Tuesday, December 02, 2014



Reported back

The Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Committee has reported back on the Countering Terrorist Fighters Legislation Bill. As expected, it has a few tweaks - a shorter sunset clause, a reduction of the time for "urgent" warrantless surveillance from 48 to 24 hours - but only one major change: the new surveillance powers will be restricted for use in terrorism cases. Which means we'll no doubt see the SIS defining redefining people as "potential terrorists" in order to stick cameras in their bedroom to gather "intelligence".

But this isn't a victory. The government will still be able to ban people from travel for ten days on no evidence whatsoever and revoke passports for up to three years with no judicial oversight. And the SIS and police will still be able to use Customs' warrantless border search powers to make an end-run around the provisions of the Search and Surveillance Act.

And Labour - our "left-wing" party - is backing all this. They don't deserve your vote, and neither does any other party which supports this bill.