Power Simon: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
Power Simon: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers Questions to Members 
[Volume:644;Page:13642] 
8.  
SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) 
 to the  
Minister of Corrections 
: Does he have confidence in his department; if so why? 
Hon PHIL GOFF (Minister of Corrections) 
: 
 Yes much more than I would have had 10 years ago. Why? Well I will give the member just three out of many reasons. Firstly prison escapes per 100 prisoners are just one-sixth of the escape number 10 years ago under a National Government. That means the escape rate has fallen by 84 percent. Secondly drug taking in prisons is less than half what it was when the National Party left office; fewer inmates are giving positive drug tests. Thirdly much more is being done in positive areas to prevent reoffending such as greater provision of work and drug and alcohol rehabilitation programmes—factors that are associated very closely with offending levels. 
Simon Power 
: Can he give this House an assurance that high-profile serious offenders in Paremoremo prison are not getting special treatment and why did his department refuse to answer written questions from me earlier this year about whether William Bell and others were getting special treatment in order to “protect the privacy” of these inmates? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: I can tell the member that I have been absolutely assured by the Department of Corrections that William Bell was not getting special treatment. I know that the member is fond of saying that inmates at the maximum security block at Paremoremo prison are in a holiday camp but it is a holiday camp where people are locked in their cells from 5 at night till 8 in the morning and it is a holiday camp where very spartan conditions apply quite properly—I make no apology for that; I believe that these inmates are a serious risk to the community and they deserve the close personal supervision and monitoring that they get every hour of the day. One thing I can tell the member is that unlike when National was in Government and the Minister said the perimeter fence at Paremoremo prison was not to stop the prisoners from escaping but just to slow them down we have now got proper security in that prison and unlike the situation under National inmates do not escape from it. 
H V Ross Robertson 
: What has the Labour-led Government done to reduce the number of escapees so dramatically? 
Madam SPEAKER 
: It is very difficult to hear. I will be asking some members to leave if the noise continues at this level. 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: In the 1990s prison escapes were as high as 154 inmates escaping a year. In the last 4 years the figure has been under 20. It has come down from as high as 154 to under 20. Why has it come down? Well I mentioned that in my answer to the last question; one of the reasons is that we have put in 17 kilometres of perimeter fencing and it is much harder for people to get out. Unlike at the prison close to Mr Power’s electorate one does not have to cross just a 6-wire fence to get to the prison; one now has to cross a perimeter fence. There is electronic monitoring. There is much better monitoring and supervision of inmates and the factors that lead to escapes. That record is a record to be proud of. It is one of the lowest escape rates of any country in the Western World. 
Simon Power 
: Why did his department move a convicted murderer to within 300 metres of the workplace of his victim’s daughter after it had already placed him next door to where she lives or does he not recall his stating in 2003 that his new laws would make that sort of mistake a thing of the past? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: I absolutely recall that. Regrettably the murder the member is referring to happened in 1992. At that time there was no Victims’ Rights Act in New Zealand. It was only in 2002 that we brought in the right for every person registered on the notification list to be advised of any plans for release or parole. Unfortunately the victim whom the member is referring to was not on the victim notification register—unfortunately. Three members of her family were. The Parole Board as a result of that ensured that a condition of release was that the particular offender would not live within 50 kilometres of the three people who were on the victim notification register. The family of the victim has now been contacted by the police. They are now on the register and as a result the Department of Corrections not only has recalled the inmate—it moved the inmate within 24 hours of being notified that the inmate was living next to one of the family of the victim—but also has now asked the Parole Board which has the authority in this area not to release that inmate at the point that he might be released again in the vicinity of anyone on the victim notification register. If the National Government instead of doing nothing on victims’ rights for 10 years had brought in the Victims’ Rights Act before that murder this problem would not have arisen. 
David Benson-Pope 
: What action has been taken to reduce access by inmates to contraband such as drugs and cellphones? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: It was very clear that there was a major problem with both drugs and cellphones in prisons. We have taken effective action against that. As I have noted we have halved the rate of positive drug tests in prison. We are doing more in a bill that is currently on the Table before the House. With cellphones we have also had much closer searching but we are now in the process of putting jamming devices in every prison so that if any cellphone is smuggled in it will not work anyway. 
Simon Power 
: How does the Minister respond to the brother of the young woman whose mother’s murderer was placed next door to her and then near her workplace who said: “What annoys me most is how Corrections and its Minister have misled the public and purported to have systems in place that they clearly have not and that the Minister has just ‘shrugged off’ my family’s case in a dismissive one-liner ‘She wasn’t on the register’ ”? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: I have already answered that question at length and I will not repeat what I have already said. But in that article it was also suggested by that person that the victim whom the offender was placed next to had not gone on the victim notification register—she did not want to be on it. Fortunately the police have approached her and she is now on that register and we can ensure that that situation will not happen again because the system does work as long as people register. 
Simon Power 
: Does the Minister have confidence in his department when in addition to these botch-ups the last 2 weeks have seen four offenders escape including a convicted murderer; a twelfth guard suspended from Rimutaka Prison this year; and an alleged head-butting incident and brawl involving Manawatu Prison staff at a Palmerston North hotel? 
Hon PHIL GOFF 
: How many times does the member have to be told that if he wants to talk about escapes he should know that escapes are at a rate one-sixth of the level they were when his party was in Government and he sat behind and was an apologist for the National Minister of Corrections. Yes from time to time there will be incidents. I cannot say that all corrections officers at a party will behave better than National members behave at their private parties. I deplore the way that that particular corrections officer behaved but it was totally outside the jurisdiction of the prison it was not on prison property and it was not in prison time. I am not sure how the member expects the Department of Corrections to act in that regard. 
I raise a point of order Madam Speaker. Mr Power is on record in the  
New Zealand Herald  
this morning as saying that he was going to ask a totally different set of questions. Perhaps he would like to take the opportunity to do what he promised to do. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: That is not a point of order. 
Simon Power 
: I seek leave to ask the Minister a further question in addition to my allocation. 
Madam SPEAKER 
: Leave is sought. Is there any objection? Yes there is objection. [ 
Interruption 
] Would the House please settle and show some respect to the next questioner.