Webb DuncanHon Dr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Thank you Madam Speaker. The Minister of Justice spent two minutes talking about this significant change to our justice system so it's a sad day when a Minister really just doesn't address or come back to the House after the committee of the whole House stage to give us a fair summation of what's happened there which is his function and takes such a dismissive approach. The guts of it is this: the National Party and its coalition partners have a view of equal treatment before the law which is one-dimensional. It takes no account for the distinctions of people where they come from their circumstances and their financial and wider ability to wrestle with the justice system. Only last week we had the Minister and the Ministry of Justice in to talk to us about the ministry's programme to ensure better outcomes and experiences for Māori when they engage with the justice system. This makes a mockery of that; there's utter mockery of any suggestion that parties on the other side of the House have any interest whatsoever in addressing the gross inequities in our justice system and the fact that the statistics show that outcomes for Māori are worse that the system is tilted the playing field isn't even. These reports which had quality issues you know might have had budget issues but by and large played a very important role in giving information to the courts. On the other side of the House—and I know there's members over there who are wincing and I get it right? I understand that; they don't like what their Minister's doing and yet they've got to suck it up because the Minister is running the show and their coalition partners—the likes of the ACT Party—are taking a hard on crime" approach and they're not willing to listen to officials. They're willing to dog-whistle to their fringe elements which just want to bash down on the most vulnerable in our society.But the Minister did say one thing I want to latch on to and he said that the savings to be made here—we know it's about $7 million a year—now in the National Party's Real Consequences for Crime election document it said that every penny of that money would go to victims. So I want to hold you to account on that. I want you to make sure—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Not "you".Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: I want to hold that party and that Government to account on that because they've made a promise to the electorate and the Minister was very clear when he was challenged time and again as to why he wasn't listening to his officials. He said "We've gone to the electorate with a promise we won now we're delivering." You won; you made more than one promise and I want to make sure that that Minister delivers on his promise to victims to take every penny of that funding the $7 million a year to put it directly into victims—not into the back pocket of landlords not to offset the roads they want to build but to victims in the criminal justice system. It's very frustrating to see the very good advice of officials utterly ignored. Officials do a great job of saying "Look we've given you the view of the direction of travel. You've stuck with the direction of travel. But if you're going to go down that road here's what we think you should do to make it the best outcome possible to achieve the policy objectives." because the policy objectives we probably agree on: safer communities lower reoffending better reintegration better outcomes for victims. We all agree on that and as an aside—secondary I would hope but perhaps primary for this Minister—a cost-effective approach one which is good value for money.Now the fact of the matter is the ministry gave great advice as to how that might be achieved with a number of different tools whether it be regulating the way in which these were provided accrediting providers placing caps on the amount that could be spent having them provided only on request—a raft of really useful tools to say "We can get your policy objectives across the line and still retain the valuable benefits of these reports." And what did the Minister say? "No nah we're not going to do it because we're not interested in good policy outcomes; we're just interested in a really dogmatic approach without nuance."You know I can see Mr Meager there is looking down and I would too because you know as well as I do that these reports are useful. You're a man who's of the law. You know these reports are useful. You know that judges rely on advocates to present the best evidence before them whether it's in deciding the case or making a sentence and this is depriving a judge of evidence.I was really frustrated with the dog-whistling in terms of the "cottage industry" comments—time and again cottage industry. Cottage industry this; cottage industry that. The Minister was not being fulsome with the House because as I said in the committee stage I asked him: who was receiving this money? What was the identity of the people to whom he was objecting and calling part of a cottage industry? The response is there in parliamentary questions for anyone to read—under the written questions part of the webpage. He did not know; he was actually making that up. I asked him in this House "How many reports has Harry Tam or his companies written?" He did not know. It's utterly inappropriate for someone of the stature of a Minister of the Crown to come to this House and cast spurious groundless allegations around to someone who isn't in this House can't come and defend themselves and to then just have a blanket "cottage industry" is utterly utterly wrong.James Meager: How dare he sully the name of Harry Tam!Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: No I'm not a defender of that person at all but what I am a defender of is of the dignity of the office of a Minister who should have a foundation for a statement before he comes to this House and makes it and that Minister knew that his statement made to this House was utterly utterly groundless. He should be ashamed of himself.So what've we got? What've we ended up with? Well time will tell but it's pretty clear from the advice that costs will rise the length of trials will rise incarceration rates will rise and—I think it's important to say this—needlessly rise; rise not because people belong in prison but because judges don't have the information to provide a more appropriate sentence which is better and safer for the community and more likely to lead to less offending. So what we've got is a Government that's so committed to dog-whistling politics that it's actually having the opposite effect. This "hard on crime" approach—yes you're going to make life worse for these criminals and you might be happy with that. I get that. But the real tragedy is you're going to make life worse for their victims and quite possibly and most tragically future victims. You're going to make their life worse for their families because you're going to be taking people out of the family home needlessly.DEPUTY SPEAKER: The Government or the Minister; not me Mr Webb.Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: That's what they're going to be doing Madam Speaker—thank you for pointing out that those members that Government is going to be needlessly taking parents out of the family home. We know that children of prisoners are much more likely to be prisoners themselves. That's what you're doing. That's what this is doing.We came to this House with genuine suggestions about how this bill might be improved and you know I believe that the Minister does want good outcomes and he's been somehow led down the garden path and thinks this is the only way to do it. But he wasn't prepared to listen to us. He wasn't prepared to make an amendment so that young people—at least someone under 18 years old—could be funded to get a report about what led to this offending and therefore inform the judge as to what the most appropriate measures might be what the best reintegration framework might be how to keep them best connected with whānau and community connections. That's the kind of material that a judge needs but no.So ultimately what we have here is a two-track justice system: those that can afford it and those that can't. The Government on the other side has reinforced inequities that already exist made it easier for the wealthy to get a good outcome in the justice system and harder for those without means. It's shameful it's sad but that's where we are today with this Government.DEPUTY SPEAKER: Tamatha Paul—ha ha that was close! Just a warning to members that if that pause happens again I could actually take a vote. So please be quick on your feet and call out. Thank you."