Mark Ron: Annual Review Debate — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMark Ron: Annual Review Debate — In Committee[Sitting date: 03 May 2016. Volume:713;Page:10684. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]RON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): Well it is interesting. Looking at page 596 of this report regarding the 2014-15 annual review of the Department of Corrections there is a part of me that says that this is like déjà vu is it not? I think back to the time when I was in Opposition over here and I was looking at the Hon Paul Swain who was the Minister of Corrections. Labour was in Government and we were talking about the Department of Corrections and what an absolute debacle it was. I look at this report here and I see the mention of the advanced control and restraint training which has been very successful. It brings back visions of the “goon squad” in Christchurch which among other things became very infamous for having initiation tests that required new members to put their penis on the bar at the West Melton pub and withstand it being bashed with a beer bottle. That was the type—and we had Justice Ailsa Duffy’s judicial inquiry into what was known as the “goon squad” in Canterbury but it was the emergency response team. Thankfully those days have gone.I have to say that looking at this report it does beg a question. In those days the Department of Corrections was a debacle. There were many across the House who questioned the view which the National Party and the ACT Party touted that we should have private prisons. Looking at this report here in this era in 2016 we see where this Government has indeed privatised a couple of prisons. We read that the private management of prisons has likewise turned out to be a debacle with the Minister herself saying that she has just received an $8 million cheque being payment from Serco for its failings some of which are covered in this report.So today in 2016 what does it lead us to think? It actually leads us in New Zealand First to think that actually the Department of Corrections has gone through a serious adjustment. The public management of our prisons has improved. The leadership team in the department has definitely improved since the days of Mr McCarthy and the like. But it is this experiment that has fallen over drastically.I read in this report here that “Serco was fined for failing to meet performance targets in accordance with the contract” and then further down I see that “The department acknowledged that it was responsible for overseeing the prison and emphasised that it was now focused on making future improvements” and the Law and Order Committee itself questioned the questionable international reputation of the prison management that actually won this contract. Question: what does this Government intend to do? It has tried its experiment. In actual fact it is the publicly managed prisons that seem to have picked up their game and are doing better and it is the private prison experiment that has turned out to be a disaster.It would be a very brave Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections to right now stand up and tell the Minister of Corrections and this Government: “Look mate the policy’s failed. It doesn’t work. All the predictions that were made about privately managed prisons have come home to roost and we’d be far better off having prisons managed by the prison service the Department of Corrections as was always the case.” But unfortunately New Zealand First does not see any indication that the Government is getting that message or that the department’s management is giving it that message. Indeed if we read on further what do we find? We find: “We heard from the department that it has a contract with Secure Future to design build finance operate and maintain the Auckland South Corrections Facility …”. What do I get from that? I get the message that the Government is wedded to its privatisation policy and it will not change despite what we have seen.Going further into this report there are a couple of things that we can agree with. I agree with the Minister’s comments about rehabilitation looking at the many drivers around—and here is the comment—the increasing prison population. We are always hearing from this Government that crime is going down and that crime is at record low levels. Match that statement against a later statement that actually says that the prisons are overflowing. Well it does not say those exact words but what it does say is it is “reported that the average prison population in 2014/15 was 8732 which is an increase from 8460 …” which in 2013-14 was an all-time high. It goes on: “This is largely the result of a steady increase in the population of prisoners on remand and represented 23 percent of the prison population in 2014/15”.Essentially that paragraph is saying that although the Government has been insistent that crime is going down our prisons are overflowing. One of these things cannot be true. We cannot have overflowing prisons and we cannot be moving to full prisons talking of building new ones and having double-bunking if crime is going down surely. Match that against the comments that we have just heard from the Hon Phil Goff about police—and I want to get to that as well. If you look at the Department of Corrections and the police hand in hand and you look at this report and read it are we succeeding at reducing reoffending? No. We had a reduction rate peaking at 12.5 percent and it has decreased now to 8 percent so we are failing at rehabilitation.We talk later on in the report about the effectiveness of rehabilitation programmes that offenders complete and then ironically we talk about how difficult it is to achieve these targets because reintegration is proving to be extremely complex and difficult. But look at the numbers. Out of a $1.25 billion budget the department is spending only $10 million on reintegration. Go figure. If we are not pouring money into reintegration if our rehabilitation programmes are not working and if they have dropped from 12.5 percent down to 8 percent is it any wonder that our prisons are overflowing? It has to be that because it cannot be that crime is increasing because the Government tells us every day ad nauseam that crime is reducing. It is down to something like 32 percent I think I heard was one figure.Let us get real. Let us be honest and truthful about it. Crime is not reducing.Did anyone watch television last night and watch the news? Four of the five most dangerous places to be are in Auckland. Why? Because you are liable to get the bash. We hear day after day after day about storekeepers corner dairy owners and superette owners being attacked at their place of business and police not responding. We hear continually that in rural provincial New Zealand police stations are—well they are not quite being closed; they are just not open for business. We are hearing continually that people are calling police and getting frustrated that no one responds.What does all that mean? If fundamentally you are not responding and if you are not reacting and catching bad guys and charging them then crime will go up and your prisons will overflow and if the reintegration and the—crikey I am losing my track now. If the reintegration and the corrective programmes are not working then your prisons will fill up and overflow. Fundamentally if we were to do a report card right now in 2016 on this Government’s performance on the Department of Corrections—on its rehabilitation programmes and on its reintegration programmes—it has failed. No amount of fluff and bumf and denial from the Government can change this report. It is what it is.I would say to the Government that it is time actually if we want to get crime down and if we want to get reoffending down to seriously focus on reintegration programmes. We do have to step up the game on the rehabilitation programmes and we do have to make sure that we are catching people and locking them up and make sure that justice is being seen to be done and that law and order is being seen to be maintained. If we fail to do those basics we will continue to build more prisons we will continue to double-bunk and we will continue to sit in this House—it does not matter whether it was 2002 2005 or now in 2016—arguing amongst ourselves as to who has done better with law and order and arguing as to whether the public in general is safer and better off for it.This report is a sad report. It is a fail. I would say to the new Minister of Police and Minister of Corrections that she has got a big task on her hands. I feel sorry for the former Minister of Corrections. I think he got a hospital pass. Some might say that he was unfairly set up to fail. But the facts speak for themselves. We have failure in law and order at both ends—