Genter Julie Anne: Sentencing (Aggravating Factors) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Genter Julie Anne: Sentencing (Aggravating Factors) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Sitting date: 12 September 2012. Volume:683;Page:5197. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green) 
: 
Tena koe Mr Speaker. I am very pleased to rise to speak on the Sentencing (Aggravating Factors) Amendment Bill. The Green Party will be supporting this bill. It is a short bill with a perfectly reasonable aim. As we have heard it seeks to ensure that an offence committed against a police officer or a prison officer acting in the course of their duties can be taken into account as an aggravating factor at sentencing and of course it was decided by this House to include emergency health professionals and fire services providers as suggested in Charles Chauvel’s Supplementary Order Paper 14. We supported that move as well and believe it did add to the bill considerably. 
That said I would like to take this opportunity to raise some issues regarding this bill. First of all there is actually little practical justification for it. Essentially what this bill provides for already occurs. My colleague David Clendon specifically noted what the Crown Law Office had opined in its review of the bill which I think is worth repeating. It said that “New Zealand sentencing decisions take into account the fact that a victim of an offence was a police officer or prison officer acting in the course of his or her duty as a matter of established practice. The Bill confirms the common law position.” 
So although we find it to be a slightly unnecessary piece of legislation to pass through this House we have opted to support what is the judicial practice of the day because not to support the bill would effectively be a vote of no confidence—it would be a vote against what is currently happening. 
Rethinking Crime and Punishment observed in its submission on this bill that there has been no evidence put forward that showed a significant increase in the number of assaults on prison officers or police officers—although had there been an increase in the number of assaults on prison officers or police officers that would have been cause for immense concern. But the lack of evidence does call into question the practical justification for bringing this bill at this point in time. Why is this the priority? Are there not other more effective things that the Government could be doing with its time? 
Seeing as this bill is here however we would have also liked to see a couple of additions to it in order to increase its scope and potentially its fairness. So as my colleague David Clendon has said although the bill does no harm in its current form it could do some good if these things had been more fully considered. 
Firstly although we agree and commend the intention to recognise the worth of police officers and prison officers and denounce offending against them—and I really have to acknowledge here the excellent comments made by the Hon Lianne Dalziel just previously—in fact it would be erroneous to believe that the aggravating factors in sentencing would result in any deterrence. There is simply not the evidence to suggest that and so we would not want to conflate that reason—deterrence—with the reason of denouncing offending against the important work that is done by prison officers and by police officers. So we simply do not see that the bill actually enhances their protection. 
Greater resources and more legislative emphasis on crime reduction has a much greater proven capacity to increase the security of society as a whole and we would be better served I think to focus on these measures rather than the very narrow scope of this particular bill. This would require of course a much more concerted effort however and I accept that this bill could not possibly deal with it on its own. But for all that it could make some effort in that direction. 
In terms of fairness the bill essentially enshrines the interpretation that offences against specific public servants in the line of their duty ought to be treated more severely by the courts. There is certainly an argument to be made given all we do in this House to acknowledge the importance and worth of police officers and prison officers. However we should note that with the protection of those in a position of authority there should be a similar and equal responsibility. We call this reciprocity. 
Police officers and prison officers most certainly fulfil an important function and serve in a position of authority. They are often placed in harm’s way and they deserve protection against that harm. In turn if they are found to have committed an offence we might consider it only fair that their actions also be considered an aggravating factor in their sentencing should it reach that point on the basis that their position of authority bears that very significant level of responsibility. If their rights are enshrined within the law so too should be their responsibilities. 
I also mentioned earlier a matter of scope and I would like to turn to that now. The New Zealand Public Service Association made the point in its submission that there are a wide range of hugely important public sector roles that will not enjoy the protection or recognition that this bill contains for police officers and prison officers. So we are pleased that the bill has been extended to include emergency health and fire services providers but there are still plenty of public service providers who are left out: mental health workers social workers noise control officers paramedics ambulance drivers—I think actually ambulance drivers might be included—animal control officers and fisheries officers to name just a few of those who are not going to be included. They all perform a vital public service and they run the risk of harm to their person during the performance of their duties. 
The submission said that “PSA workers in a range of front-line occupations including ACC customs and social workers are regularly subject to assault.” Although this bill does not necessarily diminish their worth it certainly does nothing to advance it. We would have liked to see a much broader brush applied with this legislation always keeping in mind of course the principle of reciprocity. 
Despite the issues I have raised I would like to emphasise again that the Green Party will be supporting the bill. It does no harm in that it simply enshrines in law what was already happening in practice. But it also represents a lost opportunity. There is a lot of time and effort that goes into preparing considering and progressing a bill however short it is. We firmly believe that time could have been better spent genuinely advancing the protection of police officers and prison officers or broadening the scope of aggravating factors to include the vocation of a wide range of public service providers who similarly encounter the threat of violence in the performance of their duties. We owe a duty of thanks and care to them just as we do to prison officers and police officers. I hope that in the future we do not leave them out. Thank you.