Simpson Scott: Drug and Alcohol Testing of Community-based Offenders and Bailees Legislation Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSimpson Scott: Drug and Alcohol Testing of Community-based Offenders and Bailees Legislation Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 10 March 2015. Volume:703;Page:2053. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): It is a pleasure to rise in the House this afternoon in support of this Drug and Alcohol Testing of Community-based Offenders and Bailees Legislation Bill in its first reading. In doing so I want to just spend a moment or two drawing to the attention of the House some of the matters that we who are fortunate enough to be constituent MPs and who are involved closely with our communities will often find is the case. When we are dealing with matters of reoffending and criminal offending in our communities where so often so frequently and so prevalent the incidence of the abuse of drugs and alcohol is part of the very foundation of that offending it comes as no surprise at all to find that in fact statistics show that nearly half of all criminal offending has as its root as its base a drug or alcohol component. So we find when we are doing our constituency work that in fact this is a repetitive feature which occurs again and again and again.In the previous Parliament—the 50th Parliament—I had the pleasure and honour of chairing the Justice and Electoral Committee. In that select committee it became very clear to me during my time as chair that much of the offending that was being done in New Zealand had as its root core a drug or an alcohol component. Notwithstanding that we found that prison populations were in decline that criminal activity was in decline and that offending is reducing. But there is still plenty of work yet to do.And so we come to this tricky area of what the role of the State should be in terms of trying to help assist offenders—particularly those who are serving community sentences or who are on parole—and helping them to protect themselves from temptation of the sort that occurs when they are in an environment where drugs and alcohol are prevalent. What we find is that the State does have a role in assisting those who are sometimes vulnerable and have a propensity to be influenced by drugs and alcohol particularly where that involves their criminal offending. So the question for this House is really: at what point should we be involved in intervening and trying to assist and make sure that the opportunity for offending is reduced?It probably comes as a surprise to many people listening to this debate to find that notwithstanding the Parole Board courts and other departments—for instance the Department of Corrections—which have the ability to impose conditions around parole and community sentences that involve those offenders in not being exposed to drug or alcohol in fact there is little or no ability to enforce that situation. The numbers are quite daunting. The Minister in his first reading speech on this bill indicated that each year around 4000 offenders on community sentences and orders and around 15000 people on bail have abstinence as a condition of their release. It is all very well and good to have abstinence as a condition of their release but then not to be able to record or monitor that abstinence is in my way of thinking a complete farce and a bit of a conundrum. This piece of legislation will in fact remedy that situation in a neat and sensible way. At the moment of course police and corrections staff are trying to ensure that offenders and bailees comply with their drug and alcohol abstention orders but they really have no capacity or no ability to come good on that request or that provision to abstain. So this bill creates a legal mandate for alcohol and drug testing of eligible offenders and bailees and not before time in my opinion.There are a number of questions that the select committee in its deliberations will need to address not the least of which is how intrusive this testing and this monitoring should be. How often for instance should it occur? And in what particular circumstances should it occur? Should this be a matter that is completely private or should it be in some sort of community facility or should it be in some kind of situation where the offender is required to present themselves to a regulatory authority office or personnel and make the appropriate testing available? Then there are questions about what happens if the testing is not done. What happens if the person who has abstinence as part of their parole or bail conditions makes themselves not available? What sanctions will be imposed by the State in order to ensure compliance with this new legislation? Then of course there is a question about actually where non-compliance sits. How do you define non-compliance? These are matters that the select committee will have to address.But in the bill itself there are some answers to those questions. The bill does in fact establish a number of operational principles around the drug and alcohol testing regime. For instance the bill says that testing should be no more intrusive than is reasonably necessary to ensure compliance with the drug or alcohol condition that has been imposed. That test of reasonableness is a well-known one in our legal system and I think that the committee will find it relatively easy to find a pathway to a sensible conclusion around what is or is not intrusive in terms of testing. But then there will be questions about what is reasonable in terms of compliance with the policy. How often should testing occur? Should it be random? Should it be on a regular basis? Should it be at the same time each week? And then there are questions about what form that testing should take.As my colleague Ian McKelvie pointed out in his speech only a few minutes ago drug and alcohol testing these days is not new it is not unusual it is not weird and it is not unknown in a wide range of other aspects of our day-to-day life. In fact drug and alcohol testing is now very common very prevalent in the workplace. I have had constituents come to me and say: “Well if it is good enough for me as an employee of a company to be tested for abstinence from drugs and alcohol then surely it is also good enough for those who are subject to community service orders or who are out on parole or who have been somehow involved in our criminal justice system. Surely it is also good enough for those people who on the face of it have a greater propensity to be subject to drug and alcohol abuse. Surely it makes sense for those people to be tested as well.”Then of course we have the same situation—and technology has been able to guide us greatly—through testing of drugs and alcohol in the sporting arena and in sporting environments. Some of that new technology that information those systems that have been gained in the workplace and the sporting environment and indeed in terms of testing drivers for alcohol—that kind of technology will be available and of assistance in policing and monitoring compliance with this new piece of legislation.So the question I think is a good one about why those who are subject to our criminal justice system—out on parole out on bail who are subject to community service orders—are not tested. This piece of legislation provides the answer to that. I found it of great concern when I read again the Minister’s first reading speech on this bill when he highlighted that 48 percent—almost half—of all offenders report that at the time they were arrested they were either under the influence of at least one or another drug and/or alcohol all at the same time and often there were multiple incidents of drugs and alcohol as being part of their system which they were involved with at the time of their arrest. That is an incredibly high percentage and one that I think that this House surely would want to take cognisance of and make sure that we have the absolutely regulatory and legislative tools in place to ensure that a testing regime that can be compliant and that can be providing good certainty and assurances to the wider community for their total safety is in place.So I think this is a very good bill. I know that my colleague Kanwaljit Bakshi as chair of the Law and Order Committee will ensure that this bill receives very adequate and full attention of the committee. I know that some of the questions that I have raised will be given very good consideration by the committee as it deliberates. I will watch the progress of this bill through the House with great interest. I commend it to the House for its endorsement.Bill read a first time.Bill referred to the Law and Order Committee.