Alexander Marc: General Debate 
Alexander Marc: General Debate 
[Volume:621;Page:16815] 
MARC ALEXANDER (United Future) 
: 
 I want to talk today about the issue of YouthLaw and the question I brought up in the House yesterday with the Minister of Justice in which I asked about a couple of issues. One of them was quite easy to deal with and had to do with the fact that tax dollars were being funnelled through his Government to fund YouthLaw a website that deals primarily with how to get around the law if one is caught on various kinds of infractions. I have had a very close look at that website and although a lot of the information on it is actually very good there is a tone in the information being disseminated that effectively gives tips on how to circumvent the law. 
My initial question about the financial side was fairly easily addressed. There is a money trail which we sort of followed and the responses to written questions from the Minister of Justice himself are that YouthLaw is being funded on a 3-year contract by the Legal Services Agency to the tune of $1.19 million. According to the website the Legal Services Agency is a Government-funded agency responsible for promoting access to justice for all New Zealanders. Answers to written questions from the Associate Minister for Social Development and Employment (CYF) reveal that YouthLaw has also received $114000 from the Department of Child Youth and Family Services since 1994-95. So there is a link between taxpayers’ money and what is going on in YouthLaw. For the most part I have no objection to that. It is the tenor of some aspects of what the YouthLaw website is dealing with that I have a major problem with because there is a fine line between letting young people know their rights quite legitimately so and giving them advice on how to avoid being convicted. It is a distinction that is blurred by the information provided by YouthLaw on its website in certain very critical aspects. 
The first thing to note is that the section on drugs for example is accompanied by a graphic of a young man taking a hit from a glass P pipe which hardly gives the impression that dispassionate advice is on offer. It is almost a cartoon. But the site does give advice under the various segments which I think go round or skirt what I would call dispassionate advice. I have a few examples one of which is: “If you are found drunk in public or really out of it as a result of drugs then the police will not take you home if you tell them not to.” Another example: “If you are under 17 then it is possible but unlikely that you will go to prison for dealing drugs.” Are those really the messages we want to send to youths? Do we want to tell them the minimum they can expect or do we want to tell them the maximum the law allows? Another example is: “It is not considered dealing to give Class C drugs to someone aged 18 or over only to sell them.” Basically what this is saying is: “If you are caught in an environment where you are selling the drug tell your mates very quickly to put their money away. Say you’re giving the drugs and you won’t be charged with these offences.” It is a tone—a tip if you like—in the way YouthLaw is trying to exhibit examples of the law effectively giving youths an idea of how to circumvent it. For further legal advice on drugs for example the website directs young people to NORML New Zealand a lobby group for the legalisation of cannabis. 
Either this Government is interested in doing something about drugs or it is not. It cannot have it both ways. A lot of progress is being made with the drug P. There have been increases in drug busts and so on. Of course one of the biggest problems we have had in terms of P—this is almost a side issue but it is quite relevant at the moment—is that it took 7 years to change the classification and now we want to introduce another classification for another group of drugs party pills and so on. We are talking here about the slippery slope of drug classification. What we need is a police-led approach that allows police to deal with the situation of drugs out in the public in an effective way and that allows them to have the final say. 
The debate having concluded the motion lapsed.