Urgent Action Alert – Stop the Video Camera Surveillance Bill!

It is only days now until Parliament votes on the law that would legalise covert video surveillance by Police, Fisheries, SIS and Customs. This bill must be stopped! It is the most serious assault on our fundamental freedom and rights in our lifetime. As it stands, no warrant is even required to conduct video surveillance.

We are asking everyone to take two minutes to email members of Parliament who have not decided which way to vote and tell them to vote ‘NO’ on the bill. It is likely to be voted on this Thursday (October 6). At present, the National party does not have the numbers to pass the bill. It only has the support of United Future. It needs 3 more votes – so we want to make sure that neither the Labour Party nor the ACT party support this dangerous bill from becoming  law. The Green, Maori and Mana parties do not support the bill at all.

Please email any member of parliament you like. We would certainly encourage in particular emails to:

ACT party
Rodney Hide – rodney.hide@parliament.govt.nz
John Boscawen – john.boscawen@parliament.govt.nz
Roger Douglas – roger.douglas@parliament.govt.nz
Hilary Calvert – hilary.calvert@parliament.govt.nz
Heather Roy – heather.roy@parliament.govt.nz

LABOUR
Phil Goff – phil.goff@parliament.govt.nz
Annette King – annette.king@parliament.govt.nz
David Parker – david.parker@parliament.govt.nz
Charles Chauvel – charles.chauvel@parliament.govt.nz
Grant Robertson – grant.robertson@parliament.govt.nz
David Cunliffe – david.cunliffe@parliament.govt.nz
Ruth Dyson – ruth.dyson@parliament.govt.nz
Clayton Cosgrove – clayton.cosgrove@parliament.govt.nz
Maryan Street – maryan.street@parliament.govt.nz
Trevor Mallard – trevor.mallard@parliament.govt.nz

The most important thing to say is:

‘VOTE NO ON THE VIDEO SURVEILLANCE BILL’.

Other things you can say are:

• It is an assault on the rule of law as it retrospectively legalises illegal police actions

• It is an assault on the right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure

• It is an assault on the right to privacy

• You don’t want any expansion of the power of the state to surveil people

The police and government have been misleading the public by saying that the bill will ‘restore the common law position’ - the police have never had the power to do trespassory video surveillance. The police knowingly broke the law and should be prosecuted.

The ONLY submission received in support of this law was from Police. All other submissions – including the Law Society, Criminal Bar, civil society organisations and hundred of individuals all opposed this bill.

March Against the Police State

From: The Campaign to Stop the Search and Surveillance Bill
 
'There will be an urgent protest march on Saturday, October 1st at 2pm
starting from Cuba Mall stage to oppose the government's plan to
retrospectively legalise illegal video surveillance by the police,' said
Batch Hales, member of the Campaign to Stop the Search and Surveillance
Bill.
  
'The State is set to legalise unlawful video surveillance by police to
cover cases already before the criminal courts.  In doing so, they are
validating illegal conduct deliberately engaged in by the police. They
plan to pass this law under urgency within the next week. This is an
outrage. People across the country are deeply concerned about this issue.
We must stop this further fundamental assault on our freedoms and roll
back the expanded police state.'
  
'Most people will have heard that John Key wants to legalise police
breaking the law and planting secret surveillance cameras inside people´s
homes so that it applies retrospectively - eg. to cases that have already
been investigated and are now being prosecuted. That is, quite simply,
contrary to fundamental constitutional principle and a serious violation
of individual human rights. It is the police who should be prosecuted.'

SIS Bill Passed

A sad day, on 5 July the SIS Bill became law. It was passed on a vote of 107-10 votes. Unchanged despite calls from groups such as the NZ Human Rights Commission to amend it.

Submissions Against the Bill due Friday 18 Feb

OASIS information stall about the SIS
Thursday, 17 Feb at 12:00 on Lambton Quay

As submissions against the SIS Amendment Bill close Friday, 18 February, OASIS will be helping out the day before by having a SIS information desk on Lambton Quay. We will set up a table, wearing our best black suits, and sign people up to request their SIS files, to make submissions, and in general discuss surveillance and state security in this society.

If you are free to give asistance, please meet outside the Westpac Bank, upper Lambton Quay, on Thursday lunchtime (12pm). 

OASIS - Submissions Against SIS Amendment Bill

Submission on the Security Intelligence Amendment Bill close Friday, 18 February.

Normally submissions to select committees are heard in public, but because this Bill will be heard before the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC), chaired by John Key, submissions will be be heard in secrecy. So if you do a submission, demand to be heard in public.

Wellington Public Meeting

SIS Amendments - “We Do Not Need to Know.”

Keith Locke, Helen Kelly and Nicky Hager will be joining forces in Wellington on Tuesday, 1^st February, to discuss the expanded powers of the Security Intelligence Service (SIS) that will be rushed through Parliament in the coming month.

John Key introduced the SIS Amendment Bill in the House just before Parliament broke up for summer. Submissions close on 18^th February.

“It gives little time for public discussion, but that's what Key prefers,” said Anna Cocker from OASIS, the group organising the meeting. “Key wants secrecy about this Bill. He does not want public scrutiny of it.”

The SIS spies on 6700 people

There was much controversy in 2009 when the NZ Security Intelligence Service (SIS) released several personal files of political activists who have been around for decades. It revealed that Green Party MP Keith Locke had and open SIS file until 2006. He was elected to parliament in 1999 and was spied on since he was a young boy delivering Communist Party newspapers in Christchurch.

In June 2010, Prime Minister John Key released a follow-up report from the Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security, Mr Neazor, about personal files and other records held by the SIS. Key ordered a review last year on files kept on MPs and about collecting, retaining and destroying personal records. It comes as no surprise that Neazor “is satisfied with current and proposed practices.”

The History of the Search and Surveillance Bill

In 2002 Labour said that police powers of search and surveillance were a mess. 

They argued that law and order hadn’t kept pace with technology and that police powers were based on statutes between 40 and 50 years old. The Law Commission was ordered to recommend changes.

Police run operations on political activists

A recent document released under the Official Information Act (OIA) shows that the Police are heavily spying on and running operations on protest groups. In the Police annual report for the year ending 30th June 2009, a reference was made to “84 operation orders” made in relation to “public demonstrations”. An OIA request for a list of all these operation orders made in October 2009 has now finally been answered by Police National Headquarters and the results are chilling.