Dean JacquiJACQUI DEAN (Chairperson of the Justice and Electoral Committee): I rise with great pleasure to begin the conversation around Vote Justice. Before I get into the substance of my first 5-minute contribution I just want to acknowledge the Minister in the chair the Hon Amy Adams. When she appeared in front of the Justice and Electoral Committee for the Estimates examination she confirmed very clearly to not only the committee but also the Parliament that her focus is very much on putting the victim at the heart of the justice system. That approach to justice in New Zealand follows what is now quite a good tradition of justice Ministers who have done exactly that—that is putting the victim at the very heart of what we do in the justice system across its many aspects. So I just want to note in particular the Minister's very strong focus on addressing the issue of family violence. Family violence is New Zealand's shame. Time and time again we have New Zealanders who rise up in anger at what occurs in some New Zealand homes. I am very pleased to acknowledge that the Minister not only says that she puts family violence at the heart of the justice system but is undertaking a suite of ongoing measures and the Minister outlined some of those in the Estimates examination only a couple of weeks ago. In fact so important to the Minister and this Government is the issue of tackling family violence that it remains the Minister's top priority and I do look forward to the Minister addressing the Committee to expand on some of the initiatives that she and her ministry together with other ministries—because of course it is not just the justice ministry—are addressing. This is innovative work. This is new. It is cross-Parliament work and it is to be commended. I just want to mention the ministerial working group that has been set up by the Minister. It is an integrated approach involving 16 portfolios and that is truly a cross-ministry approach to dealing with this problem led by the Minister of Justice of course. I also want to acknowledge the Minister for Social Development in that work. The work is focused on changing the approach to how we deal with justice and social agencies in requiring social agencies to be more proactive in stopping violence. It is as simple as stopping violence and managing the behaviour of the perpetrators of that violence. The incidence that I am going to talk about is rather than removing victims from their homes which is almost like revictimising them—I want to focus on the National Home Safety Service. Nearly $1.4 million is to be appropriated in this Budget to address the issues around the National Home Safety Service. What this does is it helps victims of family violence stay safe in their homes. It sounds so simple and yet it is so effective. We know already that allowing victims to feel safe in their homes when before they were fearful—and they had every reason to be fearful because there were perpetrators out there making continuing threats against them—is good for the family good for the victim and good for their children. I applaud this approach by this Government which is truly putting families the safety of children and the safety of victims at the heart of the justice system. So what does this programme do—nearly $1.4 million? What it does—and I will speak more on this later. Thank you.