Goff Phil: Family Court Proceedings Reform Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeGoff Phil: Family Court Proceedings Reform Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 18 September 2013. Volume:693;Page:13526. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): The Labour spokesperson on justice Andrew Little is quite right that the title of the Family Court Proceedings Reform Bill simply does not reflect what this bill does. “Reform” suggests in the very use of that word that you take something with major problems and you improve it so that you get better outcomes. This bill is fundamentally dishonest in its claim and so is the Minister of Justice in her claim that this is about making the justice system better for families.The honest title of this bill would be the “Slash Justice to Make Savings Bill”. It is about cost cutting. The regulatory impact statement said that it is about cost cutting. The submissions to the Justice and Electoral Committee said that it is about cost cutting. The Minister got up and on one hand said: “It was all out of control and they were spending too much but we’re not doing anything to harm the system.” Minister you are cutting millions of dollars out of this system and as the regulatory impact statement in its honesty says the only impact this bill will have is on those people who cannot afford to pay for their legal representation. That is the impact of it. The people who will be disadvantaged by this bill are those who will be denied legal aid—who will be denied legal representation in the process when they need it to create a balance that would not otherwise exist between them and the party they may be in conflict with.This bill is about cutting representation for children. The amount of time that there will be representation of the child’s interest in court by counsel for the child will be cut back. This is about cutbacks for the most vulnerable—our children and those people who lack resources to represent themselves.If the Minister was honest about this bill she would acknowledge that the expert reference group that her predecessor set up was absolutely right when it summed up this about the bill: “If this Bill proceeds … the very fabric of the New Zealand family justice system will be destroyed.” Let me say that again for you Minister: the very fabric of the New Zealand family justice system will be destroyed. Who said that? The expert reference group set up by National’s previous Minister of Justice who perhaps had some sense of what the word “justice” means. This Minister does not.This Minister is prepared to subordinate the principles the goals of justice to cutting money because she says that the Government does not have the money to spend. But as this debate has proceeded we have seen that the Government had money to spend when it came to subsidising RioTinto. It was no problem to give $30 million away to RioTinto so that you could get a bit more money for Meridian Energy if it does indeed get a bit more money. It was no problem to give it to Warner Bros. Give it another $16 million. It was no problem to give tax cuts to the wealthy. But it is a problem for this Government to provide the funding that will ensure justice for the vulnerable.I want to know from the Minister how she can call this a reform bill when it makes the system worse. I want to know how the Minister can call this a reform bill when as her regulatory impact statement shows this was not based on proper evidence. It was not based on data. It was not based on piloting the system. Indeed it was not even based on consulting with the very group that her predecessor set up to make sure they got it right. The ministry paper says that the bill aligns with the views of the expert reference group. The group is appalled at that statement. It says it was not consulted on the outcomes for the Family Court. This bill does not align with the group’s thinking. The people who have spent a lifetime on this the people who were appointed to the reference group because they were the acknowledged experts and the pre-eminent people in the area of family law say that this is a bad piece of legislation. The Minister gets up and crows that this is a reform bill. That is what the title says: “Reform”. There is a new meaning for the word “reform” in National’s lexicon. It means to make worse. That is what National means by “reform”.The expert reference group says that this is not based on empirical evidence. It says that it is contrary to extensive existing evidence of the best outcomes for families and children. It says that it will create an unjust situation a two-tiered family justice system where the most vulnerable members of society have limited access to the services they need to assist them in the resolution of family disputes.The bill is even going to cut out the psychological reports that will assist the court to find the best outcome for the children. That will save you money in the short term Minister but it will cost us in the long term because those children affected by the breakdown of their family life will go through the next 10 or 20 years carrying the wounds and the scars and the traumas of that experience. But you think it is more important to save money so that you can give tax cuts to the rich. That is not reform Minister; that is a step backwards. That is a denial of justice. That is wrong in anybody’s understanding and anybody’s language.What it says in the expert reference group’s submission is that the bill will “prevent the resolution of unsatisfactory and unsafe domestic arrangements for parties and most significantly for children;”. This bill will not reform the system to make it better; it will “prevent the resolution of unsatisfactory and unsafe domestic arrangements” most significantly for the children.The group says that it will “create injustice and unfairness in the resolution of family disputes;”. What is a justice system about? It is meant to be about creating fairness about seeing justice done yet the experts say that this bill will create injustice will create unfairness and it will not remedy it. This is not a bill that will make the FamilyCourt and the family justice system better; it is a bill that will make it worse and make it worse for the people who are already the underdogs who are already the most vulnerable who are already likely to come out of this second-best—and the Minister proudly sits in the chair to ensure that that will happen. Shame on you Minister.This will not save money for the system. It will on the surface. It will save $12 million that you take out of the pockets of the hard-working battlers and strugglers who are trying to see a fair outcome from the breakdown of the family relationship. It will take the money out of their pockets to pay for legal assistance and it will leave them without it.The Law Society and the expert reference group say that it will “significantly increase costs for the Family Court.” It does not save time when you do not have legal representation for people who do not understand the legal system; it takes longer. The judges will be taking longer struggling to try to see justice done without a professional there to represent the parties in the dispute and without professional advice on what impact any outcome may have on the well-being of the children. That again is a disgrace.It will create risks for parents by requiring parents to deal directly with ex-partners. We are not talking about the 85 percent who can resolve the situation themselves. They can do it under existing processes—85 percent of them do it. We are talking about the 15 percent where the differences are entrenched and where the damage is going to be greatest unless you can help reconcile or bring those parties to an agreed settlement so that they can move on in their lives. The limits on the rights to legal representation will mean that people will have to deal with ex-partners with whom they are in fundamental conflict without assistance negotiate the Family Court processes and represent themselves. The judges and the lawyers say that that is unrealistic. It will have a detrimental effect on the parents on the children and on the efficient functioning of this court.