O'Rourke Denis: Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (Continuation and Reform) Amendment Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Rourke Denis: Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (Continuation and Reform) Amendment Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 05 June 2013. Volume:690;Page:10767. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): I note that the Greens feel that the Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (Continuation and Reform) Amendment Bill goes somewhat too far from their concern for prisoners’ rights which is of course quite a proper concern. Labour on the other hand seems to say that the bill does not go far enough and its concern is that there should be more attention given to victims’ rights and that is a fair enough position as well. New Zealand First actually wants to achieve both of those things with an appropriate balance.I think this bill makes a contribution to that. I do not think it is really going to make much difference to anything in the end but it is certainly worth considering. The Justice and Electoral Committee has indeed done just that. I am pleased to see that it made a number of recommendations and they have been incorporated into the bill. New Zealand First will therefore support the bill as it is better than nothing.The principles we considered were these: first of all we say that being a prisoner means being penalised only by the temporary removal of personal liberty and by incarceration and it does not mean anything more than that. Prisoners should have the opportunity for rehabilitation education and reorientation in their direction of life. Secondly it does not result in the loss of other rights for them and it does not mean the loss of the right to compensation for genuine injury or disability from genuine accidents and it does not mean the loss of the right to compensation for significant mistreatment if that should occur.On the other hand the rights protected in this way must be balanced against the fact that there is concern in the community that prisoners abuse some of those rights especially the right to compensation for mistreatment and especially accident compensation on some occasions. So there are genuinely held concerns in the community about that and we must give some attention to them even if cases of abuse of rights are rare. We should certainly not mollycoddle prisoners and we should make sure there are no rorts like some of those we have seen in recent years.We in New Zealand First also accept that there is a need for an accessible process for the victims of a prisoner to be provided for in claims against any award made to a prisoner. Victims’ rights we think have been seen as almost second-class rights for far too long. This bill at least properly pays attention to that. It creates a clear right and an easily usable process for a victim to claim against an award made to a prisoner. New Zealand First therefore believes that the bill does achieve an appropriate balance to protect the rights of prisoners on the one hand while on the other also meeting community expectations that prisoners’ compensation be acceptable by their victims to meet the properly awarded claims made to those victims.The Government originally wanted a diversion fund to hold those proceeds and that of course was quite impracticable and has been abandoned and we are glad to see that. Some submitters also said that the courts had pre-empted this bill in theTaunoacase and that the bill is therefore not needed. They thought that codification would not be positive and that the law should be allowed to develop further as it tends to do. However codification does provide certainty and consistency in the law and I think that Parliament does need to set out what the scope for claims by prisoners will be. It does not mean that the courts may not develop the law within the scope of the Act further anyway. I agree with the Kim Workman submission that codification helps both prisoners and victims understand their rights. I note that section 13 of the principal Act sets out the essence of those issues.It says in section 13: “No court or tribunal may in proceedings to which this subpart applies award any compensation sought by a specified claim unless satisfied that—(a) the plaintiff has made reasonable use of all of the specified internal and external complaints mechanisms reasonably available to him or her to complain about the act or omission on which the claim is based but has not obtained in relation to that act or omission redress that the court or Tribunal considers effective; and (b) another remedy or a combination of other remedies cannot provide in relation to the act or omission on which the claim is based redress that the court or Tribunal considers effective.” and that seems to me to be a very appropriate provision.In section 14(2) there is a whole list of guiding considerations for awarding compensation that a court or tribunal must take into account. That includes such things as “the extent … to which the plaintiff the defendant or both took [concerning] reasonably practicable steps to mitigate loss or damage arising from the act or omission on which the claim is based;” and another one is “whether the defendant’s breach of or interference with the right concerned was deliberate or in bad faith; and … the relevant conduct of the plaintiff; … consequences for the plaintiff of the breach …” and so on—a whole list of those things which I think are very relevant to the issue.Taking all of that into account New Zealand First considers that the bill now does achieve the correct balance—that prisoners’ rights will be preserved but will be appropriately restricted in the ways that I have mentioned in the claims that are brought. More important the victims of crime will have a clear right and process to make claims against any award that the committer of the crime against them has received and that is as it should be. The victim should have the first claim against the money that a prisonerhas received in such a claim. The prisoner who committed a crime can only expect that he or she must first compensate the victim before benefiting themselves.I understand that the Labour Party which also supports the bill wants to see a much wider right for victims to claim the assets of the convicted person. That of course is beyond the scope of this bill but New Zealand First would support such an investigation and the development of legislation as suggested by Labour. I would doubt however that any additional legislation would prove to be necessary or would really make all that much difference because victims of convicted persons already have civil rights to make claims against those persons and arising from that they also have the right to enforce those claims. Perhaps those rights are not clear enough or easy enough to access and again that might be something that could be addressed in the future. But New Zealand First would need to be convinced that there needs to be anything more at all.Similarly New Zealand First would like to see better legislation to ensure much better treatment of victims which again is outside the scope of this bill. It is something that other parties have referred to and which we heard quite a lot about during the submission process for this bill. So I think that is something that all parties need to give good consideration to. In the meantime New Zealand First will be happy to support this bill which as I have said does make a worthwhile improvement to victims’ rights without compromising prisoners’ rights either.