Sio WilliamSu'a WILLIAM SIO (Labour—Māngere): The main purpose of the legislation is to remove legislative barriers to the electronic monitoring of offenders released from a sentence of imprisonment of 2 years or less and offenders sentenced to intensive supervision. This largely constitutes the offender participating in special programmes and interventions from 6 months to 2 years. Intensive supervision is recognised as a community-based rehabilitation sentence although I suspect many of us question whether that actually provides rehabilitation back into the community or whether people end up reoffending. It is given if the court deems that extra rehabilitation and reintegration assistance is needed in order to reduce the likelihood of reoffending and consequently according the Department of Corrections those who receive intensive supervision are generally offenders who are assessed as having a medium to high risk of reoffending who have been convicted of serious offensives or who have complex and severe rehabilitative needs. This would mean that the courts have the ability to impose electronic monitoring on such offenders. It does not mean that in all cases such conditions would be imposed. If it was chosen to enforce electronic monitoring of an individual this would allow the Department of Corrections to monitor compliance with offenders' whereabouts restrictions in certain areas. The amendments also allow probation officers to impose reasonable administrative obligations on offenders in regard to their monitoring equipment—for instance that the offender regularly charges the equipment or does not interfere with its monitoring capabilities. I note that in the Law and Order Committee report and the amendments that it offered it says that Prisoners have for many years been temporarily released or granted escorted absences from prison for several recognised purposes such as funerals medical treatment and work experience. The amendments would clarify that such temporary release and removal situations may include a requirement that a prisoner submit to electronic monitoring for the duration of their temporary release or removal from prison." In the Labour Party we support the legislation because we want to be able to give some confidence to the community in terms of providing safety in terms of ensuring that for those prisoners who are released back into society there is a tool that the Department of Corrections can use to help monitor them. I have now heard a couple of times members of the Government say that this keeps offenders away from the drivers of crime. In fact Mr Bakshi himself said earlier that the Government was working really really hard on the drivers of crime. I am not sure whether I agree with that because when we look at the drivers of crime that have been recognised by the police over years of experience they name families as one particularly when families are dysfunctional. They name youth as one particularly when vulnerable youth and children are involved. They name road policing as another driver. They name alcohol and they name organised crime and drugs. When Mr Bakshi said that this was part of the Government's efforts to tackle the drivers of crime you almost get the feeling that somehow it believes its rhetoric that it is reducing crime and it is reducing the drivers of crime. I am not sure whether the Government can confidently say that because when I look at the statistics that it released from the Department of Corrections that show we have a total number of offenders released into the Auckland region of about 12000—and here are some numbers for the Parliament to entertain. In Auckland the total number of offenders released as of 31 July 2016 was almost 3000—2932. The number of offenders with violent offences was 491. The number of offenders with sexual offences was 46. In Waitematā the total number of offenders was over 3000—3129. The number of offenders with violent offences was 497 and the number of offenders with sexual offences in the Waitematā region was 45. In Manukau we had 80 offenders with sexual offences. The number of offenders with violent offences was 1080 and the total number of offenders released into Manukau was over 5000. This is one of the reasons why you will hear people in Manukau banging on the drums and saying that South Auckland seems to be a dumping ground. This Government seems to think that having the electronic monitoring is going to reduce crime. I do not believe that. When it says that it is addressing the drivers of crime I am asking myself what it is doing about the poverty that families are facing. What is it doing about the growing numbers—the 300000 children living in poverty? What is it doing about the growing homelessness of many families? Under that heading of "family"—the police are saying that is a driver of crime. I heard Mr Bakshi and his colleagues say that they are addressing that but they are not. Under the driver "youth"—we have now got more than 70000 young people who are—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Back on the bills.Su'a WILLIAM SIO: —not yet in employment education or training. I am only addressing what that side has said—that it is doing something about the drivers of crime and that somehow electronic monitoring is going to reduce poverty reduce homelessness and reduce the number of young people not yet in education or employment. Another driver is alcohol the Government has said. But this is a Government that refuses to be hard on the liquor industry—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Focus on the bills.Su'a WILLIAM SIO: —and is making it really really difficult.The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Come back to the bills.Su'a WILLIAM SIO: My colleague Louisa Wall made mention of people who had been released on extended supervision order. We have a case in Māngere but it is really a case out in South Auckland. It is a case that I believe touches many many communities where a person who has rightfully served their time has been released into the community. But this person has been identified by the Department of Corrections as having a high risk of reoffending. The community was told that this person would be under 24/7 supervision and I suspect—I believe he also has electronic monitoring. But the reality is the difference between this person and every other offender that we have mentioned earlier is that the department recognises him as having a high risk of reoffending. In fact it felt that his was so serious that it applied for a public protection order so that he would be accommodated within the boundaries of close accommodation next to a prison. But it failed to do that. I keep asking myself why is it? One of the drivers of crime is road policing and organised crime—and it involves the police. It involves the police. We are dependent on the police yet this Government has underfunded police by $300 million. How can we then expect to solve crime reduce the number of people who are reoffending and provide proper sound in-depth rehabilitative measures if we refuse to properly fund Government departments? Yet that is what we pay our taxes for. So I do not have any confidence as others have raised. I hope that the Government does not think that this is going to be the answer to everything. The answer to everything is not electronic monitoring. The answer to some of the drivers that it says it is tackling is to provide jobs to provide higher incomes and to make housing more affordable. Those are the real issues that we should be debating. Those are the real issues that that Government ought to be focused on but that is not what we are hearing and it is certainly not what my community is hearing from this Government."