Davis KelvinHon KELVIN DAVIS (Minister of Corrections): Thank you Madam Chair. I'd like to take this opportunity just to address a few of the issues raised by the Opposition. First of all I'd just like to say that this side of the Chamber this Government has averted a catastrophe when it comes to the prison numbers. Now to go back to the justice sector forecasts from a couple of years ago at this time it was predicted that we'd have close to 12000 people in prisons. We're just hovering around 10000—2000 lower than what was predicted two years ago. The thing is that we've got a programme where accommodation is being built in prisons. That accommodation would not have been in place if the previous Government was still in—it would not have been in place; I do not know where those 2000 extra prisoners would have been housed.I just want to address the Hon Dr Nick Smith. He's criticised me tonight and the other day about the double-bunking and saying that we've made it easier for double-bunking. Now what he should have picked up on in the select committee process is that if we didn't make this small change that we're doing in the Corrections Amendment Bill then it would have left corrections with a risk of a legal challenge. Now he was praising the previous Minister of Corrections the Hon Louise Upston for the great work that she had done and yet what he was praising was this element that would actually have left corrections at risk of a legal challenge if we didn't fix the loophole.He also spoke about how there's been a few assaults in prison recently. Well assaults happen in prison sadly; it is a fact of life and it's unacceptable. I just want the Hon Dr Nick Smith to know that the rates of assaults are 0.12 per 100 prisoners. Under two years ago that rate was 0.24—sorry it might be a thousand prisoners sorry not 100 prisoners. So the rate under this Government has actually almost halved in comparison to the previous Government. I hope he's listening because he's full of criticism but then when the facts come out we realise that he was wrong.He spoke about the lack of legislation. Well look the reality around corrections is that we're not responsible for who comes through the gate at corrections. We don't have any say on the numbers of people committing crime and who enters the gates. But we have to make sure that when they arrive in our care we give them the best chance to rehabilitate and emerge out the other side and contribute to their communities. We've done this without the legislation that they're saying we must implement. All we've done is create efficiencies in the system. Corrections has had a look at what we can do better and have made those efficiencies and the result has been that we have 7 percent fewer prisoners in prison now than we did in March of 2018—7 percent fewer.The new justice sector forecasts made a really interesting statement. They said these forecasts are a future but they are not the future. We on this side have determined that it doesn't matter what the forecasts say; we have the ability as a competent Government to change the future. We don't have to actually use those forecasts as a prediction like the previous Government did but we use them to make decisions to make things better.The high-impact innovation programme has been exceptional in the work they've done to reduce the prison population. I think that the Opposition need to give credit where credit's due. They have done this without changes of legislation. I think because we have averted a catastrophe that the Opposition should really just say thank you because this country was facing a disaster because of the lack of work that they did. They didn't believe it was possible to actually reduce the prison population.Dan Bidois: What have you done for Māori?Hon KELVIN DAVIS: The Māori pathway—thank you; someone just said what have we done for Māori—$98 million has just gone into Māori pathways a pathway where Māori will enter from the start of their sentence through to the end of their sentence and beyond. We're doing it through the Department of Corrections Whānau Ora and the Ministry of Social Development cooperating working together. Now these are for the hardest to reach prisoners—those Māori males 30 and under who are at the greatest risk of reoffending. But we've taken the bold leap—myself and my fellow Ministers—to address this head on. We're very proud of the work we've done.