Ghahraman GolrizGOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN (Green): Thank you. It's a pleasure to rise to speak to this omnibus of laws that we are passing tonight given that they fix a lot of longstanding gaps and holes and areas of the criminal justice system where we'd fallen behind so as to make our system more efficient more productive and hopefully more fair as well since we should always be prioritising interests of fairness over expediency. There are some interests of expediency that do serve fairness and we're addressing those in these bills as well.Everyone has said repeatedly that these are technical and complex changes but one of the ones that jumped out at me because I've had experience of it in the criminal justice system is the reversal of the procedure whereby a defendant might be found unfit to stand trial. This was always a really problematic area especially in defending someone that might be unfit to stand trial for mental health reasons where the court required that the person essentially go through a hearing where they'd be found on a balance of probabilities to have committed the offence before they could access the two psychiatric assessments that they needed to show that they couldn't in fact fairly stand trial. So it was always difficult and felt almost unethical as a lawyer in dealing with someone that might have really serious mental illness to take them through that process where they effectively had to admit that they might have committed an offence—where you are dealing with people for example with dementia where the fairness issue arose because they couldn't tell you if they had an alibi and they couldn't tell you where they were at a certain time. So to put them through that process before they could even get the psychiatric assessment seemed a little bit perverse. But we're correcting that with this bill. So that's one thing that even though it's very technical is a real fairness issue that we're addressing tonight.We're giving security guards powers to detain people for disorderly behaviour. I think it might look on paper like something that—and it is a very minor charge but when we bring it into the context of the court and we look at the very sensitive issues and the really traumatic process that people are going through whether they're a defendant or a witness or a victim that disorderly behaviour can really mean that our process is unfair. It might mean that a defendant is unable to properly process what's happening and instruct counsel. It may mean that a witness is intimidated and isn't able to give evidence in the way that they should. For victims it can cause lifelong trauma. So it is important that we have powers to conduct proceedings in a way that's safe and we're providing for that as well tonight.Apart from all of that there's the audiovisual link (AVL) and some of the more sort of technology-based changes that we're making. So hearings might be held through a screen essentially zoomed into the courtroom. We're still living in the 20th century in most New Zealand courts. Some people have to physically come in even for the most minor appearances. So two changes that'll help with expediency there are the AVL systems and I would guard against expanding that beyond the very minor hearings that we're applying them to in this bill given that of course people do have a right to be present at their hearings and to properly instruct counsel and to be involved in the hearing in real time. But where there is a very technical appearance requiring someone to come to court can be really arduous and time-consuming as well.The other change that we're making on that kind of level is that pleas can be entered for offences that carry only a maximum of a community-based sentence in writing. So to bring someone to court to enter a plea they can wait around for hours it adds to the court list of oral hearings that day and our courts are hugely overworked. We've seen court staff go on strike only this week and that is because most courts are now sitting well beyond hours because of the caseload and the backlog. So for people to be able to enter pleas in very minor types of charges is going to really help with that.Moving on to the Tribunals Powers and Procedures Legislation Bill one thing that I would celebrate hugely is that we are about to address the backlog in the Human Rights Review Tribunal and again we've heard over and over again that now the backlog is up to about two years—so people are waiting—and there's 135 cases in waiting. And it's really important to remember the kinds of cases we're talking about. You know it's discrimination. and it's members of very vulnerable communities. My personal experience of dealing with people that have been through the tribunal has been in the family carers' case where family members of profoundly disabled persons took a fair pay claim against the Government and won. They won at the High Court and won at the Court of Appeal and the Government kept appealing but they won. They had a right to be paid fairly because members of the disabilities community have a right to choose to live at home in the community and to have their care provided for. Of course we know that the previous Government passed a law to cut them off from the Human Rights Review Tribunal—Hon Ruth Dyson: Under urgency too.GOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN: —under urgency with no consultation to cut this vulnerable community off from the Human Rights Review Tribunal. But this bill is addressing just that kind of issue. People have a right to access that tribunal. The right to justice includes the right to timely access to justice. And tonight we're providing for that and of course we have committed to repealing that little piece of legislation that cut the families off as well. So I commend this bill to the House. Thank you Madam Assistant Speaker.