National Animal Identification and Tracing Amendment Bill

Good morning. Thank you. It is great to be back here. I do feel that we shouldn’t be back here this morning debating this National Animal Identification and Tracing Amendment Bill in urgency. We spent quite a bit of time last night actually outlining to the House why this bill is unnecessary to be debated in urgency. Indeed, it should have gone to a select committee.

💬 Hon AUPITO William Sio: It’s for the farmers.

That member over there wouldn’t have a clue about what farmers do. In fact, if he was genuine about his rebuttal, he should be using his influence on the Minister to say this is a really important issue and it should have gone to a select committee.

Can I re-highlight some of our concerns, and I look forward to Minister O’Connor taking a call. Where I left off last night in my contribution was I was very keen to hear from the Minister about this aspect of this bill where a farmer moves animals to a non - National Animal Identification and Tracing farm location. We support what he is trying to achieve here, but I was under the impression that the system may not be able to cope with that. Indeed, we have some new information this morning that says that potentially it could but it’s going to require an investment in due course from Operational Solutions for Primary Industries New Zealand to do that.

I want to make some comments this morning as we go through the committee stage in this, because this is a bill that I personally do not like. I think it is an utter disgrace that it’s in front of the House and it is designed entirely to cover the backsides of Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) officers who have not acted appropriately or understood the powers that they have under the existing National Animal Identification and Tracing Act.

Where we are here, in Part 1, of course, is dealing with the movement of animals from one location to the other and adding in the provision for some scrutiny or oversight of animals that are moved to a non - National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) location. My question is: how do you have a non-NAIT location if the system was working and if the system had been diligently applied by MPI in the first place? The second point I’d like to make is: how many people out there are not complying with NAIT regulations? How many people sell cattle or sheep, or whatever the animals are, and simply say to the buyer, “Oh look, I haven’t kept up with it. Don’t worry about it. You get on with it.”

The Minister knows full well that a lot of people do that sort of thing. It’s not at all uncommon. So we have had a lax approach to the way in which the regime has been in place in the past. It’s pretty clear that it is a bill that’s before us today that, effectively, covers the tail of MPI officers who have, with all due respect, probably lost the opportunity for sound prosecution by their failure to recognise either the powers or the constraints of their powers inside the bill.

So what I would ask is simply for the Minister to come and explain to us particularly this clause 8, which deals with compliance and enforcement. It amends and replaces the definition of “search power” so that it includes warrantless entry and inspection powers conferred by or under the principal Act. The need for a prescribed form for such search warrants is removed, and the amendments to clause 82 of schedule 2 align with the offence provision in the clause, which is the amendment made by clause 7 to section 31.

What does this mean? It means that a NAIT officer under this bill is going to have more power to enter, to search, and to seize than a police officer might have in a criminal investigation. That is, I think, completely excessive. The Minister sits there smiling because he thinks no one’s actually caught on to this. I don’t think there’d be a farmer in the country who wants to see NAIT officers given the powers of entry to their property and the powers to seize property, assets, information, or everything else as they choose without any kind of warrant. A warrant at least is an expression, if nothing else, of a concern that has been identified.

We’ve heard in our discussions with officials that the problem is that there might be someone there who sees, say, tags missing off animals’ ears etc., etc., and they think, “Right, we’d better have a bit of an in-depth search here.” and they have to go away and it takes a bit of time to get a warrant. Well, I’m not sure that the time factor is a reasonable consideration. Then they said, “Well, the problem is they might have all their details written down inside a notebook, and suddenly the notebook disappears, or suddenly the computer records disappear.”

Well, wake up. We’re in 2018. Every transaction these days between a farmer and another farmer will have a long computer record. For every transaction between a farmer and anyone else who buys those stock units, there will be a long computer transaction list. Somehow they’ll get from one farm to the other. That would tend to mean that there is a transport company manifest somewhere and there is a payment made by the farmer to the transporting company, or by the buyer to the transporting company. These records, under a warrant, are able to be accessed, so any suggestion that there needs to be some kind of immediacy is completely out of order.

I do not understand the Green Party, who went on the streets in all sorts of protests against the Search and Surveillance Bill, silently sitting in this committee allowing this huge extension of powers to NAIT officers—powers well beyond those of a police officer.

Madam Chair, I can speak on if it’s your choice. [Bell rung]

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): The Hon Gerry Brownlee.

So the question for the Minister is: why is it necessary for a NAIT officer to have search and seizure powers greater than a police officer conducting a criminal investigation? Why do they not have to at least satisfy the concerns of anybody who values civil liberties in this country and gain a warrant from a court?

💬 Hon AUPITO William Sio: Will Mr Brownlee vote for the bill?

And there we have Mr Sio sitting over there, Aupito sitting over there, telling me that everything’s OK—“Don’t worry about it.” Well there is a slight—there is a slight—connection here, or should I say simile here, to something that he found very, very offensive that happened during the 1970s and 1980s: the so-called dawn raids.

I’ll tell you what—the member might sit over there and smile and say, “Oh, this won’t happen.” Well, how many times does this House give powers to people that ultimately become abused? So if I was a farmer out there at the moment going about my daily business, worried about the capital I’ve got invested in my farm, worried about the commodity prices, and worried about who was going to be there to purchase the animals when they reach their bullet point, their disposal point—I’m sorry, I’m not a farmer so I don’t know what you’d describe that as—over the top of that would be the worry that should they miss some compliance somewhere, there’s not going to be a discussion with NAIT. I don’t believe now, after this incident, that there’ll be any farmer that doesn’t want to comply. It’s not in their interests. Those bad farmers—those rogues, those ratbags—who have caused the problem in the first place are not typical of farmers in this country. And I think it’s just outrageous that because the MPI officers mucked up—completely mucked up—the investigation on that particular farm, we come here now and are asked to pass a law that grants extraordinary powers to the NAIT officers who are selected, appointed, by the Ministry for Primary Industries.

What are their qualifications? What makes them capable of understanding what is reasonable human rights behaviour when they’re exercising the extraordinary powers that are given under this bill? None of us like to think that anyone can knock at our door and just enter our home and go for a bit of a search through any of our records. While the Minister will probably stand and say, “Well, dwelling houses are removed.”, I don’t doubt that within a short period of time, MPI NAIT officers will decide that the office where a farmer keeps all his records or the corner of the lounge or the living room, or wherever it is, is actually not a dwelling place. And it will be up to the farmer to go to the court to prove that it’s part of his dwelling, so all of these protections aren’t there.

What we have is a bill granting extraordinary powers to a small group of people who are, simply, taking those powers because they have not used the powers they’ve got right now properly—haven’t understood what they’re required to do. I don’t for one minute think that there would have been the mistakes that were made in original investigations in the M. bovis problem had there been proper warrants sought and perhaps even police assistance in getting the information required for prosecutions.

Here’s the question also for the Minister: can he stand up in the committee today and say that there is going to be some prosecution of some ratbag farmer who has not complied with NAIT regulations and that has seen the spread of M. bovis in New Zealand. His answer will be no. Then the question will be, “Why is that?”, and the answer almost certainly is “Because MPI stuffed up the investigation.” Then you’ll say, “So is the answer to their stuffing it up this piece of legislation?”, and almost certainly the answer will be, “Well, if they’d had this bit of legislation, they wouldn’t have been in so much trouble, because they would have had the warrantless right of entry and seizure from farm properties.”

But it is not appropriate, in my opinion, to change a law that affects every New Zealander, because, by the way, there’s no constraint on where a NAIT officer might go—no constraint that says “just a farm”. It could be anywhere. This is very bad for the civil liberties of New Zealanders.

With a number of questions being raised already this morning, I would hope the Minister Damien O’Connor is going to take the opportunity of answering genuine questions. We are in urgency. This has not gone to a select committee. The only chance we get to find out how the Minister thinks his legislation is going to work is in the committee of the whole House. So I implore the Minister to listen and to answer the questions.

I want to start my contribution this morning by talking to an amendment that I’ve moved and that I hope the Minister will give due consideration to, because I think my amendment takes a lot of the heat out of the arguments that were before the House last night. The amendment is to insert new clause 8A, and it says that the amendments in clause 8 will expire on 15 August 2019. The reason I have put that amendment before the committee is that this side of the Chamber passionately believes this legislation should have gone to a select committee. It could have gone to a select committee for the two-week recess, and been back and ready to pass by 4 September. I asked the Minister yesterday in my speeches—and he hasn’t responded but he might—why the urgency. What difference would a two-week select committee process make to the efficacy of this legislation? I want that question answered.

If we accept my amendment, then we do—we heard from the Minister yesterday that he intends to bring yet another NAIT amendment bill before the House. I want to know the timetable for that amendment bill, and I also want an assurance that the Minister will respect democratic process with that legislation and send it to a select committee. Because if we then allow these extraordinary powers to expire, as per my amendment, he’s got the ability to bring it in in his next draft amendment legislation of NAIT, allow it to go through a select committee process, and let the farmers of New Zealand have a say on the extraordinary powers that he’s rushing through, that the Hon Gerry Brownlee has just spoken about. It’s a simple solution, Minister, that will take the heat out of his committee today, allow us to have some comfort in seeing the legislation pass, knowing that the issue then, within 12 months, will be substantially examined at a select committee, as it should be. Why won’t the Minister accept that amendment?

The second issue I want some answers to concerns clauses 4 to 8, and it regards what is a movement of cattle. Now, it might seem a fairly plain question, but what about a farmer that has two contiguous blocks of land, and he attempts to run them quite independently. And he then, for some particular reason, wants to move a bunch of two-year-old heifers from one particular block to another. Does he have to register that as a movement? It is an absolutely contiguous common boundary.

Another example: it might be a hill-country farm, contiguous at some point on the hill, making stock movement difficult from one part of the farm to another, so he engages a transport company and takes his stock from his farm, but along the road because it’s an easier way of moving it to the same property. Is that a movement requiring registration as a NAIT movement?

My third example, and this is particularly common around the cities of New Zealand, is where you’ve got a large number of lifestylers owning their 8-hectare blocks and not wanting to engage in agriculture in any way, so they enlist the assistance of a local farmer, and what that local farmer does is he moves them around, raising them as if those properties were his own. They’re not his own; they’re owned completely by somebody else, and he moves them legitimately, either by driving them on the road or by getting transport in.

As he answers that question, I come back to a fourth example, or a farmer with one registered NAIT number, who perhaps has two properties but separated by, for example, 20 kilometres. He moves cattle from one of his properties to the other property—is that a NAIT movement that needs to be recorded? Is that a NAIT movement that should have been recorded under the current legislation but now has to be recorded under the proposed amendment legislation?

They are simple questions, practical questions, Minister, from a farmer who knows a little bit about NAIT, unlike, I suspect, the Minister in the chair, who should know a lot about NAIT but maybe doesn’t know as much as he should do. They’re the sorts of questions that farmers will be asking as this legislation is passed and receives its formal assent. I want to know where they go and ask for that information.

We’ve just had a very brief half-hour select committee briefing by the NAIT chair and the NAIT chief executive. I subbed on to the Primary Production Committee for that examination—I came away with less confidence in NAIT as an organisation and Operational Solutions for Primary Industries New Zealand (OSPRI) as an organisation than I had before I attended that briefing. We asked the chief executive about the level of compliance with NAIT under the current legislation. She answered—and this is extraordinary—that she was comfortable with the level of compliance. She argued that when you compared the introduction of our animal tracing system with others around the world, they take time to come in and we should be grateful that it’s being complied with at the level that it is. I don’t agree with Michelle Edge. I don’t think the level of compliance is anywhere near where it should be.

The next question that arises out of that—that I didn’t get a satisfactory answer from Michelle Edge as chief executive of OSPRI, but I look forward to the satisfactory answer from the Minister when he takes to his feet—is who is the policeman for NAIT under the current legislation and under the amendment legislation? Who is expected to monitor compliance? As I pointed out to the NAIT people before the select committee this morning, there’s a perfect opportunity for compliance auditing to be done under the TB testing regime. Farmers get regular TB tests done by a person who is a subcontractor to OSPRI, and they have the opportunity to do an audit of NAIT every time they do a TB test.

So, Minister, take a call. Talk to your officials who are pushing for these extraordinary greater-than-police - like powers in the Search and Surveillance Act; talk to your officials and answer to me on the level of compliance auditing that’s done now under the TB testing regime. Again, Minister, despite the answer that was given to me today by Michelle Edge, the chief executive of OSPRI, my observation as a farmer would be that there’s zero auditing done by the TB testing regime—a lost opportunity, Minister.

There are a number of questions I’ve raised. They’re not frivolous questions; they’re genuine questions. I do ask the Minister to talk to his officials and have a serious look at my amendment. If he agrees to that amendment, we can take the heat of this argument out, knowing that the extraordinary powers will have a sunset clause on them prior to a proper select committee examination, which he is refusing to allow on this particular occasion, and I want to know the reason why he’s refusing to allow that examination. Why the urgency for this to be done under urgency?

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’m happy to answer a few of the queries. I appreciate the oratory skills of Mr Brownlee, but I’m not sure I appreciate all the points that he’s raised. I guess trying to overplay what we’re trying to do here probably might raise some concern with farmers, but is completely without justification.

What we are trying to do here is align the powers under the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) Act to be equivalent to those under the Search and Surveillance Act—no more, no less: that is, we’re wanting to assist NAIT officers and Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) people who are going in, firstly, under the powers of checking compliance, whether warrantless entry—there’s a warranted entry and a warrantless one. The warrantless one is the one that we’re looking at to ensure that if they are moving not into a house, not into a marae, but into a building on a farm to check to ensure that compliance with the NAIT Act is, in fact, occurring, they have the ability to, I guess, look around, see what might be going on—

💬 Hon Amy Adams: They have that now.

—and lawfully seize anything that might assist them—lawfully seize.

Now, the member sitting in the front there understands full well—better than I do—what “lawful seizure” means in case law, in precedent. If we are to make any adjustments to that, that has huge ramifications not just across the Search and Surveillance Act but, actually, in many other Acts. What we’re not attempting to do is make any major change. In fact, these are just technical changes, which is why we are not going to select committee, because we will have, probably early next year, another piece of legislation that legitimately goes through more changes of policy under NAIT and under biosecurity.

I would have thought that, actually, the National Party, the former Government, would have been more helpful and conciliatory in this whole process, because, without going and digging too deep, I think the former Minister Mr Carter has identified a few of the problems himself—that is, that he got the NAIT regime in front of the select committee, asked questions, and wasn’t comforted. Well, I have to say, I’ve not been comforted at all while I’ve been Minister. Firstly, we’ve had a focus on eradication of M. bovis and then improvement of the NAIT system. Then, in terms of changes to NAIT Ltd or to Operational Solutions for Primary Industries New Zealand (OSPRI), those things are evolving. Can I just say that I’m happy. I would’ve rather had them happen more quickly, but a former colleague of theirs has now gone to London. He was in charge of NAIT and OSPRI, and we are seeing the change at a CEO level. I think those things will help us move forward, and the faster the better—no more said in that area.

Can I just work through a couple of the other issues. The urgency is because we want these changes to occur as quickly as possible. We’ve been working systematically through the challenges of M. bovis, including the need to upgrade NAIT to ensure that the investigations under way do deliver an outcome. The question, I think from Mr Carter, is “Will anyone be prosecuted?” Yes, I can assure him of that. In spite of, I guess, the technical glitches that we’ve had in seizing information and getting the right evidence, the changes that we’re putting through here will assist in that in the future.

One thing that the previous Government never did—or NAIT or OSPRI; call it what you like—is they never sent clear messages to farmers that they should adhere to this. The previous speaker Mr Carter says, “Well, should all stock movements be recorded?” And he quite clearly, I guess, exposed what has been the problem: that being apologetic and trying to make excuses for farmers not to do things, as the previous Government did, hasn’t helped here. So I’ll be upfront and say, yes, all movements should be recorded—absolutely—because we’re paying $886 million, or maybe more, to try and eradicate M. bovis. That would’ve cost us hundreds of millions of dollars less if we’d had a proper operating NAIT system—fact. So, yes, we will ask farmers to record all movement. Yes, we will change the NAIT system to make it more effective and efficient, because it’s been clunky and the changes that most speakers are referring to should’ve happened under the previous Government.

We’re getting on and doing it, and I know that Opposition members understand the need for us to do that. As we’ve moved forward and exposed some of the deficiencies, we’re going to make the changes. So we can have some assistance and move this through as quickly as possible, so that NAIT officers, and MPI officials as well, can do their jobs properly, because, if they can’t, then we’re likely to end up with hundreds of millions of dollars of expenditure through other biosecurity incursions.

Can I just refer to a couple of other questions around lifestylers moving stock between blocks. Yes, you should record those movements, because, as with many of the unfortunate farmers who are caught up in the M. bovis situation at the moment, some of them have different blocks of land. Some of them have been able to work with MPI and identify different blocks and different management regimes, and that means that not all the animals off all their farms have then had to be killed—just the ones off clearly identified blocks. If we’d had better traceability around all of those movements, other farmers may not have had to kill all their animals—the point being, we need identification and NAIT numbers connected to land blocks, we need to have all movements recorded, and we need to have all animals recorded. These things have not been happening, and we’re trying to move through to make sure that they do.

One of the signals that farmers should clearly have is that if they don’t adhere to the system and there’s a suspicion that they’re not adhering to it, then officers can come on to their property and investigate properly. That’s the basis of good law: implementation. The fact that it hasn’t occurred under the previous five years is not our fault. I have to say that we are doing that now. It hasn’t happened in the past, and what we’re trying to do is rectify that. I guess the member—and there’ll be lots of speeches, no doubt; righteous speeches, on all sorts of areas of overreach, etc. The bottom line is I think most of the members of the Opposition know that we’ve got to do this. We’ve got to do it quickly to make sure that the NAIT system operates, and we will have the ability to scrutinise the areas of policy change in the select committee when the new bill is brought before this House.

💬 Rt Hon David Carter: When?

What we’re wanting to do—it’ll be next year, early next year. But can I say that we, as a Government, are wanting to bring in good law and ensure that we have a good outcome from that law. The fact that we are having to debate issues around the NAIT Act is because the NAIT Act passed by the previous Government left a whole lot of holes exposed and, in part, contributed to the frustration and the cost that we have in running the M. bovis eradication programme.

We’re trying to move forward here, and so I’d appreciate it if the Opposition could see their way through to run a better NAIT system, to have better levels of compliance, and to have more cooperation. We’d welcome that. Otherwise, I’m happy to answer any of the questions raised here.

Well, Minister Damien O’Connor has taken a call this morning to apparently answer some of the genuine questions—

💬 Hon Nathan Guy: He hasn’t answered the questions.

—I said “apparently”—raised by the Opposition. Let me make it very clear for everybody that we have no objection to the strengthening of the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) provisions, and the whole of his speech was all about the strengthening of the NAIT provisions. What we have a strong objection to is a bill that, firstly, has not been scrutinised by a select committee, so it had no farming interests able to express an opinion on the need for the extraordinary powers that are conveyed in the bill.

No one is going to be arguing against a better NAIT system that would have helped more in the circumstances. No one is going to say, “Well, we shouldn’t track the movements of animals, particularly in a country that is so dependent on its agriculture and where biosecurity is such an important aspect of maintaining our economy.” No one’s going to argue against that, and the Minister, I think, is disingenuous in suggesting that that’s what the Opposition are doing today.

But it is still very unclear why a NAIT officer has to have such extraordinary powers of entry, of surveillance, and of seizure on farm properties. What’s worse is that it’s not even clear that those powers can only be exercised on farm properties. The reality is that there may be numerous places where such records could be held in the electronic world. It could be in the accounting offices in downtown Wellington or Auckland or Christchurch or Dunedin, or in the small provincial accounting offices. It’s quite possible that the records are held there, and NAIT officers have an absolute right to come in and go fishing around to see what they’re after, without ever satisfying someone who is there to protect the civil liberties of New Zealanders—a judge, in this case—that it’s necessary to do so. All this rubbish about “Well, records can be deleted, notebooks can be lost.”—all that sort of thing is complete rubbish.

The other thing I’d have to suggest to you is that the concept of a NAIT officer having all these powers is clearly designed to be quite coercive of the farming community, and another word for that might be “intimidatory” of the farming community. So if a NAIT man turns up at the gate, you know that you could be in trouble. You know that there is no possibility of your declining entry to the property—well, in actual fact, they can’t do that now anyway. But there is no idea that you could say, “Well, actually, I do not have my records available today.” There is no engagement, but simply an understanding that you’re about to be turned over by the NAIT officer. That, I think, is quite a problem, and it certainly doesn’t auger well for creating the sort of cooperative environment that will be necessary for the full implementation of the NAIT arrangements.

It’s also not clear exactly what went wrong in the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) investigation of the ratbag farmer down south. Why can’t we know what the exact problem was that’s meant that probably the people who are responsible for the M. bovis spread throughout the country are likely to escape prosecution? Simply passing it off and saying “Well, this legislation will make sure that that can’t happen in the future.” is not good enough. It’s not good enough. We are being asked to set aside all of the concerns that we have about the civil liberties of New Zealanders, the freedoms of New Zealanders, the right to consider your home your sanctuary, etc., simply because a Government department failed to understand its own legislation.

Now, if I’m wrong, the Minister will stand up and tell me I’m wrong and, at the same time, give us a clear indication or, perhaps, the example of what went wrong. But what’s clear is that something did go wrong. Somebody inside MPI or some group of persons did not know how they should operate that legislation, and that’s why we’re here today.

I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. I want to seek your assistance. Look, it’s a matter that I genuinely haven’t heard addressed in this committee, and so I’m genuinely asking for your guidance. It is around the status of the explanatory notes of the legislation. Now, my concern is that this explanatory note starts off by telling the House that the bill “makes technical amendments” to the Act and “does not represent new policy.” Now, within the course of the debate, obviously, we can debate those matters between us, and we have a very different view to the Minister. But my concern is that when you have a document that has come out of the Parliamentary Counsel Office that asserts in the introductory section of the legislation those matters of absolute fact, I think the representation of the contents in the bill is seriously questionable.

Now, I know we won’t want to get into the debating of the merits, but can I just give the Chair this context, which is that the Minister himself has acknowledged in his last contribution that this now ensures that National Animal Identification and Tracing officers, who are already lawfully able to enter a property and inspect—which we agree with—can now seize goods. Now, we will all debate the merits and the value and the appropriateness of that, but to suggest that giving powers to seize is a technical matter and not new policy would be like saying that a bill could come into this House and say that the police could enter any property in New Zealand, at any time, for no reason at all, and take property and that that was technical. It simply cannot be factually accurate. Now, I’m not saying that the Minister can’t bring in a bill that we should have those powers—and that’s exactly what we debate in this House—but it cannot be technical to say that a new power of seizure that everybody accepts does not exist now is not new policy.

Yeah. OK, I understand the point. Can I refer the member to Speaker’s ruling 96/2, which I think won’t satisfy but does address the issue. For the benefit of the committee, it says, “whether an explanatory note is accurate is always a matter of opinion. It is not a matter on which the Speaker can judge.” So the Minister’s opinion can be criticised in the debate, and members do not have to accept it. The point of order that the member is making may well be correct, but according to Speakers’ rulings, it’s a debatable point and it’s nothing that the Chair can rule on.

💬 Hon Amy Adams: Thank you for that, Madam Chair. Speaking to the point of order, can I ask—

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): No, I’ve actually—you’ve made your point of order and I’ve ruled on it.

💬 Hon Amy Adams: Yes, OK. Well, new point of order, then.

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Is this a new point of order?

I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. Thank you—a new point of order. Thank you for your ruling. I understand that. I note that I did look at Speaker’s ruling 96/2, which, of course, makes it very clear that a Minister may not mislead the House in the explanatory note and that the explanatory note must be factual. My question to you now, as Chair, is what then is the remedy for the House if the Minister does indeed mislead the House in an explanatory note and the explanatory note is not factual, and, as a further aspect of that, is the Chair confirming, then, that the explanatory note is no more than a statement by the Minister of—in this case—his personal opinion and that it should be regarded as having no greater standing than that? So the question is: is it simply a statement of the Minister’s opinion and nothing more, and, secondly, what is the remedy for this House if the Minister does breach Speaker’s ruling 96/2 and misleads the House in that explanatory note?

So that point of order, then, is what is the remedy if the House decides that the Minister is deliberately misleading, and there are procedures for that. As Chair of the committee of the whole House, I have no remedy for that. You will have to take up the formal response about anyone misleading the House—OK?

Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Madam Chair, for that. Look, we are, obviously, now debating Part 1, which is a substantive part of this National Animal Identification and Tracing Amendment Bill. I want to come to exactly the point that I’ve just been raising, which is around the status and the nature of the changes we’re making in this bill. My colleague the Hon Gerry Brownlee has set out very well that there is no objection on this side of the Chamber whatsoever to improving the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) legislation to ensure that the NAIT legislation is properly complied with, that the officers have the appropriate range of powers, and that our response to M. bovis is robust and effective. That is why we are voting for the legislation, and that is why we have worked so constructively with the Minister, through my colleague Nathan Guy, to this point. To suggest otherwise is, frankly, offensive to this side of the Chamber.

What we are absolutely saying, and we’re saying very, very clearly—in fact, the Minister acknowledged it in his last contribution—is that this is not a technical bill. I’m sorry. I know the officials want to pass it off that way, but officials will always take an opportunity to get more powers. What the officials are saying is, “We’ve now discovered we would like to have more powers than we currently have.” Fair enough—bring a bill to the House and we can have the debate as to whether those powers are appropriate. But to give an officer the power to seize goods, which they do not currently have, can under no interpretation, in any natural meaning of the words, be regarded as technical or a drafting error. When the NAIT legislation was passed, Parliament said that when a NAIT officer goes into a property without warrant, without any cause to suspect any offending—and, as my colleagues have said, this isn’t just farms; it could be any number of businesses that may hold records or information relevant—they should have the power to enter, they should have the power to inspect, but beyond that they should get a warrant.

Now, if the Minister wants to bring a bill to the House and suggest that actually those officials should have the power to also seize goods, well, we can have that debate. We’re up for that debate. It’s a debate we can have. But I want to remind the committee that that very Minister is the one who voted against the search and surveillance legislation that provided for, actually, more constrained powers than this.

💬 Hon Nathan Guy: Did he vote against it?

He voted against that. So to now suggest that the powers that the Minister in the chair said were inappropriate and should be opposed should not only go through but should go through in urgency, should go through without a select committee—and he has the audacity, the barefaced cheek to describe it as a technical change. Mr O’Connor, I ask you, please explain on what basis giving an officer going on to a property without warrant, without cause, a power they don’t currently have is technical?

Now, I don’t mind, as I say, having that discussion. On this side of the Chamber, we have implored you: please send it to a select committee. If we’re going to grant an extension of warrantless search powers, the very least you can do is allow members of this House to get good legal advice, to allow those affected to come and address the select committee, and to allow us to assess the way those powers sit in the overall framework. The Minister has completely refused to do that. He has, I believe, attempted to obfuscate through his officials and through this bill by telling his support partners and members of this House that it’s just a technical fix-up—nothing to see here. Well, listen; I’ve been a Minister for six years. I know that every time you get told something is minor and technical, every alarm bell in your head should be going—and a siren. And then to rush it through under urgency is outrageous. It is utterly outrageous. This is an extension of warrantless search powers—no select committee, no legal advice—and the Minister has attempted to tell this committee that it is technical. Under no analysis possible can this be regarded as technical, and the Minister should expect that we will be raising the issue of why he has attempted to mislead the House in the explanatory note in this way.

I also want to reflect on the fact that the Minister has not answered the questions that my colleague the Rt Hon David Carter put up. Now, the Rt Hon David Carter is, of course, not only a farmer himself but a previous Minister in the role that the Minister in the chair now holds. I’m sure the Minister in the chair will acknowledge that David Carter has extensive knowledge of not only the law but the practical operations in this regard, and he has raised very serious and reasonable, realistic scenarios in which this—[Bell rung] Madam Chair?

CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): The Hon Amy Adams.

He has raised very reasonable, as I was saying, and practical examples of exactly what could be caught in this aspect of now widening the definition of what is caught as a “movement”.

David Carter pointed out that if a farmer was to move a mob of cows from one paddock to another after milking—is that now a movement? Is that now going to have to be reported for NAIT purposes? There are any number of iterations of confusions as to what that might be—Mr Carter ran through several of them—and while the Minister took a call, he didn’t address any of those. These are important issues, and while we don’t have a select committee to go through it, it is incumbent on the Minister to go beyond what a Minister in a committee stage might normally do and take the time to work through every reasonable question that is put, because he has denied members of this House, he has denied the public, any chance to raise their concerns with him and with his officials through a more considered process. I simply cannot emphasise enough to this committee how concerned I am that we would be extending warrantless search powers without any assessment of that and without any checks and balances.

One of the amendments on the Table that I want to support is that of my colleague again, the Rt Hon David Carter, where he has suggested, quite reasonably, that this House is determined to ram this through without taking the opportunity to test it, even over a very limited time frame, Minister. We’re not talking about anything that would delay the M. bovis response. A week, 10 days would be sufficient for members to get the sort of advice that would enable a proper consideration. If the Minister is utterly determined that he won’t do that, we implore him and we implore this committee to put in place a sunset clause so that if these powers are to exist over a permanent course, if this is to become the new normal, at the very least the Minister takes the time to bring a bill back to the House that goes through the proper process.

Now, the Minister has told us he’s intending to bring more NAIT legislation to the House. So he already has a vehicle. He’s got a bill coming back to the House. He has every chance in that bill to say, “OK, now let’s have a proper select committee process and a testing of that.” If that’s his intention—and I hope it is—then there can be nothing lost at all to support a sunset clause in this legislation so that at least members of the House, but more importantly those affected by these powers, know that there will be an opportunity to really test this with some rigour before it becomes the new normal. So if the Minister is true to his word—and I’m sure as an honourable member he will be—and he intends to ensure these matters are properly reviewed in the NAIT legislation, tested in the select committee process—and we would welcome that—then I implore you to show your good intentions by backing the amendment that puts in place a three-year sunset clause. That’s plenty of time for the Minister’s legislation to progress, but it would assure the House that this is not a nefarious, dead-of-night—although we’re now in the morning—under urgency approach to ram through extensions of warrantless search powers as the new normal because the officials have seen an opportunity to get some more powers and to rely on the goodwill of this House to address the M. bovis response as a platform to do it.

I can think of no reason why that wouldn’t be acceptable to the Minister. I hope that it would be acceptable to other members of the committee who have, on many occasions, spoken strongly about their concerns at extending search and surveillance powers. The most concerning search and surveillance power is always the warrantless one. This is what we’re talking about. Of course NAIT officers need the ability to go on to farms and to inspect. They can do that now, but if they want to seize goods, that is a massive increase in their powers. It is not technical. It is significant. It needs to be properly debated, and if it isn’t going to be in this process—and we think that is incredibly regretful—the House should at least have the assurance that it cannot become the new normal without a select committee process in due course.

Madam Chair, I’ll just attempt to move through the thing to—firstly, the accusation that this is not a technical bill. I guess I go through the explanation, which is accurate, which says particularly that the provisions in the bill which change the particular form, the format of a search warrant—so not a terribly big policy issue—align the powers under National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) and clarifies. These are not major policy changes.

I can go back to the issue of the search and surveillance powers and quote from the report that came from the Primary Production Committee way back before the National Animal Identification and Tracing Act was passed. “This anticipates the enactment of the Search and Surveillance Bill”—because both were going through the system at the same time—“currently before the House, and would facilitate an amendment to the provisions that are proposed to form Schedule 1A, to align the provisions of the two pieces of legislation once they are both in force.”

The clear intention of the committee when processing the NAIT Bill, before it became an Act, was that the provisions would align with the Search and Surveillance Act. Can I say that those provisions are the same as in the Wine Act, the Fisheries Act, the Crown Minerals Act, and the Waste Minimisation Act. So what they do is, of course, provide powers for people to enter property under warrants if they have reasonable cause, or if they don’t have reasonable cause, they are able to have a warrantless search to check for compliance, and while doing so, under section 110(d) of the Search and Surveillance Act, “to seize anything that is the subject of the search or anything else that may be lawfully seized:”—the point being that “lawfully seized” is a term, as I’ve said before in my earlier speech, that has been laid down through precedent and through case law, which, if we are to tinker with, would be a policy change. But we’re not intending to at all. What we are—

💬 Hon Amy Adams: No, you’re adding the power. You’re adding the power.

We are not adding power; we are aligning the powers under the NAIT Act, which are currently inadequate, to those of the Search and Surveillance Act. And, I guess, the question could be: why wasn’t that done earlier to enable NAIT officers to better implement the Act? Well, I can’t answer for the previous Government. All I’m saying is that, when exposed as a deficiency by our Government, we wanted to make the change to ensure that no more powers, but equivalent powers, should be given to NAIT officers as are currently given to officers to implement the Wine Act, the Fisheries Act, the Crown Minerals Act, the Waste Minimisation Act, and we believe, because it’s so important, the NAIT Act as well. That is all this bill is doing. That is why it is a technical amendment. That is why the explanatory note to the bill is accurate, and I stand by it.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the chance to speak on this bill, and I appreciate the Minister’s last response, but he leaves many questions open that members of the farming community would like answered, and especially in this committee here today.

We understand, and everyone in this room understands, the need to do something in regard to incursions that may require that, but the powers that are being put in place here are unfettered powers. They are not the same powers that are in other legislation that the Minister has tried to hide behind. These are the search and surveillance powers, which are the high end, you could say, of the powers available to any Government organisation in regard to search and surveillance. They are, basically, unfettered powers which enable an organisation to do what it likes. And I explain that to the New Zealand First members, because, when the farmers understand what these powers are in comparison to other investigationary powers, they are completely different. These are the top end, unfettered powers, and they were designed in legislation that was for the national interest to protect New Zealand in cases of attack, basically, and to give New Zealand extreme powers.

Now, when we’re talking about the case of New Zealand farmers and incursions, there do need to be powers given to the Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) and other officials—nobody’s denying that—but they need to have some kinds of rules around them, otherwise this would be seen as a blatant attack on farmers at a point of weakness, when there is an incursion, like M. bovis, to use this process to put on them more powers than would be on any other organisation. And that will be the reaction of the farming community. It won’t be a reaction of “Thank you. Let’s do this.” They will be going, “You have now increased the powers that MPI have.” And so we want the Minister to actually specify whether warrants are required for those pieces of legislation that he just talked about—do they need a warrant in those circumstances?—and to go through individually and answer that.

💬 Hon Amy Adams: Do they need reasonable cause?

Do they need reasonable cause in each of those circumstances under those other pieces of legislation he discussed? We don’t want these broad statements about how this was about trying to align legislation that was set up at one time to be put in the other place. It didn’t happen that way. The search and surveillance rules were put there for a reason.

Now, we also have the situation in this House where we’re in urgency. Urgency is a very special part of the political process, and it’s only used in special circumstances. This is not a special circumstance that demands urgency. There certainly is a need to do something, as the Minister has reflected on, but it does not demand urgency. So why would there be urgency in this situation? It can only lead to one conclusion, and that is: because the Minister does not want to have a full and fair process of investigation of these rules. That can be the only reason why there would be urgency at this stage.

The select committee has offered to meet in the recess over the next two weeks to go through all these things and to give that comfort to farmers, and that has been denied by this House.

💬 Hon Nathan Guy: By the Minister, not by the House.

By the Minister. If there’s nothing to hide, why not do that? Why not go through a process which gives comfort to those people out there that are going to be subject to these rules? There’s no urgency. The incursion has already happened. The Minister is dealing with it as best he can. This power won’t assist them in any part of that incursion at the moment. It simply is using the guise of that emergency situation to pass through laws that will mean that farmers are subject to a higher sense of invasion to their personal privacy and their personal property rights—and anybody else that’s a landowner or has any stock or involvement in those industries. That is what is happening here today.

I believe that there is a solution that can be looked at in the context of this debate here today. [Time expired]

Thank you, Madam Chair. I’ll just take a brief call just, I think, to step back from this a little bit and look at some of the context, because I think there is a little bit of misunderstanding about how important bringing in these provisions is, as we see in Part 1.

I just want to go back to a previous contribution by the Hon Gerry Brownlee, who seemed to be under the misapprehension that these powers weren’t particularly needed because there would be other ways of finding this information—that there would be some transport records or some other records that we could go through. Now, is he not aware that there are utes and trailers and bobby calves getting taken all round this country, and the response from the head of the Ministry for Primary Industries, Geoff Gwyn, outlined this quite clearly during the select committee process.

💬 Hon Amy Adams: We haven’t had one. That’s the point. There hasn’t been a select committee.

Well, his appearance before the select committee previously. This has been a widespread occurrence, and this is why these powers are going to be necessary. We have to give these National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) officers the tools that they need to effect their role.

💬 Hon Amy Adams: Then have a select committee.

There is some urgency around this. As we’ve heard, we’ve started the spring milk testing. This is going to be the key part of our response to find out if indeed this disease has spread outside the cordon of known outbreaks. So this brings milking-testing processes under way. We need to have our officers with the powers that they need to respond to the results of that test when they come up. It is quite clear. So these are, to the member who’s just sat down, the Hon David Bennett, special circumstances. This is a response that we need to make.

I just want also to go back to the Rt Hon David Carter and the observations he made about the select committee appearance by Operational Solutions for Primary Industries New Zealand (OSPRI) this morning, and particularly Michelle Edge, the CEO. It was an absolute exercise in denial, and I think it showed us what the Minister is now having to address. There has been a systems failure. We do need urgently to tidy this up and get it under control. Michelle Edge told us that it is sort of an international norm, it does take a while for these things to settle in, and there are other countries that have had this longer that, maybe, we are not looking so bad against.

Well, I’ve got news for Michelle Edge. We expect to lead the world. We don’t expect to follow the world in these things. This is what the Minister of Agriculture is doing. He is putting in place the provisions that we need to make this response, and to get ourselves back to leading the world and getting our reputation back on track. So this is not a measure that is taken lightly.

We do know that the powers that we are asking for were ones that were originally intended, as outlined by the Minister’s re-presentation of the select committee report at the time. The Search and Surveillance Act—the very people that are now railing against it are the people that brought it in. So if you’re that concerned about that particular Act, it will be because you guys, the previous National Government, brought that particular Act in. So if that is not appropriate, that is an issue that you need to address in reflection, because we are having to deal with what you’ve brought in, and that’s what the Minister is doing because we do need some action.

So just in conclusion—

💬 Simeon Brown: Appalling speech. Appalling speech.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: No. It’s up to expectation.

Just in—no. Just in conclusion, you’ve got to take a step back and realise why we are doing this. This is a serious biosecurity incursion. We’ve got an $886 million bill. We’ve had a denial from OSPRI. We’ve got a Minister that is looking to take some action. We need to have the powers made available to him under this provision and we need to give our NAIT officers the powers to respond. This is walking the talk. So we in New Zealand First will back this provision and we will back our Minister to make the changes that he needs to make. Thank you.

Thank you. Madam Chair. It was good to have the Minister of Agriculture on his feet a few moments ago. Really, he was what I consider to be sort of dancing on the head of a pin. First of all, he appears to have been sucked in by his officials that this is a drafting anomaly—

💬 Simeon Brown: It’s not a nice pin. It’s not a nice pin.

—and it’s quite technical. And I thought—no, it’s not a nice pin; it’s actually quite sharp.

What I thought was really interesting was when the Hon Amy Adams got up to take a point of order on the cover sheet of this bill—which is written by the Minister, all signed off by him—which says that this bill makes technical amendments and it doesn’t represent a new policy. Well, we have a completely different point of view. It was interesting to hear Mark Patterson just talk about his talking points—

💬 Hon Amy Adams: He’s doesn’t know what bill we’re debating.

Yeah, that’s right. He started to talk about the search and surveillance stuff and how we are making changes to that. What I’m really keen to hear from the Minister in the chair, Damien O’Connor, is this: can he name to us—and he might need to turn to his officials—one regulatory scheme where officials can enter, search, and seize goods (a) from a property, (b) without a warrant, and (c) without reasonable cause? That is a very fair question, and I would appreciate him in the next wee while giving us examples of that. We also haven’t heard examples from the Minister as to why suddenly this has become very urgent—hugely urgent.

💬 Clayton Mitchell: Anyone could answer that.

Ten months, and now—well, take a call, then.

Now, suddenly we’ve got to put the House into urgency; no select committee; he doesn’t want to hear back from Federated Farmers, Dairy New Zealand, Fonterra, Beef and Lamb—doesn’t want to hear what they think about it. He doesn’t want officials to sit down with the select committee in a truncated period so that we can interrogate them to understand that this is a technical bill, because we don’t believe it is, Minister. That’s why we are proposing two very important amendments, and I want the Minister to consider them. One is from the Hon Amy Adams and is hugely important. When you look at the powers under warrant under the National Animal Identification and Tracing Act 2012, it has wide-ranging powers. What these warrantless powers will do, the extension that the Minister—

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: New powers.

—wants—yeah, new powers: copying of documents, photos, videos—OK, we get that. But what is not mentioned is that with these warrantless powers they can go on and seize anything. So they can, effectively, turn up on a farm, unannounced, without cause, and say, “Hi, I’m taking your hard drive.”

💬 Hon Amy Adams: For no reason.

Yeah, for no reason—no reason; no cause. Surely you would think that if you can go on to the property and photograph documents and video and copy documents, that would be enough. Why not, then, go back into town, get a search warrant, get it signed off by the judge, and go back? These powers go beyond being technical. That’s why the amendment from Amy Adams needs a huge amount of consideration and debate, and I think that the Minister should be able to support that. It knocks out that one intrusive power: the power to seize any property under a warrantless inspection.

The other amendment—from me—is all about a National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) officer having to have reasonable cause to suspect non-compliance with the provisions of the Act. So what I mean by this is that a NAIT officer can’t just suddenly drive along and think, “Oh, I’m just gonna swoop in on this property under my warrantless powers and go in and interrogate the farmer or the farm manager under these NAIT officer provisions.” He or she has to have reasonable cause.

We have seen elements—if you think back to the WorkSafe debate that we had where we had overzealous officials out there on farms, completely overreaching and going beyond their powers, and that got farmers’ backs up. We know that by and large these NAIT officers are good, well-meaning people. We know that they’re doing their utmost to try and get on top of the phased eradication of M. bovis. But what could happen—here’s a hypothetical and it indeed could happen. You have an overzealous NAIT officer, with extended warrantless powers, who takes it on themselves, with these intrusive powers, to turn up unannounced, without cause, and demand to seize property.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Vindictive behaviour with no consequence.

Exactly right, Mr Brownlee. Why on earth wouldn’t the Minister want this piece of legislation, this bill, to go to a select committee so that we can hear from his officials why this is needed?

💬 Hon Amy Adams: We found out that it’s not technical.

We agree it’s not technical—Amy Adams is exactly right. So I suspect that the Minister won’t be able to give us an example of a regulatory scheme where officials can enter, seize, and search goods from any property or place, without a warrant and without reasonable cause.

💬 Simeon Brown: Just one would be helpful.

Yep, one example would be helpful. So these are two very good amendments. There are others in the name of David Bennett, that he’s going to talk about shortly, and the Rt Hon David Carter. We think that the Minister should seriously consider these proposals from the National Party. The contribution this morning and yesterday has been fair and reasonable and balanced, because, fundamentally, we want to get on and make sure that the NAIT system is working appropriately. But these warrantless powers—an overzealous NAIT officer being able to turn up on properties unannounced, without cause, and seize property—we think, have gone too far.

The other questions—which I’m very keen to hear about from the Minister—are these: what about the question that I proposed last night to do with the NAIT system; can he give us a feel on the overall system, the IT, and whether it will be able to handle the proposed changes that he’s talking about; and what’s the likely cost? That’s one question.

What happens if the farmer has been open and warm when a biosecurity, animal welfare, NAIT officer, or whoever, turns up on the farm—they could indeed have a ute-load of them—and he or she invites them into the house? Suddenly, they are in the property, where the potential hard drive and the files are stored. As I understand it, the provisions with these warrantless inspections do not include the dwelling. But what happens if the farmer—like they often do when someone cold calls on them—says, “Come on, let’s sit around the table and have a cup of tea or coffee and have a chat.”, and suddenly they’re in the dwelling?

What happens if the records are stored down at a bank—more likely the local accountant’s office. In fact, it may not be local. Because of the way technology is now, it could be not be in the local town; it could be in the city. So does that therefore mean that these NAIT officers, with these warrantless powers, can turn up unannounced and take all of these files?

So this is not just a mere drafting anomaly that the Minister has been sucked in to believe by his officials. I heard the Greens—Eugenie Sage—parrot that last night: the lines that she’d been given by the Minister’s office. That is not true. It’s not a drafting anomaly. It’s not just a technical bill; it goes further. The cover sheet on this bill says, “The bill does not represent new policy.” Well, we don’t agree.

So there are several questions that I’m very keen to hear from the Minister, and the technical one is one I imagine he’ll need to go and refer to his officials on. He’s said on numerous occasions that this doesn’t extend the powers of NAIT. Well, of course it does. So I’m keen to hear from the Minister, and we’re going to have more contributions.

Thank you, Madam Chair. It’s a pleasure to take a call on this, the National Animal Identification and Tracing Amendment Bill. I do want to acknowledge the Minister and the fact that he’s motivated by the right thing, and that is to make improvements that he’s identified in the bill to help with what has been a serious issue for the country in terms of dealing with the M. bovis outbreak. But the problem—and this is the way I see it—is that although initially in his briefings from officials he was told, and he believed, that this was merely a technical change to the bill, actually, through the process, he’s realised now that it’s not a technical change. It’s actually a major change to the bill.

One of the changes that’s proposed that I’ve looked at is a very good one, and that’s around National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) - registered animals. Right now, if they’re moved from a NAIT property on to another property that’s not a NAIT property then they don’t have to be registered or reported on. So that is a good change.

But when you are making the changes to this, or when the Minister’s making the changes to this bill, you should be looking very carefully at the way you’re going to genuinely strengthen the bill and the way that you’re going to be able to make that apply through NAIT offices in the country, to make a better, stronger, regime, with cooperation and by working alongside the farming sector and the rural sector. If you don’t have a spirit of cooperation, if you don’t have their buy-in, and if they don’t actually trust in what you’re doing, then, actually, the system’s going to become worse, not better.

This is a fundamental argument that exists inside the bill in its current form, and it’s why we’re taking a very strong positon in saying that this needs to go through a select committee process so that, actually, submissions can be made on it, and especially so that this part of the bill around a warrantless search is interrogated properly. I sat in the meeting with the Hon Gerry Brownlee, the Hon Amy Adams, and with officials, and this was the bit that we really wanted to interrogate, because we feel that it is absolutely not a technical change. It’s a massive change in terms of the number of powers that are going to be passed to these NAIT officers, and that is going to create a whole lot of new issues to deal with. We couldn’t get any straight, clear answers. The officials are doing their job, but at the end of the meeting we could not get any clear answers. We actually asked them—and I’d still like to see this information—to go away and show us clearly where other agencies share the same powers and have got the same access around warrantless searches.

I just want to highlight just how powerful the powers that are going to be conferred upon NAIT officers with this bill are. Again, the Hon Nathan Guy referred to some calls that the Hon Eugenie Sage took yesterday. It’s clear, it’s very clear—and I’d ask Gareth Hughes, who’s in the House today, to maybe take a call and ask the Minister to clarify this—that she referred to searches with a warrant. So she’s confused; she’s talking about searches with a warrant. Fundamentally, we’re happy with that. Warranted searches—there are no issues there for us, either.

The issues that we have are the new powers that are being conferred for warrantless searches. Let’s just give a clear example of it: right now, under the National Animal Identification and Tracing Act, a NAIT officer is able to go on to the property for the purpose of an inspection—and maybe the Minister can take a call and answer this, because we couldn’t get an answer on this yesterday. So right now, as the Act provides for, a NAIT officer can go on to a property, with the purpose of inspecting and checking on compliance in terms of the Act. They can do that today, right now. If they identify or they think that maybe someone’s not compliant or that the law is being broken, there’s a very simple next step for them, and that is to go and apply for a warrant. They need to make their case; that gets tested.

You know, we can’t have a regime, whether it be the police or fisheries or anyone else that has a power to search, just being given a wholesale power to be able to search without there being any checks and balances—that’s what we have in this country, a very good system of checks and balances. So they can go away and they can apply for a search warrant. If they meet the criteria and if they meet the standard for a search warrant being issued, then they can go, if they need to—I mean, you know, the police often do this: they’ll be there for one purpose and they’ll realise that there could be some evidence that they need to gather for a court case—[Time expired]

I move, That the question be now put.

Madam Chair, thank you for the call. I would just like to follow up on my last call and talk about an amendment that I’m putting through as a tabled amendment to this bill. Now, I don’t believe for a second that the Minister doesn’t understand this legislation. He knows exactly what he’s doing in the Chamber here today. He’s not a silly Minister. He would understand that he is giving extreme powers to his departments, all under the guise of M. bovis, to attack the farming community. That is what is happening here today. There’s no other way of looking at it.

There have been reasonable requests made to the Minister; all have been declined. The Minister refuses to answer the hard questions. He will get up and talk about things that are irrelevant and try to diffuse the situation, but when he is asked to specifically say, comparatively, if other legislation has these powers in similar cases, he will not answer that. When he’s been asked to take this to select committee, in a conducive process where all of Parliament could work together, he refuses to do that—and we would do that in a timely manner to enable the Government to have the tools to attack M. bovis; he refuses to that. And now I’m going to give him one last chance—and that is the amendment that I’ve put forward under this part. This one chance is for us to put another test into this bill, to say that search powers are available only if the Minister decides that in certain circumstances these powers are necessary—and I don’t disagree that there may be some certain circumstances, like if there was a foot-and-mouth outbreak in New Zealand.

In that circumstance, and even in an M. bovis outbreak like we have now, the Minister may be able to use these kinds of search and surveillance powers, because that’s what they were originally for. They were for situations where the national interest of New Zealand was being attacked. That’s why we brought them in when we did. We did not bring them in as a wholesale mechanism to investigate and manage New Zealand farmers, New Zealanders in business places, or New Zealanders in any other environment.

So what I am saying here today, Minister, is this: why won’t you agree to having another test in there, which says that in special circumstances—and that’s what the tabled amendment says—the Minister will determine, and let this House know, that these extra powers are convenient, necessary, and required?

You are in this situation now. The M. bovis outbreak would be something that, potentially, would satisfy the conditions of this amendment. It would enable the Minister of Agriculture to go out of this House, to have actually listened to the requirements of the community that have been represented by the Opposition here, and to take into account the property rights and the personal interests of New Zealand farmers and other people that may have property that would have animals and be subject to this legislation. I request the Minister to do that today, because that is his last chance.

Otherwise, we will see legislation passed here today that is Draconian. It is understood by the Minister and the Government parties, and they are doing this because they want to use the M. bovis situation to put extra unfettered powers into their department. The Minister may laugh—and I think it’s disgraceful that he laughs in this situation. He has done a good job on M. bovis, and I’ve said that many times in this House, but he doesn’t need to stuff it up now. This is a step too far, and he knows that.

This is something that could be subject to abuse, and even if it isn’t subject to abuse, it gives the fear to ordinary New Zealanders that it could be abused. Ordinary New Zealand farmers and property holders now will know that they have no recourse if somebody comes on to their property under the guise of National Animal Identification and Tracing. It will create fear in a community that we rely on to actually act with integrity and understanding to deal with M. bovis and whatever may come in the future—and we are doing the exact opposite.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Look, I’d just like to follow on from what my colleague the Hon David Bennett was saying. The risk that we’re facing here by not going through the proper process with select committees is that we are going to implement some rules that provide much further-ranging powers than are actually anticipated. There’s a whole range of reasons. We’ve heard a bit about that, and I’ll go into that in more detail, but one of the aspects I would encourage the Minister in the chair, Damien O’Connor, to consider in this instance is the Rt Hon David Carter’s amendment proposing a sunset clause which will then allow for this to be in place only up until such time as the additional proposed piece of legislation for changes to National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) is brought before this House.

The National Animal Identification and Tracing Act was implemented in 2012 and started getting rolled out 2013. It started with cattle initially, and deer were subsequently brought into it. A three-year phased trial, initially through to 2016, was conducted, and then a review of that process was initiated. So this is all normal practice that has been carried out. There’s an element of luck with timing with the incursion of Mycoplasma bovis and this review of NAIT having already been under way for some 12 or so months prior to that incursion occurring.

We saw the results of the NAIT review early this year. There was a whole raft of recommendations—38 of those coming out of that report—and the Minister has already told us that he will be bringing another suite of amendments to the NAIT legislation before this House. So I would encourage him to seriously consider and to adopt the Rt Hon David Carter’s amendment providing a sunset clause to this particular set of amendments we’re proposing today to enable—clearly, on this side of the House we disagree with what’s being proposed at this point—a compromise; to say, “Well, look, let’s get this in place, but, actually, let’s put an end date on it subsequent to seeing the new proposed legislation.”

In terms of that new proposed legislation, the expectation from this side of the House would be that it does indeed go through the full, normal, democratic process, as in a thorough select committee process at that point, which will help a review of any relevancy for the continuation of what’s proposed under today’s discussion as to whether or not that would indeed be incorporated into the more fulsome review of the NAIT legislation that will at some point come before the House. So I would really encourage that amendment to be adopted by the Minister.

Now, there is no dispute from this side of the Chamber that we do need to tighten up some of the rules around NAIT. There have been instances where it has not been adhered to as strongly as it should have been in the rural community, and farmers accept that, but to hear that we need to be providing this far-ranging power—I believe it is an unintended consequence of this legislation. I don’t believe the intent was necessarily there at drafting stage to provide such wide-ranging powers. But the reality is that, under this proposal, it does give those powers of warrantless searches—the power to enter, to search, and to seize property for any purpose, for any reason. Actually, there does not need to be any reasonable cause, and the Hon Nathan Guy has an amendment on the Table—again, a relevant, worthwhile amendment to be considered—around the requirement for these NAIT officers to have reasonable cause before they can actually enter the property under a warrantless search.

One of the points I really want to capture is that farming is a little unique in that, often—and, generally, 95 percent of the time; 100 percent of the time, just about—home offices are where the details, the records, of a farming business are kept. So that’s a room within the dwelling of the farmer. That entitles these people to enter, to search, and to obtain information from those offices if they’re invited into the house. Look, anyone in this House who’s from a rural background will appreciate that farmers are friendly, open people. Someone turns up at the door; they’ll invite them in. I spent many years in the rural banking sector and was always welcomed into people’s houses. You’d sit down for a cup of tea, you’d discuss business—

💬 Hon David Bennett: Maybe not always.

Perhaps not always, as Mr Bennett points out, and I accept that may be the case. But, you know, farmers always welcome people on to their property, which gives them access—[Time expired]

I call Stuart Smith. I just encourage the member to have some other arguments.

Yes. I would like to speak to clauses 4 through to 7 in relation to animal movements from National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) properties or between properties, and raise a question, because what’s not clear is what constitutes a movement and what properties would be captured in that. I can use an example of stock being grazed in vineyards in Marlborough—and this happens a lot, particularly with sheep. Now, sheep aren’t part of NAIT, but they may well be at some point in the future. Anyway, the argument holds true. Where animals are taken to a third party’s property, shifted on to there, grazed—and then they may well be shifted four or five times around different properties. Is that a movement that has to be recorded and reported to NAIT? That’s unclear—it’s totally unclear—and I think this is a very important aspect to it.

Also, what would be unclear—what about the search and surveillance clauses? Does that give power to NAIT people discharging their duties under this bill to be able to have access to, in this case, a vineyard’s records, and a warrantless search and seizure of property from a third party completely unrelated? The way I read the bill, that is actually the case. This would have far-reaching implications if this is the case and this level of uncertainty is out there, because we’ll have people who would be concerned about those infringements on their rights and having that extended to them. So they will simply withdraw that opportunity for the grazing of those animals to be carried out on these properties. It’s a very valuable part, and a symbiotic relationship between, in this case, sheep—but it could be cattle going on to vineyards. The great thing about grazing on vineyards is that most of the year, they don’t have any animals on them at all.

That has a very low worm burden to no worm burden on those properties. So the pasture is clean. The pasture is also great for storing carbon, so we want to have that. We don’t want to have chemically nuked - out vineyards, which would be the alternative. Otherwise, you’re spending a lot of money. Also, in these days of concern about the environment and climate change, the alternative to having stock grazing in those vineyards is to run tractors around and mow them. That is not the best solution. So this bill, I think, has quite far-reaching and perverse impacts.

This is what we are often back in this House fixing—a bill is drafted, it becomes an Act, many years pass, and people haven’t thought about the consequences of what might happen in the future. This is the opportunity. We’re not going through a select committee process, as has been alluded to by many people today, and I won’t traverse all of those arguments. But that is a serious problem, potentially, in the future.

I note that the Hon Damien O’Connor is back in the chair, so I’d like him to consider that question. What happens when stock is moved on to a grazing property such as a vineyard? Does that constitute a movement that has to be reported to NAIT? And when it shifts from one vineyard to another vineyard, does that constitute a NAIT movement that has to be recorded? Do the search and surveillance powers in the bill—and the warrantless entry and all of those provisions—also apply to those third-party properties? Because the way the bill reads, they do. And, as I said, this will have far-reaching implications for those good relationships between farmers and third parties, utilising our resources in New Zealand for the best effect, and helping to meet our climate change ambitions as a country—these things all fit together. And in my reading of the bill, this will have implications that we do not want as a country. I certainly don’t want it in my electorate, and having all of those good relations being undone by an ill-thought out, ill-prepared bill, which has come before this—[Time expired]

Madam Chair, thank you very much. I appreciate that, in the spirit, I guess, of some unity around the Chamber, we’re wanting to move on and improve the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) system, because we all realise that it’s not working as it should. I appreciate the points that have been raised. I stand by the explanatory note of the bill. I stand by the advice to me—that this is a technical bill to make some changes.

Can I just go through a few things. The first question I have is why should farmers—good farmers—and people in the farming sector have any less protection from the rogues than people in the wine industry, the fisheries industry, the people in Crown minerals, or, indeed, people who are managing waste across the country? What we are doing here with changes is just giving equivalence to provisions that ensure that compliance officers have the same ability to investigate where they suspect non-compliance, because non-compliance affects everyone across industries.

So I’ll work through some of the proposed amendments that have been put to us and those that I have here. There are some valid points raised, and I’ve had discussions with the member Nathan Guy on where we might go from here. Can I say in respect of the one about reasonable cause—a proposition put up by the Hon Nathan Guy that they would have to have reasonable cause to suspect non-compliance before they could do anything—that the reality is that if an officer has reasonable cause to suspect non-compliance, they’d get a warrant. But a warrantless search, for the most part, is because they might need to go and get some indication of whether compliance is in fact being adhered to or not—they don’t know. And, in fact, under all those other Acts, then compliance officers can go in to inspect.

💬 Hon Mark Mitchell: They can do that now.

To inspect, right? Not to search, and the member knows that. So if, then, in inspecting, they identify any property that they realise may be relevant, then they can lawfully seize it. And lawful seizure is accepted in law. The member will know that. He’s probably done quite a bit of it himself—that is, to seize under precedent, under case law, under protections in that law, they can lawfully seize what might be relevant to the investigation, or to confirm or otherwise whether compliance is occurring.

I guess that if we were to introduce reasonable cause as a qualification to legal seizure, then the problem is that all the other Acts that rely on legal seizure as a term would have to be changed, and it comes down to a policy issue as to whether that would be relevant in the others, under the Search and Surveillance Act.

So we start to unravel what is a legal construct around protection—which the previous Government has endorsed through the Search and Surveillance Act—on one side, and then the ability of compliance officers to carry through with their legal obligations. So, in my view, I can’t support Nathan Guy’s amendment, that does seek to have a qualification of reasonable cause, on the basis that that would undermine legal seizure across all other Acts.

Can I say that in another one—and it’s hard to keep up with the numbers. I appreciate that the member the Hon Nathan Guy has made some, I think, updates on his Supplementary Order Papers. I’ve got some of them here, and I’m not sure which one is which. So I guess he’s clarified the drafting on one of those, and I appreciate it’s much the same argument around the one of legal seizure.

Can I go to another one that has been put up by David Bennett around the declaration of a natural disaster. Certainly, in times like that, maybe there are other powers that are required. The situation with M. Bovis, arguably, is similar to that of foot-and-mouth. The difference is in the way that the disease is transferred—one happens very quickly, the other happens more slowly, but they are, none the less, both actually significant natural events. I don’t think we should have to wait for a natural disaster to be declared before we go and investigate whether people are complying with the law—with the law.

So can I say that the Minister would have to declare an incursion before a search can take place. That’s a ridiculous situation. Can I say that we have to be reasonable here. We are trying to protect good farmers, who abide by the law, who understand the value of NAIT, and want people who are non-compliant to be investigated and prosecuted. And the question was asked of me: will that occur? Well, in spite of the flaws or deficiencies in the law that we were delivered when coming into Government, we’ve identified them—

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Bungled operation.

—the Ministry of Primary Industries has moved—well, maybe it has been more difficult because the law was deficient. That’s why we’re trying to change it. That’s why we’re trying to change it, and this technical amendment will make it easier to ensure that the law is adhered to.

The Hon Amy Adams put up another amendment. She’s going a step further and, in fact, has two here to say that “Notwithstanding anything else contained in this clause, a NAIT officer … shall not have the power to seize any property”. Well, that’s a rather ridiculous step back from what should be, and are, accepted under the Search and Surveillance Act as reasonable powers to follow through on obligations to ensure compliance, as any good policeman, as any good compliance officer would do. I cannot support that. So I have to say that, at this point, I haven’t seen any amendments that I consider acceptable, because they will either unravel legal precedent by way of legal seizure; they will either undermine the ability to seize property, full stop; or they require a threshold which is too high before we can go in and have either a warranted or warrantless search.

We need to ensure that there is flexibility in the powers of compliance officers to go in, first, to check whether compliance is occurring, and then, if they suspect it isn’t, to be able to seize the property that either can confirm or clear those farmers. This is fair. The Search and Surveillance Act, as passed by the previous National Government, brought a fair balance between protection of property rights and individuals’ rights and the need to enforce the law, particularly in those Acts—

💬 Hon Mark Mitchell: Why have a search-warrant regime?

Well, we have a search-warrant regime under warrant or warrantless, and that member should know the difference between that. So without trying to unravel what is significant legal precedent, what we’re making is a technical adjustment to bring the National Animal Identification and Tracing Act into line with the Wine Act, into line with the Fisheries Act, and others that require the same compliance to protect industry.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Look, I take issue with what the Minister is trying to explain away there. I think the Minister really needs to take to his feet again and actually explain to this committee, given we’re doing this under urgency, why a National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) officer should have greater powers than a police officer. The police are our principal law enforcement body.

I have been looking at the Search and Surveillance Act this morning, and the police are very, very limited in what they can do without a warrant. They can enter a property if they have reason to suspect someone is unlawfully at large in that property. They can enter a property and take action if they have got reason to believe that there could be injury to people or destruction of property. But they don’t have the right to enter a property without a warrant just to sniff around. Now, the NAIT officials get that, but the Minister has not explained to this committee why NAIT officers should have greater powers than a police officer does, because there’s simply no justification for it.

The other thing which is new—absolutely new—is this: given the Minister wants to give these greater powers to NAIT officials, why is it that he feels there should be no check or balance or reporting on their exercising of warrantless seizure or warrantless search?

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Who has to?

Well, thank you, Mr Brownlee. As a new member in this House in 2014, the very first select committee I had the privilege to sit on, under urgency, was the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee considering a bill under urgency to give greater surveillance powers to the State surveillance agents: the GCSB and the SIS. That was a fraught bill. Members of the then Opposition fought quite strongly against extending powers to the State security apparatus—fought strongly against it. So provisions were included in that bill that if those security agencies, who are there to protect the lives of New Zealanders—that, for them, is an issue of national security, and the potential for terrorist activity in New Zealand to damage property and to take the life of New Zealand citizens, and indeed visitors to this country, is hugely serious. The provisions in that bill require that if there is warrantless surveillance, the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security must undertake an assessment and report back if that warrantless power was exercised appropriately under that bill.

So where, Minister, are the provisions in this so-called technical change? Where are your provisions you’re proposing so that New Zealanders can know that Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) officials and NAIT officials exercised appropriately that warrantless huge power you want to give them, that the conditions and circumstances were right, and that they exercised that power to an extent that was appropriate for those circumstances but they went no further than they needed to, and that the New Zealand public can therefore have confidence?

Particularly, I want you, Minister, to justify for New Zealanders and to this committee why, if we require that sort of assessment and report for matters of national security and the potential loss of life, we do not require that sort of oversight and reporting for something that is truly important—and we accept that—but certainly cannot be compared against an act of terrorism that could take wholesale numbers of lives of our citizens and visitors to this country.

So I am very keen—very keen—for the Minister to find a way to persuade members in this committee. I am keen for him, firstly, to inform us, and, secondly, to persuade us of the rationale to give such sweeping rights of access and seizure to MPI officials when we very carefully—and that Minister was a member of that Opposition—considered for our intelligence apparatus how we would limit those powers for them, to make sure that New Zealanders could have confidence that the surveillance activities on them and in their country would always be used and observed with the sorts of protections for New Zealanders’ rights and privacy that they demand and expect.

So, Minister, take to your feet and tell us all why NAIT officials should have greater powers than our security intelligence services.

Kia ora, Madam Chair. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I think the Minister in the chair, in his latest of a long line of responses to questions from the floor, was overly generous and conciliatory to the Opposition, because I don’t think our rural communities or farmers are being well served by the debate, and, quite frankly, the politics we’ve seen dished up in this debate. We’ve seen exaggeration. We’ve seen red herrings. We’ve seen extreme claims: extreme claims of conspiracy theories that officials are running rampant, trying to totally change the regime under the catastrophe that is M. bovis—an absolute conspiracy theory; extreme claims that, somehow, Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) officials are getting greater powers than police officers, as Gerry Brownlee said, or even more bizarre claims that they’re getting even more powers than counter-terrorism operations in New Zealand. Our public and our rural communities aren’t served by these exaggerated claims. We should be getting proper information, accurate information, to people, which will be on the parliamentary record.

💬 Matt King: Have you read the bill?

CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): Order! I have read the bill, Mr King. I have read the bill.

This is a technical amendment. Even if the Opposition says it a hundred times that it’s not, it does not make it true. But I have a question—I have a question for the National Party. Given this technical amendment simply aligns the legislation with the existing search and surveillance legislation that they passed—you know, with the existing safeguards within it—is National going to now logically follow and amend legislation, or put up members’ bills to put these extra hurdles, these extra jumps, that they want to see MPI go through into other legislation? Is National going to introduce legislation to put existing hurdles they want to see in the Wine Act? Are they going to put them in the Waste Minimisation Act? Are they going to put them in the Fisheries Act? They’re being absolutely logically inconsistent asking for greater hurdles for MPI. Given it was National that put in the warrantless search provisions for NAIT, are they going to now follow the tenor of the debate tonight and remove that in the future? It was National that put in the warrantless search functions. This is why I say the public aren’t being well served by the debate and the tenor coming from the Opposition.

Look, the fact is these warrantless searches were there originally. They follow strict guidelines: the codes within the departments. Now, the fact is it’s their job, right? It’s their job, and that’s why National put it in the original NAIT legislation for compliance officers to actually go talk to people, to actually do their job investigating. They have those guidelines they’ve got to follow. This legislation passing is simply fixing the problem when they exercised their functions, did a warrantless search as part of their routine compliance obligations, and they could literally see offending material. Let’s say—a hypothetical scenario—a whole bunch of counterfeit tags were sitting on a table. National, if you follow the logic of their debate tonight, would not let that official take a photograph because the fact is they’re trying to make up for, quite frankly, the botched job they originally did with bluster, exaggeration, and red herring in this debate.

Now, I’ve been asked why the Green Party is supporting this under urgency. The Green Party supports urgency when there’s a legitimate case for urgency. In this case, we are talking about tens of thousands of cows being culled, we’re talking about hundreds of millions of dollars, we’re talking about a biosecurity crisis which—quite frankly, we’re fortunate that it wasn’t foot-and-mouth, because the regime that National created wasn’t fit for purpose. This was something the Prime Minister has said has failed abysmally; something Minister O’Connor has said was pathetic—the NAIT enforcement; something we’ve heard one of the creators, Coats, saying was a betrayal of New Zealand agriculture. So no amount of bluster, no amount of making things up, no amount of exaggeration is going to change the fact we’re here today to fix, to clean up, the mess that was created. This technical amendment is doing that because biosecurity is important to New Zealand. It’s important to our economy, and I just want to make sure the record’s straight and farmers and our rural communities know exactly what’s happening here.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for the opportunity to take my first call in the committee stage of the National Animal Identification and Tracing Amendment Bill. I do want to acknowledge the Minister, both for taking the opportunity to respond to some of our questions in the committee this morning but also for coming down to Ashburton and attending the public meeting that was attended by between 800 and 1,000 people, which is certainly the largest public meeting that I recall in Ashburton in recent times.

💬 Hon Gerry Brownlee: Did he need you there to get a crowd?

He did indeed. He did indeed. I’d also like to acknowledge Nathan Guy, who’s come down to Ashburton on many occasions, and quite recently to also meet with a number of affected farmers, who have infected properties, restricted place notices, and also notices of direction.

I do want to start my contribution this morning by speaking to Part 1, and specifically provisions relating to animal movement. I’m in the, I guess, unfortunate position of representing an electorate that is, probably more than most, affected by Mycoplasma bovis. The vast bulk of the properties that are infected or are under restricted place notices are either in Southland or in mid-Canterbury, and I’ve certainly dealt with a great many number of farmers over the last 12 months who have been negatively affected by M. bovis, and many of the concerns that they have relate to animal movement.

They’ve been incredibly affected by it, not just by the length of time that it’s taken to move to culling, but then, when it comes to animal movement, in many cases stock have been moved off at a very slow rate of just a few dozen a day in some cases. So it takes, in some circumstances, many weeks for farms to be depopulated. So I have to ask the question to the Minister: why has it been so slow? Why has it been that once that decision’s made to cull on a farm, the process is so slow for removing stock? In many cases, these are farmers who have been without an income since January of this year. They can’t receive full compensation payments until they are depopulated and, in many cases, have gone through the 90-day stand down.

I do now want to turn to the search and surveillance provisions in this bill. Like my colleagues on this side of the Chamber, I do have concerns about the scope and the nature, and particularly the process these provisions are being brought in by. But one area that the bill is silent on, and that I’d like the Minister to perhaps comment on as well, is around where this bill makes no comment.

At the start of this year, I caught up with a farmer, just south of my electorate, actually, in South Canterbury, and he was one of the first affected by Mycoplasma bovis, and it hit him very hard. His farm was very clearly under surveillance. When I arrived at the property there was a police car parked just down the road, and so he was very clearly under surveillance for a very long period of time. But, unfortunately, every evening that police car would depart. So although he was under surveillance during the day, there was nobody keeping an eye on his property during the evening. It won’t surprise many members of this committee to know that that farmer was targeted repeatedly by burglars and other thugs in the community.

I do want to say, though, that the fortunate thing is that that is the exception rather than the rule. Most communities around New Zealand, and particularly in my part of the world of mid-Canterbury and South Canterbury, have pulled together very well in response to Mycoplasma bovis. The community haven’t thrown a lot of blame around. Most of the farmers who have been affected have done the right thing, they’ve told their neighbours, and they have contacted agencies like the Rural Support Trust for support.

I do just want to come back to that meeting though that Damien O’Connor had in Ashburton, because one of the big questions that was asked at that meeting still hasn’t been answered, unfortunately. The question that was put to him was: “At what point will the Government say that eradication is no longer possible and that we have to move to management?” If the tens of thousands of stock that are currently going through the process of being culled doesn’t work, and if the billion dollars that was allocated to spend on the response isn’t enough, at what point does the Government say that we move from eradication to management? I’d really like an answer to that question. He was asked that question several months ago. I still haven’t heard an answer from him. My constituents still haven’t heard an answer from him. This response from the Government in many cases has been bungled, and it’s been far too slow.

We heard a contribution a few minutes ago from the Green member Gareth Hughes, who was asking a number of questions to the Opposition—a somewhat unusual process in a committee stage. But all I want to say to him is that his interpretation of the Act and his analysis of how both the Search and Surveillance Act and the National Animal Identification and Tracing Act work at the present time is very, very inadequate. What I find amazing is that his party were once out on the streets rallying people in protest against the Search and Surveillance Act, but are now in here today voting for an expansion of the powers—or an expansion of those who may call on powers under that Act. I think what I am now expecting is that any time soon, we’re going to see the Green Party promoting a bill that allows agricultural chemicals and pesticides to be considered part of organic farming practice. That is the sort of ridiculous situation that this party has got themselves into.

We have a bill here today that allows the National Animal Identification and Tracing (NAIT) officers more powers to surveil, search, and seize than a police officer, because all it has to be is on a suspicion or an idea. And then, of course, we learn from Brett Hudson that not only does this bill confer more powers on NAIT officers than police; it also confers on NAIT officers less supervision, less scrutiny of their warrantless activities, than is on either the GCSB or the SIS—the country’s two main security agencies. So, in other words, the Government currently thinks that there is activity going on on farms that is likely to cause incursion issues across the agricultural sector that is of greater risk to the country than any terrorist threat. I want to suggest to the Minister that that is somewhat out of balance with the reality of the world we live in.

Now, the question is still not answered by the Minister: what scrutiny will go on NAIT officers who decide to use their warrantless powers to search and seize? Is there going to be any? I think it would be only reasonable that some kind of regime, such as the Inspector-General’s scheme over the security agencies, the SIS and the GCSB, applies to NAIT officers; a similar thing to the Independent Police Conduct Authority that applies over the police. These guys are going to be totally free agents to enter any property, because there is no definition in the bill that confines it simply to a farm or to a place where animals are contained or held or housed or whatever; it’s a general power.

So, as I said earlier, they can go into the local accountant’s office. They can go into the main offices of accounting firms throughout the country if they have an idea or a bit of a suspicion that there might be records of movements of cattle inside those premises. It’s most unlikely, but there’s no constraint in this bill on the use of that warrantless power. So we’re going to have a group of New Zealanders, presumably, who are titled NAIT officers—no particular indication of how they’re trained, what they’re trained in, what they are supposed to understand, but they’re going to have this extraordinary power to go wherever they like without any constraint whatsoever. That cannot be the intention of the bill.

If the intention is to tighten up the NAIT regulations, which we all agree with; if it is to encourage greater compliance with the NAIT regulations, which we all agree with; if it is to have a regime in place that means if there is a future incursion of any type there is a greater ability to contain it and to eradicate it, then we all agree with that. What we don’t agree with is the opening up of the warrantless authority to go anywhere you like, to search anything you like, and to seize whatever you like without any reference or scrutiny of that activity whatsoever.

I move, That the question be now put.

I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson.

CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): We are in the middle of conducting a vote.

I’m sorry?

CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): We are in the middle of conducting a vote, Mr Brownlee.

Have you called another vote or are you just declaring a vote?

CHAIRPERSON (Poto Williams): We are in the middle of conducting the—

Well, can I perhaps explain. The reason for my seeking the point of order is that I understand there has been some last-minute agreement to accept a tabled amendment that would belong to this part. It is not included in your list at this point. Now, the only way that could happen would be if the committee were to grant leave for that amendment to be considered in the voting. So we’re not looking at further debate, simply that the amendment in the name of the Hon Nathan Guy, which puts a 12-month review clause in there for the use of the warrantless powers, which is quite a reasonable thing—and I understand the Government is OK with that.

Thank you. Yes, thank you, Mr Brownlee. We are actually just about to put that question.

The question was put that the following amendment in the name of the Hon Nathan Guy to Part 1 be agreed to:

after clause 8, insert:

8A Review

(1) The Minister must, 12 months after the commencement of this Act, initiate a review of the amendments set out in section 8.

(2) The Minister must present a report on the review to the House of Representatives within 3 months of the initiation of the review under subsection (1).

Amendment agreed to.

The question was put that the following amendment in the name of the Hon Amy Adams to Part 1 be agreed to:

after clause 8(4), insert:

(5) Notwithstanding anything else contained in this clause, a NAIT officer conducting a search under clause 49 of Schedule 2 shall not have the power to seize any property.