception and self-regard. There should be no room, I suggest, for moral superiority, whether it is on the part of those promoting the bill or those opposing the bill.

The main problem—the reason for the lack of consensus that I spoke of—has been twofold: a lack of transparency over the source itself of the legislation, the reason for it, and a studied imprecision and a lack of logic in the reasoning through to the final product. Because the Government chose to oppose without any responding explanation the Supplementary Order Paper that the Green Party put forward, which would have defined the central concept of “foreign terrorist fighter” and advanced a statement of purpose explaining the bills, there will tonight be changes to three Acts on New Zealand’s statute book that will allow new, intrusive powers, with no explanatory statement for the historical record, no statement of purpose of fact, and no definitions entered.

We pride ourselves in passing this legislation efficiently, but we lack the efficiency to clarify the central concepts in them. At the end of the day, the Prime Minister may feel comfortable with this piece of legislation, but most New Zealanders are not, and he leaves a legislative dog’s breakfast as part of his political legacy. The committee chairman, a decent man to whom I want to pay tribute, kept describing the process as “truncated”, as recently as half an hour ago. “Aborted” might be more accurate if we are talking about the democratic process. No piece of New Zealand legislation addressing constitutional rights, such as those of privacy of the person and dignity of the individual, as we have witnessed these past 2 weeks, should ever be subjected to this procedural abomination.

What we are doing tonight is passing unprecedented powers of surveillance by the SIS, based on an increased threat posed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in the Middle East, which potentially intrudes into the ultimate bastions of privacy of all New Zealanders. This legislation claims to target foreign terrorist fighters planning to return to New Zealand fully radicalised and to engage in acts of physical violence, but it stretches beyond that. It will now be possible for the SIS, without ministerial warrant, and at the decision of the director, to plant a camera for 24 hours in the bedroom of any New Zealander who may be suspected of facilitating an act causing major environmental damage, motivated by an ideological cause, and aiming to unduly compel the Government to abstain from some act. That action by the citizen, which may have nothing to do with ISIL in the Middle East whatsoever, falls within the definition of the actions justifying those SIS powers. This is wrong. I am aware of the avoidance of doubt subsection, and that does not change the fact.

It is a sorry day for New Zealand. Yes, the world is a tough place. Yes, ISIL is brutal. Yes, we must ensure New Zealand’s national security is safeguarded, but, no, we must not panic and overreact to the realities out there that have existed since the Munich Olympics of 1972. And we must ensure that we do not get dragged into a higher level of threat than is natural for New Zealand through undue association with larger powers that have less regard for inter-civilisational dialogue, conflict resolution, and peaceful settlement. The Green Party concludes that although these issues are difficult and complex, it was right to have opposed the introduction of the bill in the first reading 14 days ago, and right to oppose its adoption in the third reading tonight.

I invite the Prime Minister, once again, to recall Ben Franklin’s observation that “those who are prepared to give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” That comment was made in another age and in a different context, and yet it speaks to us tonight. I invite all of us to reflect on John Rawls, who, in his A Theory of Justice, argues that “Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override. For this reason justice denies that the loss of freedom for some is made right by a greater good shared by others … the rights secured by justice are not subject to political bargaining or to the calculus of social interests”. The Green Party will vote against this legislation.

This has been a farce of a democratic process. This use of urgency by the National Government is an alarming trend that is happening more and more often. Does the National Government just not want to talk to the people whom it presumes to represent? Every single one of the submissions, oral and written, made special note of the ludicrous time frame given to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, and also to everyday New Zealanders to give their input to select committee members. The anger and frustration of those who made the effort to turn up at such short notice before the select committee was highly, highly evident.

If this was all so urgent, why did every other party in this House vote to break for the holidays this week? Why was New Zealand First the only party that asked the question: “Hold on, why break so early? Don’t we have these very important issues to consider and put before the people of New Zealand?” New Zealand First was the only party that opposed these dates, and this bill was just one of the many reasons why. But, no, the Government wanted to go on holiday.

You cannot agree with the supposed changes to this bill when the entire process used to achieve that outcome was flawed in all of its parts. Our select committee heard from the likes of the Human Rights Commission, the New Zealand Law Society, the New Zealand Council for Civil Liberties, and the Legislation Advisory Committee. Every single one of those groups spoke about the travesty of the truncated process, especially for this bill, and the large and wide-reaching implications for all New Zealanders. You cannot in good conscience sit on that committee and agree with every single person who spoke to us. You cannot stand in this House and speak of this travesty of human justice, state that this process has been a farce, and then say we have reached a compromise and it is OK. You cannot say—

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order! Do not bring me into the debate.

It cannot be said—because we did not even get a chance to read every submission—that it is OK, that we reached a compromise, especially when no compromise has been reached.

We still have a 3-year period on the cancellation of passports. We still have new warrantless surveillance rights. We still have new video surveillance rights. We still have the situation that evidence collected without a warrant can be retained by these security agencies. Every time we asked the question to those standing before us we got the same answer. Every time we asked “What do you think?”, every time we asked “What would you have done instead?”, every time we asked “What would you do?”, we got the same answer, and the answer was always accusatory. The answer was: “We don’t know. You didn’t give us enough time to think this through.”

Sir Geoffrey Palmer said it best, perhaps: “Where legislation is rushed, it often goes wrong.”. I know, and acknowledge, that all of the select committee members in that room were looking to achieve the best for all New Zealanders, but we 10 cannot, and should not, be the sole critique of legislation that alters the fundamental rights of all New Zealanders. We did not give New Zealanders a just chance to speak.

We are told there is a threat, and New Zealand First does not disagree that there is one. In fact, members of this party have been part of New Zealand’s armed forces. We were willing to stand up then, and we are willing to fight vehemently against terrorism now, but this bill does not do that. However, what is our threat warning? “Possible, but not likely.” This Government’s urgency implies there is a clear and present danger. New Zealand First accepts that there is a threat and the security setting has changed, but we think the threat does not justify this bill in these circumstances.

I question also the pressure of the Cricket World Cup. During the Rugby World Cup the American team played on the 10th anniversary of 9/11. What was the solution at the time? They beefed up security. They did not change the law. They acted accordingly, and they acknowledged that there might be a risk; they stated it was a low one. Our right to privacy and our human rights were left alone then, and they should be left alone now.

The Prime Minister has used the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) conflict in his rhetoric to justify the development and the extension of these intrusive powers. The UN Security Council Resolution 2178 asks New Zealanders to do all they can to restrict the movement of foreign terrorist fighters, and rightfully so. We should not be letting New Zealanders take arms in support of terrorist organisations. But this rhetoric has inflamed many in New Zealand, and has further isolated and marginalised good people whom New Zealand First would presume to support.

We need to be considerate and measured. The Law Society accepts that the international situation is moving rapidly, and that the national response must keep abreast, as does New Zealand First. It finished by saying that this “is not synonymous with saying that any legislation should be enacted under urgency.” United Nations special rapporteur Ben Emmerson, when submitting to the UN General Assembly in relation to Resolution 2178, commented that “Measures justified by reference to States’ duties to protect against the threat of terrorism should never be used as a Trojan horse to usher in wider powers of surveillance for unrelated governmental functions.”

I have found some excellent words spoken on the rights of New Zealanders, and much of the public fears that our rights are being eroded cut by cut. “We have an obligation to maintain the integrity of our democratic system, or institutions, and the systems and processes of Government. Here in New Zealand we often take our democratic freedoms for granted. We think they will always be there. We have a Bill of Rights, which is supposed to protect our right to freedom of expression. What on Earth could go wrong?”. The quote continues: “I have a different view. I believe what Thomas Jefferson said—that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance … There are times when we have to stand up for our rights, and the rights of our neighbours and friends, and indeed the rights of people we totally disagree with, or else these rights will begin to erode away.” That same man who spoke these so appropriate words some time ago is now the leader of our Government. Under his leadership this Government is instigating a system and a process that will undermine the very democratic principles that he spoke to not so long ago.

New Zealand First recognises our commitment to the United Nations Security Council, which requires us to prevent the travel of foreign terrorist fighters, but we already have the power to do this. We can cancel passports now. But what about the rest of the obligations from the Security Council? What about the statement that we must reaffirm that member States must comply with their human rights obligations when fighting terrorism, which notes that a failure to do so contributes to radicalisation? Where was this Government’s dialogue with religious faiths and ethnic groups? We were told in the select committee—openly and outright—that it had not taken place. Together with the tools and resources to prevent citizens from becoming terrorist fighters, the Government should engage with civil society to address the problems of communities most at risk of recruitment and radicalisation, and achieve their smooth and satisfactory social integration. That comes from a UN Security Council address.

So far all this Government has done is to inflame potentially disaffected members of our society, and it has achieved exactly what the UN Security Council warned us not to do. What I heard in the debate amongst select committee members was an intelligent thrust and counter-thrust of arguments and ideas. I developed a high level of respect for my peers, especially on the left. But what I observed over and above the detail was the public’s repeated and passionate argument that this process is flawed and undemocratic, and, as has been stated many times, a rushed process can lead to flawed legislation. We do not know, we have not taken the time, and we will not find out whether it is flawed.

The Government and Labour argue that there is a sunset clause, but it is too long, too far away, for those who would get caught up in what history—very recent history—has shown us to be an abused system, with security agencies that are looking for an enemy of the State instead targeting enemies of the Prime Minister and other members of this House. To conclude, beyond all of these issues, information that is gathered without a warrant under this bill can be retained and used, even if no warrant is granted and no subsequent warrant is sought. To clarify, information gathered without a warrant can be used by New Zealand security agencies. Nothing has changed in the rushed committee process. New Zealand First opposes this legislation.

I would just like to congratulate this Parliament on passing this legislation tonight. I think that many times we hear that this Parliament does not act in the best interests of all New Zealanders and that it takes a very adversarial approach to debating issues. I would like New Zealanders just to reflect on the way that this Parliament has come together in some very quick time—and nobody is debating that—to come to a good solution.

I would like to congratulate all those involved in that process—first of all, the Minister in charge of the NZ Security Intelligence Service, Chris Finlayson, who is here and has contributed through the debates tonight to give detailed analysis of the decisions that were made. I would like to draw special attention to the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee chair, Mark Mitchell, who did a fine job in enabling all people to have their points of view well known and took on board the comments made by the Opposition to come to some constructive solutions; to other committee members from the National side who worked hard to achieve that; and also to two special members of the Opposition, David Shearer and Phil Goff. I think their experience in the political process was important for the decisions that they came to in this legislation, and also their understanding of foreign affairs was, I think, essentially a big part of where we got to as a committee.

I would also like to thank our officials who are here. They worked tirelessly in short periods of time to deliver draft on draft of legislation, and to give very strong and solid advice so that the Parliament could come to the solution that it did reach. Last of all, and most important, I would like to thank the submitters. We did get some people, whom you would expect to submit, who were against this bill but we also got a lot of ordinary New Zealanders who wanted to have their say. They had genuine concerns, whether it was around the timing that the bill took or some with a religious or ethnic basis who saw some issues in the process and also the legislation.

It is not perfect, but this Parliament is never perfect. This Parliament has passed many laws under urgency that have never gone to select committees. This Parliament will continue to do that, in the best interests of the country going forward. The two main political parties agreed on that and came to a compromise that is workable, efficient, and in the best interests of New Zealanders.

I want to emphasise that today because the bill is about keeping New Zealanders safe, and that is all New Zealanders. It is not just the people whom political parties may represent in their voting bases; it is all of us. It is all the different ethnicities, religions, and cultures that make up this country.

I just want to give special credit to Phil Goff as well for the way he took on New Zealand First then. It is disgusting that in this House a political party can do what New Zealand First has done tonight and politicise this issue. It is absolutely disgusting. Fletcher Tabuteau—at least he spoke in the third reading. I give him credit for that. He is a new member so he will not be able to go against his leader, but to make this a political football, to take on some of the most vulnerable people in our communities, is a disgrace from the New Zealand First Party.

That was one of the things that many submitters did raise with us. I know in my community we have got a large Islamic community. They are great people. They are people who have come here to make a new life for themselves in this country. The last thing we need in this Parliament is for parties like New Zealand First to attack them politically and publicly. We should be supporting those communities, not trying to take them down. That is something that New Zealanders want to see, and both Labour and National have achieved it.

💬 Ron Mark: Name one.

Name one what?

💬 Ron Mark: Muslim person you’ve ever looked after.

Name one? Well, if you ever won an electorate seat you would actually have to do a lot of immigration work. We have got thousands of people there whom we have done immigration work for. But that member would never know because he will never win an electorate seat. He has always been on the gravy train, that man. He is in here just because his boss gets him in here. Look at the reality—[Interruption] That is it. You actually go and do some work and then come and tell us what to do.

But, members of this Parliament, be proud of your Parliament tonight. Your Parliament has stood up for the good things that New Zealanders wanted to achieve. It has stood up for the security of New Zealanders going forward. It has achieved that through working together, as both main political parties have done. That is a credit to our political system, and it is a credit to, I think, all members of those two main political parties. The Greens were never going to vote for the bill. It does not matter what you had in it; they would never vote for it. New Zealand First is just a disgusting party that should not be in this Parliament. That is all that you need to say.

Moving forward there are, and there always will be, threats to the security of a country. We do not know necessarily what those threats may be. They will morph and change, and the organisations involved will not be something that we can put in a box and say this is going to happen, this is the time it will happen, and this is the place. It does not work that way. But we need to have flexibility in our rules. We need to give our institutions that protect New Zealanders the skills and resources to do that. We need to take that insurance to protect the future of our people and our country going forward. That is what this bill is about. It is about giving the tools to the communities that are there and that are vested with the interest of protecting our whole country, of protecting the reputation of New Zealand going forward as a free and open country, of protecting our young people who go about their business on a day-to-day basis, and of protecting vital interests that we have as a country. Labour understood that, National understood that, and we worked to get a solution that is a good compromise.

I think if you had this legislation when it first came before this Parliament and then you had a look at what you have got at the end here now, you would be very happy with what you have got here.

The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Order!

This legislation is a very good compromise. It is actually probably where it would have started off and ended up if we had had more time. It is actually something that I think you would have found that whether National or Labour had promoted it, it would have the same result.

This is good legislation. It shows New Zealanders that this Parliament is serious about it. The good people who are in this Parliament—and I take into account both parties for that—have delivered for New Zealanders the safety and security they need for their country going forward. I would like to thank everybody involved, especially the submitters, and those who helped with supporting Parliament to achieve that. Thank you.

Tēnā koe, Mr Assistant Speaker. Tēnā koutou e te Whare i tēnei pō. It is a sad moment, because despite the soothing noises, the legal arguments, and all the cosiness that some people are claiming, it is clear to me that this legislation is being supported by people who have never experienced surveillance, and that the people who are actually going to experience the surveillance or have already experienced it, who came before you, have a reason to understand the term “moral ambiguity”.

I would like to focus on that very term because moral ambiguity is how the conflict in the Middle East has been characterised, and it is fuelling the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). Moral ambiguity from the Western powers, whose weapons of supposed mass destruction and their blatant politics of oil, not the politics of an ethical stance, has allowed the allies to support various violent regimes, some extremely misogynist, when it suits the Western powers. When it suits the Western powers, legislation like this will be passed. So let us not pretend that we are operating in some independent little country’s virtuous cycle of self-responsibility. This is about “Five Eyes”, and this what the Americans want us to do and so we are doing it. If that is not moral ambiguity, I do not know what it is.

I would like to remind people of some citizens of this country who have experienced the SIS and its capacity to be morally ambiguous. Mr Ahmed Zaoui, a gentleman whom I happen to know, was put in solitary confinement because he was supposedly connected with terrorism, because the French did not like him. He did 5 years, and it cost $3 million for his name to be cleared. This man had no connection with violence—he was a member of Parliament in his own country and a non-violent person—but nevertheless ended up rotting in a cell inside New Zealand. The powers that be, the SIS right up to the Prime Minister of the day, refused to look at the evidence. That is how safe we feel about what can happen in this country. I would like to talk about my friend Benny Wenda, who was not allowed to speak in this Parliament—a West Papuan who was on the red list for Interpol. Interpol put him on their red list for no other reason than that the Indonesians had framed him.

Information from other countries about these so-called people who need to be on red lists, or be in solitary confinement, or who are terrorists, can mean they suffer a huge price. This legislation will allow that. Despite all the reassurances that we are going to be dealing with only the bad people—because, of course, the world is divided neatly into good and bad people; we all know that in this House, do we not—what is actually happening is a low-trust model, and we are being asked to trust something that has not yet proven to be trustworthy, i.e., the SIS, let alone the Minister of the day having control over the SIS.

I think the point is well made that the committee of this House that makes decisions around the SIS is a failed committee. If there was so much that was heard by the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee about how dangerous it all was—my colleague Dr Kennedy Graham heard all the evidence too. Somehow he was not swayed into a state of paranoia. Somehow he did not think it was necessary to forgo human rights and civil liberties in this legislation. Somehow he managed to maintain a sense of proportion in the face of a disproportionate piece of legislation that is not convincing. It has not convinced many, many people. So it is very disappointing, when you know how surveillance works, to hear people talk as if only the bad people are at risk.

We are proud to stand on our record of being peace makers, because this legislation will not make peace. It will not make anyone safer. It has already made people less safe in this country, because Muslim people are being targeted. They are being abused because of the Government having to create the hyperbole to pass the legislation. That is very disturbing—not to mention how much surveillance you can do in 24 hours. Tame Iti told us about the surveillance that was in his bathroom, and the devices that were put in his bathroom. The SIS and others will do these things. People here think, oh, it will not happen to them. For people like myself who have experienced surveillance, we know that this is not about all New Zealanders. This is wrong, this is a betrayal, and this is an abuse of human rights.

I rise on behalf of the ACT Party in support of this legislation. The lines, or the written laws, that demarcate the relationship between the power of the State and the rights and freedoms of the individual are among the most important things that we will ever debate in this House, and so I am grateful for the opportunity to explain my support for this legislation.

During the first reading, I said that I too have read both Franklin and Rawls. The main conclusion I came to is that I wish the Green Party would apply its new-found classical liberalism to the role of Government within the domestic economy—but I digress. I also conclude that we do not live by the maxim that those who give up freedom for security deserve neither. In fact, the history of classical liberal society is that we have done precisely that, and have done it very, very carefully to get a good bargain in terms of security for the freedom that we have been prepared to trade off. I said at the time that extending visual surveillance powers that already exist within the police to the SIS was not a significant change in principle, and neither was extending the period that a passport could be cancelled for.

Forty-eight hour warrantless surveillance with a very wide scope, however, I said was not OK and was a significant shift in principle rather than extent. So I stand before you today and explain why it is that I have changed my mind on what I regard as a very important matter. No doubt reducing the period of warrantless surveillance to 24 hours puts it far more in line with the practical requirements of the time taken to get a warrant properly. Bear in mind, a much greater threat to civil liberties was that under practical pressures, the existing warrant-granting process might have been watered down. It is far better to have a more transparent process like this than to do that. Narrowing the scope to terrorist acts only was a significant concession that has made it much easier for me to support this bill.

But most important is the fact that despite the truncated process that we have gone through—and I might say it is very easy for members of New Zealand First to say that we should have sat through the holiday for this legislation, because for them going on holiday does not change their workload very much anyway. I have to say that despite this truncated process, the greatest mercy that we have is that we are able to revisit this legislation within the current term, and that is how I was able to change my mind.

In particular, I would like to thank the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security for her briefing. I would like to thank the chair of the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, Mark Mitchell, for his chairing. In particular, I would like to thank senior members of the Labour Party whom I respect. Ultimately, for me, it was their willingness to forgo the ability to do political point-scoring in order to support this legislation for issues of both national security and our civil liberties simultaneously that persuaded me that it was worth supporting this legislation. With that in mind, I commend this legislation to the House. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, for the opportunity to speak on the third reading of this legislation. Even though I am not on the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee, I thought it was important for me to contribute in the third reading of this legislation. First of all, I would like to congratulate the chair of this select committee, Mark Mitchell, on the hard work and the other members who contributed during the long hours of the select committee. I would also like to thank the officials for their work. It is really good to see quality legislation back in the House.

I thought I would share some of the discussions I had with the Muslim community during the past few weeks. They have raised concerns about their family security. They did not talk about the legislation; they talked about the security of their families and the future of their families, which are important to them. Here I would like to clarify the point raised by Ron Mark about whether David Bennett has worked with the Muslim community or not. I can vouch that I have visited the mosques in Hamilton on a number of occasions with the two hard-working MPs of Hamilton, David Bennett and Tim Macindoe, so I can assure that member that we are working with all communities of this country.

While this legislation has been debated there have been a number of issues that have been raised. I would like to take this opportunity to say that the Muslim community should rest assured that they are living in a fair country. We have always welcomed the migrants coming into this country, and we will continue to work. With these words I would like to conclude my speech, and commend this legislation to the House.

Thank you for the acclamation. Anyone listening to this debate, I think, would have heard, on balance, a reasonably constructive debate, perhaps with the exception of David Bennett. There are things that unite us in this House, but there are also deeply held principles that we will dispute, and that we will dispute in a constructive way. As Opposition MPs—and we have all noticed this and known this over the past 6 years—we are often forced to take the on-balance view. This legislation is an example of that in the most extreme. But let us be under no illusion. If right now we were voting on the first iteration of the original bill that came before the House, I doubt very much that you would see support from Labour on that version of the bill. In fact, you absolutely would not. It was a bill we just could not support.

It was made absolutely clear in some of the speeches that were first given in the House that we had five main concerns: the fact that it allowed warrantless surveillance for up to 48 hours; the fact that the sunset clause did not expire until 2018; the fact that it enabled the SIS to conduct visual surveillance like the police; the fact that it increased access to the Customs Service database; and the fact that it extended the period that passports could be cancelled from 1 year up to 3 years. I think everyone in this House would agree that those were significant steps to be taking as a Parliament, and that we had to be assured that there were grounds for those steps to be taken. It was our view that there were not grounds to go as far as that bill first suggested.

Let us also be absolutely clear. If we were voting just based on the process that the Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill underwent, we also would not be voting in favour of it. The process by which we came to debate some extraordinarily significant issues was appalling to the extreme. I think everyone would probably agree—and, in fact, on ratings they are—that the United Kingdom and Australia are facing a significantly higher threat to their security than New Zealand is. Yet, they are taking greater time to debate and consider these similar powers than we did, and we never heard the justification for that from the Government. We understand that there will always be security and intelligence information that we as citizens, or even as Opposition members of Parliament, are not privy to, and for good reason. In those circumstances we, therefore, place an enormous amount of trust in those who are privy to that information. But if the only comparator that we have is the fact that the UK, which also has similar threats and which also is not able to share that information, is still taking more time than we are, then of course that sows the seeds of doubt as to what the motivation was and whether it was justified.

The fact that we had a 2-day process, and, yet, still in that time there were 588 submissions, speaks more about the concern of citizens in New Zealand than it does about how grateful the Government was that so many people were still willing to submit. In fact, I have almost heard it termed as a victory on that side of the House that so many people were still willing to come forward and engage, in those circumstances. It was not a victory. How many people missed out because of that short time frame or were unable to be heard, given only 63 submitters were heard? Yes, I congratulate the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee on putting in such long hours to hear as many submissions as it could, but it did not have to be that way. The great irony, of course, is that we were proposing that spy agencies be given 48 hours of warrantless surveillance but we would not give that long to submitters to submit on the bill that would have granted that power.

This was not the basis on which we as an Opposition were forced to make a decision as to whether or not we would support the legislation. Yes, we accept that there is an increased threat. We accept that the acts of terror undertaken by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria are heinous and should not, and cannot, be tolerated by any nation State. Yes, we accept that the international environment in which we are operating now is very different from what it was even 10 years ago. We accept all of those premises, but how much of our inalienable rights do we trade in order to meet all of those threats that we accept? Well, not as much as the Government first proposed. I want to acknowledge the work that David Shearer and Phil Goff did on behalf of the Labour Party to push extremely hard in the select committee, in a constructive way, to change some of the fundamental elements of the bill. I just want to cover some of those briefly.

First of all is warrantless searches. It is a massive step. The threshold needs to be extraordinarily high. As introduced, the bill allowed warrantless searches to “detect activities prejudicial to security … or [for the purpose of gathering] foreign intelligence information that is essential to security;”. That was the definition. This bill was introduced under the premise that we were tackling only international terrorist acts. That is what this bill was meant to be around. That definition was far too broad to ensure that those were the only circumstances in which it was used. So it was because of Labour that that definition has been narrowed as far as it has now.

The bill also allowed a time frame that was far too generous, and unnecessarily so. The select committee again argued it down to 24 hours, not 48. Extra safety provisions, extra safeguards, have been added. The SIS will have to report to the public every 6 months, rather than annually, on the use of the powers that have been granted to it, and, also, the director of the Security Intelligence Service will be required to immediately notify the Commissioner of Security Warrants and the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security when using this warrantless power.

The second major change was to the sunset clause. A sunset clause, of course, means the expiration of a bill. We do tend to do this when we use a controversial extension of powers. We did it when we extended supervision orders for offenders, for instance. It gives a chance for Parliament to review its use. But, as introduced, the sunset clause in this bill did not expire until April 2018. That would mean that a new Parliament would discuss and debate it. It was, of course, quite far out. I think it is right that the select committee made sure that it would expire on 1 April 2017. Part of our argument has been that this should be part of a wider review of our security and intelligence agencies, and we still argue that that review should have taken place even before we saw the massive changes to the powers of the Government Communications Security Bureau. We continue to argue for that broader review.

Finally, of course, there were changes to the Customs and Excise Act. We continue to have concerns about the ability under the Passports Act to cancel a passport for 3 years, rather than 12 years, but we made sure that we would never leave a citizen stateless if their passport were to be revoked. Those, again, were assurances that Labour sought at the select committee.

There has been considerable talk in this House about perception, except perhaps we have talked about perception in the wrong direction. There has been a view that terrorist agencies would be looking at what New Zealand would be doing, in its domestic context, to tackle terrorism. But what about what New Zealanders perceive of this legislation and this process? This law may now be one, on balance, where we have worked hard to preserve those inalienable rights of New Zealanders, but a balanced view was not what was brought to the debate in the lead up to this law. The perception posed by the Government left members of our ethnic community feeling vilified and feeling targeted, and that was wrong. Yes, perception matters, but what has this process done to that community?

That is why I absolutely believe that we must defend—as much as, or even more vehemently than, our security—our independence, we must defend our inclusiveness, and we must defend more than just tolerance in our society. I am extremely sad about what this process has done to damage that.

I am very pleased to be the last speaker in the last reading of the legislation arising out of this particular bill, the Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill. Perhaps I should summarise some main points. First of all, I would say that this legislation is an effort to protect our national security and to fulfil our international obligations while at the same time trying to have safeguard measures. For that reason we have made a number of changes. Let me summarise a few of these changes. The previous speakers touched upon all sorts of changes. There are three or four major changes. First of all, there is the sunset clause. As the previous speaker, Jacinda Ardern, has just mentioned, the sunset clause will now expire on 1 April 2017 instead of 1 April 2018. Secondly, visual surveillance is strictly limited to countering terrorism. Thirdly, we say that the time of warrantless emergency surveillance is now shortened to 24 hours from 48 hours. These are efforts to make sure that we have safeguard measures there.

Most important, I would emphasise the other point that some other speakers have touched upon—that is, the Muslim society. As a first-generation immigrant from an ethnic minority in New Zealand, I fully appreciate the concerns of the Muslim society. A number of submitters mentioned this while at the hearings. New Zealand is an inclusive society. We all appreciate that and that is why we came to New Zealand. I was told recently that a local Muslim policeman opened a mosque in Taihape just for visitors and local community members. This is very important. We want to see such things happening more and more because we want to see a vibrant cultural society. New Zealand is doing well and we believe that this legislation itself will protect our national security and fulfil our international obligations, but at the same time we will also make sure we treat our Muslim society very, very fairly. I commend the bill to the House.