Green MP: SIS has been spying on me

Green MP Keith Locke says the SIS has intruded upon his life, and the democratic process. Photo / Dean Purcell

The Security Intelligence Service has been spying on an MP's private life and his communications with constituents, he says.

Green MP Keith Locke, a former peace activist, applied under the Privacy Act to have his top-secret security file released - revealing what he describes as distasteful intrusion into his personal life and unacceptable intrusion into the democratic process.

The declassified file showed that he had previously been covertly photographed, that the SIS had kept track of his private work with constituents and that he had been monitored in other ways as late as 2006.

He is demanding assurances that the monitoring will not continue, and calling for tighter Government control and public accountability for the so-called spooks. "Clearly the SIS has been operating without adequate government oversight," he said.

Both Prime Minister John Key and his predecessor, Helen Clark, said they were never told that the SIS was spying on MPs.

John Key said he had not authorised any surveillance warrant or investigation into a sitting MP.

"There would need to be demonstrable evidence any individual presented a security risk before I would issue a warrant," he added.

Warrants to mount covert surveillance operations, like phone bugging, are overseen by Sir John Jeffries, the Commissioner of Security Warrants.

Last night, the SIS issued a statement saying it was "not actively" investigating any sitting MP. It acknowledged that some recorded information might have been very personal and sensitive - including convictions, adoptions, personal finances, physical and mental health - and said that would not be disclosed.

"The practices of the NZSIS that are reflected in some of the personal files are of a different era," the statement said. "They were meticulous in detail and often contained material that would not be collected today."

Locke is the son of prominent environmentalists and Communist Party members Jack and Elsie Locke - they were reportedly described by former Prime Minister Robert Muldoon as the most notorious Communist family in the country.

Some of the 400-plus documents in Locke's security file date back to when he was 11 years old.

Keith Locke joined the Socialist Action League in 1970. He was too radical for Labour, which tried to expel him in 1974. He joined the Greens and in 1999 he entered Parliament. He campaigned strongly against New Zealand's imprisonment of Algerian dissident Ahmed Zaoui, which was supported by the SIS.