The Greens

Broadband

While New Zealand lumbers towards speeds of 10-20 megabits per second across old copper wires, countries at the top of the OECD are targeting speeds between 100 megabits per second and one gigabit per second across fibre access.

1. Using a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is irrelevant and 10 is critical; please rate the importance of an Internet-enabled digital future to New Zealand’s society and economy?

Nine out of ten. A prosperous and sustainable future for New Zealand depends on the best possible Internet access, structure, and protocols we can afford. The roll-out of fast, widely available broadband is one of the best major infrastructure projects we could be investing in for our sustainable future.

2. Should the investment model for rolling out fibre access be private sector or public private partnership, and what is the appropriate role for government, both central and local?

The public sector should take responsibility for the provision of public infrastructure, but local circumstances will differ so local solutions will need to be found. Fibre is not the only solution to achieving faster, more accessible Internet, so the Greens will support a number of solutions to achieve this goal. Speed is one part of the access equation. Net neutrality is also important. The benefits of information technology must be shared amongst all members of our society and not be used to enhance or entrench existing inequalities, or create new layers of inequality.

3.  Do you consider the existing international connectivity to be a bottleneck? If yes, what options would you pursue to deal with this?

Yes. There does need to be more investment in increasing the options for international connectivity.

Infrastructure

Passive infrastructure, such as ducting and laying the fibre cable itself, can account for up to 70 percent of fibre access deployment costs.

4. What policies would you support that would encourage co-investment and/or coordination in laying fibre cables?

Any cable laying project should be co-ordinated to prevent wasteful doubling-up of work. Significant coordination between the relevant government agencies, local authorities, and contractors will be required. In addition, future developments in fibre technology may mean ducting is more appropriate than simply burying cable.  The Greens are mindful of the many issues involved.

5. Would you support requirements on duct access, sharing of fibre access inside buildings, and requirements to install fibre in new buildings?

We support clear access and sharing requirements for flexible and fair outcomes. Fast and reliable Internet access within buildings is a practical issue that might best be resolved through suitable building regulations.

6. Do you support an open access model for local fibre in which the network provider sells passive network capacity to other services providers to sell, or lesser requirements of equity of access to wholesale services from network providers?

Absolutely we support open access.  If any of the IT infrastructure is privately owned, then they must be strictly regulated otherwise innovation will be stifled.  Internet providers should not have the right to give preferential access to their networks to packets from certain providers. We have a policy of ISPs being "common carriers" and not being responsible for what goes over their networks. The rights and (lack of) responsibilities of common carriers implies that ISPs should not give preferential treatment to the packets of those most able to pay for them.

Digital Divide

The term ‘Digital Divide’ refers to the gap between those with effective access to digital and information technology and those without. The recent World Internet Project survey said that Digital Divide issues in New Zealand are driven by household income and location. The more rural you are, and the poorer you are, the less likely you are to have good access to the Internet.

7. How will your party assist the poor in New Zealand to get decent access to computers and the Internet, and what will your party do to ensure every school, library and polytechnic has fibre access?

All citizens and groups should be able to access information technology The Greens will support and fund the establishment of community technology hubs in schools, tertiary Institutions, public libraries and other community centres. This will require appropriate investment in installing hardware and software, as well as providing IT training. 

We’ll also go further.  Our policy to ensure net neutrality is fundamental to bridging the Digital Divide. We’ll support research into the feasibility of municipally owned free wireless Internet systems along the lines of those already operating in some cities in the US.

8. The rural sector is often called the engine room of our economy – how will you improve rural connectivity and access to high-speed broadband? 

We fully support the roll-out of high speed broadband to improve rural connectivity and access. However, this is an engineering problem that requires an engineering solution backed with political commitment. The Greens have the political commitment.

Copyright

Copyright law lets people benefit economically from their creative work. It should balance the rights of individual users with those of the copyright holders but in recent times significant concerns have arisen that the balance has shifted towards copyright holders as society grapples with the implications of digital media.

9. How far should Government go to protect the interests of copyright owners against the rights of citizens and do you think our copyright laws are being unduly influenced by the US entertainment industries?

Protecting the rights of citizens should be government’s first priority not the interests of international corporations.   IT manufacturers do not have the absolute right to enforce copyright protection via technological means (e.g. DVD Zoning, CD crippling).

The Green Party will ensure:

* New Zealand's copyright protection should make exceptions for processes that are unique to digital works, for example caching digital works on Internet servers to economise on bandwidth should not be deemed copying (e.g. hyper-linking).

* The right of consumers who have lawfully obtained copyrighted works to make copies for their own lawful use (e.g. format/time shifting and backups) are protected.

* ISP's are not liable for copyright infringing material stored on their web space where the ISP does not know that the material infringes copyright and upon obtaining knowledge takes action to remove or disable access to it. (This is not compatible with section 92A of the Copyright Act, which requires only an accusation to rather than knowledge by an ISP)

10. As a result of industry pressure, the Government has delayed Section 92A of the amended Copyright Act, which will require ISPs to terminate the accounts of repeat copyright infringers. What is your position on s92A and how would you resolve the issues?

Gone by lunchtime.  The Greens would repeal section 92A of the Act. Instead of the current “notice and take-down” provisions, the Greens support a “notice and notice” regime. We believe that this approach would provide fair protection for copyright holders while also protecting legitimate use. It would at least allow claims to be contested in an impartial forum. We believe that the current notice and take-down provisions do not provide any protection for fair use.

11. Will you commit to a balanced approach to copyright reform that reflects the views of all New Zealanders by pledging: to respect the rights of creators and consumers; to not support law change that undermines or weakens copyright user rights; and to fully consult with New Zealanders before introducing law changes or signing international treaties that would impact copyright user rights?

Yes.

12. Should there be a first-principles review of New Zealand’s Copyright Law and, if so, when would you begin this work?

Yes, the Greens support a review in principle.  Any timeframe is dependent on sufficient political will to make progress.

Cybersafety

Connection to the Internet exposes the public of all ages to inappropriate material, online predators, and net nasties such as viruses, worms, Trojans and malicious software.

13. Last election there were pledges of 1,000 more cops on the street. What about online? How many more cops do we need in cyberspace? And will you increase the capability of the Police E-crime Lab, Internal Affairs Censorship and Anti-Spam Units, Customs, and the Centre for Critical Infrastructure Protection?

The Greens would seek to balance on-line criminal enforcement with people’s right to privacy and freedom from censorship. As the ability and scope of on-line crime increases, however, the police are inevitably going to need to shift and possibly expand their resources in this area.

14. Does NZ need to establish an NZCERT (Computer Emergency Response Team) and if yes, what role should Government play in the establishment, operation and funding of an NZCERT?

New Zealand’s cyber infrastructure needs to be as reliable as our national grid. To this end, the Greens will take the necessary steps to protect the integrity of our computer networks. 

Privacy

The UK Government is planning to spend £12 billion on a database to monitor and store all its citizens’ Internet browsing, emails and phone calls, in the face of huge concerns globally about privacy breaches surrounding Government and corporate data.

15. What is your party’s view of the UK approach? Are you in favour of more, or less, intrusive actions by Government and enforcement agencies? What will your party do to ensure the privacy of each individual’s identity and information online?

The Greens believe that the UK's actions are unethical and impractical. The Greens have extensive policy to protect New Zealanders privacy including: amending the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990 to specifically include a right to privacy and  ensuring that personal information that is held by Public Sector Agencies concerning New Zealand citizens is the responsibility of New Zealand organisations.

IPv6

The Internet is currently reliant on IPv4 as the network layer IP addressing protocol. The entire IPv4 address space amounts to around 4 billion addresses available globally and exhaustion of this address space is likely to occur within the next two years.

Governments are increasingly concerned with the lethargy of conversion to IPv6, the next generation of IP addressing, and the USA and Australian Governments are showing determination to migrate, particularly in the area of their Defence Forces.

16. What steps do you intend taking to accelerate the deployment of networks using IPv6 in New Zealand, particularly inside Government? 

This is a technical issue. The government moving to open formats then Free Software is more important and this will help facilitate a move to the next generation of Internet Protocols (which will probably be IP6).

Convergence

The Internet and traditional broadcast media are converging and the Government is reviewing broadcasting and content regulation. The boundaries are breaking down between digital and analogue worlds, across business models, delivery channels and access devices and fundamental differences between traditional broadcast and the Internet need to be addressed.

17. How will your party address the issues of regulation of content in New Zealand as content becomes more and more available online and outside of traditionally regulated broadcasting channels?

The Green Party considers a number of actors to be key in developing policies and protocols around Internet content management. It’s a fine balancing process. However, ISPs must, within the constraints of legal requirements, provide a censorship free service for users who do not want any form of censorship.

18. Do we need a converged regulator of broadcasting and telecommunications, and if so, should there be two such converged regulators, one for content and the other for infrastructure? 

We don’t currently have a policy on the converged regulators but are willing to consult widely and explore this issue further. 

19. How do you see the increasing delivery of media content over the Internet affecting the way content creation is funded by Government?

New Zealand on Air and other funding agencies need to keep abreast of new content delivery technologies that are in use and adapt accordingly. 

For the Greens full information technology policy, please refer to: http://www.greens.org.nz/policy/informationtechnology