Penk Chris; Little AndrewCHRIS PENK (National—Helensville): Thank you Mr Chair. As this Estimates hearing represents something of a wrap-up of the last three years please indulge me for a moment to acknowledge the other members of the Justice Committee and various officials some of whom are with us today as well as the Minister in the chair the Hon Andrew Little. And I just wish to say that I've enjoyed various interactions that we've had throughout the three-year term including and especially—he said seguing into the topic that he wishes to cover—in relation to courts which is the portfolio that I hold on my side of the aisle. The Minister in the chair is of course the Minister of Justice as well. But in the courts space I would like to highlight that I would be grateful for some responses to a number of questions that I've got particularly around reforms that may or may not be possible within the period covered by the Estimates in particular addressing the considerable backlog of cases that we have in both the civil and criminal realms. I do acknowledge that these are longstanding issues; they're systemic. So I don't wish to imply that there is anything particular within the last Estimates period that has brought us to this point with the exception obviously of COVID-19 exacerbating existing issues. But nevertheless with all that aside I do want to ask the Minister: please can he advise whether he and his ministry are looking at initiatives that would increase safety time and cost efficiency in relation to reducing in-person appearances needed in court some of which were brought to attention more particularly in relation to public health during the COVID inquiry—if there's anything going forward that's being progressed since we last discussed that subject.Hon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister for Courts): I thank the member for his questions and yes the Government knows there is a backlog of casework and that's why recently we announced an additional package to take on more judges more staff more prosecuting personnel and the police and others so that we can start to chomp through that backlog. We know that with jury trials having been suspended until next week there'll be a backlog of jury trials to have to pick up. Fortunately the judge-alone trials have been able to be—or some of have been able to be undertaken—on an accelerated basis.In terms of anything we've learnt from the lockdown period in relation to safety timeliness and efficiency of appearances—look there's been a lot of use of audio-visual link (AVL) and that will continue and I expect that will grow. But we also have to be aware of the if you like virtually constitutional requirement of the right of a defendant to appear in court physically. I think judges are very alert to that. The New Zealand Bill of Rights Act says that it is a right that defendants have. Judges are making it increasingly clear that they expect it at the very least for first appearances that a person appears in court. But there's always a set of balancing factors to weigh up about what justifies an in-person appearance or an AVL appearance and we'll continue a programme of making sure that whatever it is it enables the judiciary to dispose of their case workload in the most effective and efficient means possible.CHRIS PENK (National—Helensville): Thank you. Does the Minister have a view on proposals that have been made from various quarters that the courts should be sitting outside the hours that they currently do both within the ordinary working week at the moment but also potentially weekends to clear the backlog?Hon ANDREW LITTLE (Minister for Courts): I can say that I have a personal view that I think we should be trying to maximise the amount of flexibility by which the courts operate. I mean it's not unusual in overseas jurisdictions for there to be night courts for example. I know our judiciary have experimented with those sorts of initiatives. I think the more we can do to accommodate particularly people in work who we want to keep in work because that's a very important factor in even those who do stray occasionally and offend and cause harm—to get them back on the straight and narrow—that if they've got a job they stay in a job and particularly I think for younger men who've got apprenticeships or are in the early stages of their working life; the more we can do to keep them in work the better chance we have of getting them off some bad habits. So the more we can ensure that our courts accommodate people's working lives the better. It has been tried; I'd like to see more of it. I am convinced that we have in our present Chief District Court Judge somebody who is committed to making sure that the courts to the extent they haven't before—and it would be wrong to say they haven't before but to the extent that they haven't been able to do more before—see themselves as truly public servants serving their communities by making appearances in court an easier thing to do rather than a more difficult thing to do.