Mass arrivals bill: MBIE chief executive Carolyn Tremain apologises to Parliament Select Committee as staff accused of ‘devious’ conduct

National Party foreign affairs spokesman MP Gerry Brownlee. Photo / Mark Mitchell

The head of MBIE has apologised to a Parliamentary Select Committee as a senior MP accused staff of “devious” conduct in preparing a report despite clear direction it had not been requested.

The issue came about after the Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade Select Committee was unable to agree on whether a bill to allow warrantless detention of asylum seekers for up to 28 days should become law.

The committee has been considering submissions on the bill, and in its recently-released report stated that it could not ultimately “agree on whether to recommend that the bill be passed”.

The committee is made up of three Labour MPs who were in favour, and two National and one Green MP who were opposed.

Committee chair and Labour MP Jenny Salesa said today that due to that 50/50 split, they were unable to reach a majority position on the bill and so had not sought a department report, which usually occurs when there is agreement.

Despite this, department officials prepared a report anyway, which Immigration Minister Andrew Little said would be used to inform any changes he would make to the bill as he proceeds to the second reading.

Committee members from all parties today raised concerns with MBIE officials that those staff had circumvented the committee, and in turn submitters, by preparing a report without their input.

National and the Green Party raised further concerns that it was a symptom of a majority Labour Government that ultimately did not need to listen to submissions if it didn’t want to.

Carolyn Tremain, chief executive of MBIE. Photo / Supplied

Carolyn Tremain, chief executive of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment - under which falls Immigration NZ - said she accepted they had not lived up to the “standards” expected.

“On behalf of the department, I really want to apologise for the misunderstanding that arose.

“We acknowledge that process error, and we should have explicitly confirmed the requirements of the committee chair before the departmental report was sent.”

She said it was very unusual for there not to be a departmental report and the team decided to keep working on it, despite being told not to.

“In hindsight, we understand that process was the incorrect decision.”

National MP Gerry Brownlee said he felt Tremain was minimising the situation and accused staff of being “devious”.

“I think your department has taken a strong view that we had no choice but to pass the bill

“Putting it in front of not the clerk of the committee but someone who was charged with writing the [committee] report was simply devious.”

Brownlee said there were consequences for MPs behaving that way including going before the Privileges Committee.

“What we’re looking at today is whether or not we pursue that. Because you can’t have government agencies starting to organise the way a result comes out of the democratic process.

“There is a strong flavour of that in this particular activity. I think that flavour exists across the public service a little bit at the moment.”

Tremain responded that she understood the concern but denied there was any “devious” nature to the actions.

Green MP Golriz Ghahraman said she was “quite concerned” to hear Tremain’s response, saying it was very explicit that a report was not sought.

“This was not a process error. So I think that with respect, you need to stop characterising it that way. They knew that the committee did not want a report.”

Little said on Monday despite the committee not reaching an agreement he would push on to the second reading of the bill.

He said it was “unbelievable” they had not requested a report, which he said included changes that responded to many of the concerns expressed by submitters, and refusing to consider an updated risk assessment.

He accused National of being “opportunistic” and the Green Party of “being their usual selves”.

“This bill adds to what the previous [National] government did when they set up the current regime for mass arrivals.

“At that time, that was based on a risk assessment. The risk assessment has changed. Hence, the provisions of this bill.”

Ghahraman told the Herald that the report did not reflect the submissions process of the Select Committee.

“The input is from MBIE only.”

She said the committee not agreeing was “how democracy should work” but given Labour’s majority if could simply override them.

“The Minister should have seen this process, and paused and said actually I didn’t hear from these submitters, their opposition seems a big deal so maybe we should go back to the drawing board.”

The Government says the bill is necessary to be able to screen those arriving and provide them adequate legal support but asylum seeker advocates have argued it “deprioritises human rights” and is putting New Zealand on a similar path as Australia.

It says the bill, which had its first reading in March, is to fix the original legislation from 2013 - introduced by National - and ensure anybody arriving as part of a “mass arrival”, defined as a group of more than 30, would be treated in an “orderly and safe manner” and be able to access adequate legal representation.

In all the committee received 322 submissions, the vast majority opposed to the bill, including from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Amnesty International and the Government watchdog the Ombudsman.

Common concerns included that it went against international protocols around human rights and seeking asylum - especially around the presumption of detention and use of prisons, how it treated vulnerable people and that there were more humane approaches such as establishing purpose-built facilities.