Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:660;Page:9292] 
Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill 
In Committee 
Debate resumed from 18 February. 
Part 2 Amendments to other enactments ( 
continued 
)  
JACINDA ARDERN (Labour) 
: 
 I have a lot to say on Part 2 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. I think Part 2 demonstrates the far-reaching effect of an issue that has been the source of quite a lot of discussion throughout the debate. That issue is the extension to capture 12 and 13-year-olds in the Act because that crosses over into the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act which we find amended in Part 2 and it has some impact on that Act. Those on the Justice and Electoral Committee will know that we have only recently made significant changes to the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act. The way that children and young people are captured in the Act was the source of quite a lot of discussion. I want to touch on that in my contribution. As Chester Borrows a member of the Social Services Committee has pointed out it was his view that the provisions around 12 and 13-year-olds being able to go through the Youth Court were essentially a matter of filtering and a matter of expediency. But I think this part points out that the provisions make much more of an impact than that. 
Part 2 cross-references section 8(1A) of the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act 1995. I want to quickly just reflect on that section which reads: “However a suspect who is a child or was a child at the time an offence in relation to which he or she may not be lawfully prosecuted (being an indictable offence other than murder or manslaughter) was committed may consent to the taking of a buccal sample as a result of a Part 2A request.” What we see there is that there are elements of compulsion available to police for the taking of buccal samples for offences such as murder and manslaughter because we acknowledge that as it stands the 12 and 13-year-olds charged with those offences in our system are already able to be taken through a higher level of court. That section essentially says that for everything else compulsion does not apply; it is voluntary. 
Then we come to Part 2 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. I do not recall there being great lengths of discussion in the select committee about this part but I want to talk about what is implied by this part. If we look at it we see that replacement clause 41(1A) of the bill says that “However a suspect may in relation to an indictable offence consent to the taking of a buccal sample as a result of a Part 2A request if the subject is a child or was a child at the time the offence is alleged to have been committed and cannot lawfully be prosecuted in relation to that offence because it is not an offence of any of the following kinds:”. Before in section 8(1A) of the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act we had just the offences of murder or manslaughter. Now we have an indictable offence as well. Also going on are two more criteria in clause 41(1A)(i) and (ii) of the bill: “that is alleged to have been committed when the suspect was aged 12 or 13 years; and for which the maximum penalty available is or includes imprisonment for life or for at least 14 years:”. I want to seek some clarity from the Minister for Social Development and Employment Paula Bennett on that clause. I accept that I may have misinterpreted it here but I do not believe I have. Prior to that we had the case where compulsion in respect of taking buccal samples could be applied for murder and manslaughter. Now we are saying that—outside of murder manslaughter and indictable offences with a penalty of up to 14 years—for everything else it is voluntary but within that compulsion can be applied to 12 and 13-year-olds. That is the only assumption that we can make by the reference in this Part 2. 
So I would like to seek some clarity from the Minister on that. The reason for that is this: when we discussed the bodily samples bill in the Justice and Electoral Committee the direction from the Minister of Justice was clear. That was that he held grave concerns about the creep that could have occurred on the basis of that legislation. Direct reference was made to the idea that we do not want samples being taken in the backs of police cars from young children without guardians who are there or available. We went to great lengths in that bill to make sure that we cross-referenced the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act and made sure that we carried over the provisions that apply to an interview situation where a guardian or a caregiver must be given the opportunity to be present. We carried over those provisions for certain classes of buccal samples when taken from young people. It seems to me that we did not discuss again those same kinds of protection for our 12 and 13-year-olds in relation to the broadening of that power for those groups. I have great concerns about that. I ask the Minister to clarify the intention and also whether the change was discussed with the Minister of Justice. I certainly think it is a clause and a proposal that would have been gratefully received and discussed by the Justice and Electoral Committee when we originally discussed the bodily samples legislation. I think we would have had something quite substantive to say on that extension that broadening of scope and power. 
I guess again that that all comes back to the flow-on as I mentioned of the broadening out of the way we treat our children in our legislation because this is not just a filtering or a streamlining of our Youth Court and Family Court processes; it has a much broader effect. The importance of this clause is reflected in the fact that we now as a consequence are in breach of our obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. I would like to hear the Minister’s thoughts on the impact of those changes on that convention because—very recently I know—the Government had an opportunity to appear before the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva but did not mention this bill; it did not mention Part 1 let alone Part 2. Not only were we already in breach based on the way that our 17-year-olds are treated in the youth justice system but rather than fixing that the Government broadened the whole thing out and brought in 12 and 13-year-olds just for good measure. They are children; as we have continually highlighted throughout this debate they are still children. That is what I would like to put to the Minister. 
The reason why the UN obviously has a broad definition of whom it considers to be children in that convention and why it is important that they be treated differently is based on research and on evidence. It is based around the ideas of brain development the impact of young people being in what is deemed a pseudo-adult criminal justice system and the long-term impact on those children being exposed to an overtly punitive form of criminal justice. I would like to hear the Minister’s reflection on our obligations because Part 2 I think is in direct contravention of that convention as well. I know for instance that Simon Power either in the lead-up to or after his appearance before the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva stated—and I think this is a good quote because I do agree—“It’s important to front up with our own situation so that we can credibly discuss the challenges facing other countries.” There is an acknowledgment there by the Minister of Justice that in order to maintain our credibility on the international stage we not only need to be present and be ready to be scrutinised but also have to hold our own in this forum. We need to make sure that we maintain the bar set by the United Nations. In many other respects we do but this is a fundamental failing. I think that it is slightly disingenuous to have said that we can credibly discuss the challenges facing other countries only if we front up with our own and then not even discuss what we were debating at that time back in the New Zealand Parliament and in the Social Services Committee as part of the parliamentary process—these fundamental changes made through the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. 
I ask the Minister for Social Development and Employment whether she would not mind addressing the points I have raised around the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act and the impact of changes in that legislation because it is reasonably detailed. The changes there mainly come through implication rather than direct reference so I would like a little more clarity around those provisions. I also would like to know what discussions were had with the Minister of Justice and the Ministry of Justice on those provisions because I think quite rightly that there have been concerns about the very swift broadening of powers around bodily samples and DNA testing in New Zealand. 
Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister for Social Development and Employment) 
: 
 To be clear about Part 2 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill  clause 41 amends sections 8 18(1) 23(1) and 24C of the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act 1995. The amendments update the circumstances when children may be required or may consent to give bodily samples in order to reflect the changes to the principal Act proposed by the bill. 
Clause 42 amends section 142A of the Criminal Justice Act 1985. The amendment relates to a child who is serving a sentence of imprisonment whether that sentence was imposed before or after the commencement of this legislation. It ensures that after the commencement of this legislation the child may while he or she still is a child be detained under that sentence only in an approved residence as defined under the principal Act. 
This part of the bill is very narrow. It applies directly to those matters. I would be interested to hear whether Labour will support this part. It did support the original Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Amendment Bill and Part 2 merely brings the Act into line with the changes in this bill. Part 2 is a narrow part. We have debated the main part of the bill. I think the clauses in Part 2 are important additions to the bill that we must do. 
SUE MORONEY (Labour) 
: 
 I thank the Minister for Social Development and Employment for her contribution but I am afraid it did not actually address the issues that my colleague Jacinda Ardern had asked about with regard to her concerns around this part of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. In particular the Minister failed to address the concerns about the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child which in my reading of Part 2 of this bill does cause New Zealand some grief in terms of its commitments in that regard. I have had the opportunity to contribute to this debate in the earlier parts of the Committee stage and in the main I was very focused on whether the boot camp model was the right pathway to go down for our young people who are in trouble with the justice system and in trouble in the course of their lives in particular thinking about the very good model Te Hurihanga which has been established in Hamilton and which this Government is closing down. That seems to be a much better way to go in order to deal with these issues. 
When it comes to Part 2 of this bill I am interested in gaining some understanding from the Minister about what the implications are for clause 42 which amends the Criminal Justice Act and amends it in a way that has children subject to our youth justice facilities. I am particularly keen to know what that means in terms of residential facilities when it comes to 12 and 13-year-olds. I have to say that I am interested from a personal perspective as well because when I read this bill as a member of Parliament I also cannot help but read this as a mother. I cannot separate the two sometimes and I think that is probably a good thing. That is why we have women in this Chamber because it is important that we wear all of those hats when we are reading legislation. I am the mother of a 12-year-old. I read this part of the bill and wonder about the rights of my 12-year-old with regard to having compulsory samples taken. I tell members it is not something that I relish the idea of as a parent. What are the— 
Hon Member 
: It’s taking a cheek swab. 
SUE MORONEY 
: Mr Borrows seems to think that he has the answer to the anxiety that parents might have about the rights of children at the ages of 12 and 13 years. I am interested that at least Part 2 does call these 12 and 13-year-olds “children” because they are and there are other parts of this bill that pretend otherwise. We are talking about children who are 12 and 13 years old. For example if my son were in this position—if he were accused of a crime—would I be with him? Would there be a requirement for the parents to be informed? Would the parents need to give consent for bodily samples to be taken from a 12-year-old? Those are things that I think New Zealand parents will be contemplating as they hear this debate because they are very important issues to consider. Certainly being the mother of a 12-year-old I do not believe that he would be in a position to make legal decisions about his rights in this regard. Those are the sorts of things that I would like to hear in a more succinct form from the Minister. 
The Minister stood up and read out perfectly well what we can all see in front of us. We can all see which sections of which acts will be amended but what we are really interested in is what this means with regard to our international obligations; we want to know what discussions have been had with other Ministers with regard to this and we want to know exactly what this means in terms of children and the way they are treated. 
I started by talking about residential facilities and that is where I want to end my contribution. For example the Te Hurihanga facility in Hamilton is an 8-bed facility. I want to know whether 12-year-olds would be in a residential facility staying overnight with 24-year-olds. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD (Labour) 
: 
 I am pleased to take a short call on Part 2 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill in order to reflect as my colleagues have done on the implications from our perspective of the major change that this bill brings forward: that is the treatment of 12 to 13-year-olds. We are discussing children here. We know the Minister for Social Development and Employment has been very reluctant to use the word children when referring to 12 to 13-year-olds but that is what they are. When we put them into a criminal jurisdiction like the Youth Court then it has a whole series of implications. 
This part identifies again some of the concerns Labour members have. We are discussing children who are 12 and 13 years of age and who will be asked to provide bodily samples I assume voluntarily. Once collected the sample is kept. All the uses and abuses of those samples are possible. 
Todd McClay 
: What abuses? Give us an example. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: I say to Mr McClay that the major one is that it will give a dog a bad name. When a 12-year-old does stray and eventually comes back to the fold those samples are kept for a long time and one does not know how those samples will be used or abused. 
Todd McClay 
: It sounds like conspiracy theory. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: The member ought to be an advocate for 12-year-olds and protect their rights. This part does not do that and this bill does not do that. Here is an example of what is likely to happen to those children: they will be exposed to this bodily samples regime. This part of the bill opens them up to it. Where are the protections for 12 and 13-year-olds? New Zealand will be in breach of international conventions. What discussions have there been around that? We have not heard any of those arguments. The Minister may want to take a call to give us those kinds of guarantees. 
Todd McClay 
: The information will be misused. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: I say to Mr McClay that he knows that these issues were not discussed at any length in the Social Services Committee. It was taken for granted but now when we come back and have a look at it in the totality of what this bill provides we see we have a major glitch that ought to be addressed and that ought to be talked about. What are the explanations we will provide for the responsibilities we have in terms of our United Nations obligations? They have not been reported they have not been discussed and they have not been identified. They were not discussed in the select committee and here we are again with the risks of exposing 12 to13-year-olds. We are told that it is for a small number but we do not know what the number will be under this regime. We believe that those children ought to have those protections but the protections are not there at the moment. So what is the real purpose of this legislation? How will the Minister address our United Nations obligations to protect children? 
One also wonders what other implications there are for the 12 to 13-year-olds who will be caught by the regime and by this legislation. What might they be? Which ones have been talked about? The present Minister in the chair the Hon Judith Collins might want to explain some of those. In the end these are ethical questions as well. They are ethical questions that accrue to this aspect of this bill and they have not been answered. They have not been addressed. Minister Bennett in the speeches she has given so far has not been willing to engage in a philosophical or ethical justification for these provisions but here is another opportunity for the Minister in the chair and perhaps for other speakers on the other side of the Chamber to address the question and convince us that the protections for children—because that is what they are—that they deserve and demand will be accorded. 
Indeed those are the obligations we have and we have given guarantees in our own child protection as well as in the United Nations rules and conventions we have signed up to in New Zealand that we need to address. I would like to hear some explanation about why this legislation is necessary and how it really protects the needs of very young children. I look forward to those explanations. Thank you. 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 I rise on behalf of the Green Party to oppose Part 2 for many of the reasons that have been outlined by my Labour colleagues. I think that the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child is very relevant here because the essence of that convention is that the rights and welfare of children come first. If we apply that in this situation to 12 and 13-year-olds the imposition of a regime of DNA testing and bodily samples is not putting the rights of children first. 
We can look at this in perspective. It was not long ago that we did not have any DNA testing. When the select committee discussed the bill that Part 2 is amending it was said quite clearly by a number of jurisdictions and by the Privacy Commissioner that taking bodily samples of people’s DNA is particularly intrusive much more so than is taking fingerprints or other forms of biometric testing. It is an intrusion on the privacy of the person. If we look at it in the context that this has just come in then it is very intrusive. We have not had the taking of body samples in place for too long; I ask why we need it now for children. 
The Green Party opposed the original bill that effectively brought in compulsory bodily sample extraction. I ask why we now have to bring it right down to include children—12 and 13-year-olds. There is no argument for it to be brought to that level. A provision in the bill talks about suspects and it should be borne in mind that we do not actually need to be charged to have a bodily sample taken according to the original legislation that this bill is amending; one need just be a police suspect. The police have a couple of months before they can charge a person or decide not to after they have taken the bodily sample. 
Then there is the question about whether a 12 or 13-year-old is able to give consent. When we are talking about 12 and 13-year-olds are we really talking about consent? For example a 12-year-old is bundled into the back of a police car and is taken to the station and asked whether he or she will consent to a body sample being taken. In any rational analysis there is no consent there—99 percent of the time you do what the police say and there might be a few implications that if you do not there might be a few downsides for you and your family. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: The member is bringing the Chair into the debate. 
KEITH LOCKE 
: I am sorry Mr Chairman. I am talking about “you” in the generic sense but I should not use the word. I think that is the problem with a lot of legislation in this House. We keep running down the track of having more and more restrictions on people’s rights. Sure people can argue that there might be an upside to it and that there might be a really bad 12-year-old and that this particular provision will enable a bodily sample to be given. That person may at some point in the future be convicted and that provision will be good. But if we put it in the balance of what is happening to children in this society—the criminalisation of children—and adding the extraction of bodily samples from them in essentially a forced way then I ask which is the greater problem for society. Is it the occasional child who might get off when he or she should be convicted—the one in one thousand or whatever—or is it the intrusion that this measure will cause and the infringement on children’s rights that is contrary to all our international commitments to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child? Thank you. 
MOANA MACKEY (Labour) 
: 
 I will start off my call on Part 2 by foreshadowing two amendments that Labour will put forward. It is important to say that Labour has put forward these amendments to Part 2 based on previous rulings in the accident compensation legislation about where these matters need to be raised. The Chairperson previously ruled that expiry provisions must be within a part of the bill not with the preliminary provisions so we are following that ruling and these amendments are to be inserted as a new clause in Part 2. 
The two amendments are very different. The first amendment would mean that the entire Act expires by way of a sunset clause and the second amendment would mean that only Part 2 of this legislation expires. I very much look forward to the ACT Party’s support for these amendments as the ACT Party has regularly called for legislation and regulations to have sunset clauses and expiry dates. In this instance we agree with those members and we look forward to having a majority of the Committee in favour of these sunset clauses. 
When it comes to Part 2 I urge the Minister in the chair the Minister for Social Development and Employment to answer some of the questions that are going unanswered in this debate. I would really appreciate getting some clarification over the compulsion in the taking of DNA samples from minors. 
I have the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act 1995 in front of me which is the principal Act being amended by this part. A reading of the Act would imply that we can compulsorily take a sample from a 12 or 13-year-old in the case of murder or manslaughter and my reading of the amendment that the Minister is putting forward in Part 2 is that that power will be extended to any indictable offence punishable by 14 years’ imprisonment or more. I would like the Minister’s clarification on that—that what we are doing here is saying that a DNA sample can be taken compulsorily from a 12 or 13-year-old for any indictable offence punishable by 14 years’ imprisonment or more. I do not think it is too much to ask for that clarification so that we know what we are passing here this evening. 
This is of particular interest to me and I gave many speeches on previous legislation amending the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act which this Government passed. That amending legislation extended the DNA database. The reason I did that was that although I am a great believer in DNA legislation—I am a great believer in its potential not just for convicting the guilty but for freeing people who have been wrongly convicted of crime—it does worry me that members of this Parliament do not seem to realise that although this technology has enormous potential it also has enormous risk and restrictions in its ability. It is not foolproof by any stretch of the imagination. 
Members of this Committee know how powerful DNA technology is. If 12 or 13-year-olds go to court and there is DNA evidence against them it is very difficult to argue out of those charges. The fact is that all DNA evidence does is prove that someone’s DNA was at the scene of a crime. That is all it proves. It is up to the rest of the evidence to prove why someone’s DNA was there that that person was there and what that person was doing whilst there. There is an idea that somehow if someone’s DNA is found at a crime scene it means that person committed the crime. I find it worrying that Government members have made those claims in terms of this legislation and in previous DNA legislation that we have passed. They have called DNA testing a fingerprint. It is not a fingerprint. A fingerprint is an entire thing. 
When we come to DNA testing we test only a few loci—something like 0.001 percent of someone’s DNA is tested when a DNA sample is taken. Although it is incredibly accurate it is not a fingerprint. If we are to be extending again the use and the powers of this technology I want to hear—and I am pleased the Minister of Justice has come to the Chamber—that Government members understand and are prepared to articulate not just the potential but the limitations of this technology. 
As my colleague Lianne Dalziel has pointed out time and time again it is not just that it is difficult to exonerate someone if he or she is innocent but has DNA against them; it is sometimes hard to get a conviction if the person does not have DNA evidence against them. People believe because they watch  
CSI 
 that DNA is always there in every single case—it is called the  
CSI 
 effect amongst the science community. The belief is that if DNA is present someone is guilty and if it is not present the person must be innocent. That is not true. With the greatest respect to the Minister in the chair I say that when legislation like this extends the jurisdiction of this technology I want to know that the Government understands those limitations. 
I would like the Minister to stand and say yes categorically this bill is about the compulsory taking of DNA samples from 12 and 13-year-olds for any indictable offence punishable by 14 years’ or more imprisonment and that has been extended from murder and manslaughter. That is actually why we have a Committee stage—it is the one opportunity for Opposition MPs to put questions about legislation directly to a Minister and to have them answered particularly on legislation that is of such importance. 
I sincerely hope because my colleagues have told me that this question has not been answered that the Minister is prepared to answer it and to clarify it not just for members on this side of the Chamber but for the public of New Zealand who want to know exactly what is being passed into law. I am very pleased to see that the Minister is seeking advice and I hope we can get some clarification on this point so we can stop asking the same question. Until we get a response I think it is very very unfair of the Minister to just not answer our question and then move the closure motion as the Government will inevitably try to do. 
Previous speakers have said that we are talking about children here and we are. These are 12 and 13-year-olds. I think anyone who has children or anyone who was a 12 or 13-year-old knows that we are talking about children. It is terrible when children do tragic and awful things. But I would also say that this legislation is about the taking of a DNA sample prior to someone being found guilty. 
A person is innocent until proven guilty in this country and we have to remind ourselves of that when we are talking about extending the jurisdiction of this technology which is very powerful but comes with enormous risks. When we hear tub-thumping and chest-beating speeches from Government members about how the Government is tough on crime and is cracking down on these terrible awful tiny horrors and terrors we have to remind ourselves that in this country a person is innocent until proven guilty. 
Just because someone has a DNA sample taken it does not mean that he or she is guilty. Given the extension of these provisions to 12 and 13-year-olds who may well not have done anything wrong I do not think it is too much to ask for the Minister in the chair to take a call and clarify for the Opposition members and for the people of New Zealand exactly what we are passing into law because it is not clear. 
I would also like the Minister in her response to that question to acknowledge that the Government despite all the speeches that its members are giving understands the limitations on this technology. I would like her to acknowledge that the Government will properly fund the Institute of Environmental Science and Research which does the DNA testing through a contract with the police and that it will train the police properly. In Victoria special squads had to be hired to forcibly take DNA samples from minors. They had to be trained in how to hold minors down in order to forcibly take a DNA sample. 
I want the Minister to clarify that that may well be what we are talking about here. If it is I ask whether training will take place so that we do not end up with endless complaints to the Independent Police Conduct Authority and endless litigation over what the police can and cannot do. The police need protection in this as well. They need to know exactly what they can and cannot do in order to forcibly take a DNA sample—because we are extending this provision well beyond where the current law is at right now. 
But more important is the question of whether the Institute of Environmental Science and Research will be properly funded not just for the cost of actually doing the extra DNA tests but for the administrative staff. The administrative staff receive the samples log them in correctly and continue the chain of custody that started with the police and we need to ensure that we do not have any miscarriages of justice because of a lack of funding for the administrative functions that the institute carries out. This is not scaremongering; this has happened in other jurisdictions. In fact this happened in New Zealand. A man was assaulted in Christchurch and he gave a DNA sample. He was then was charged with murder. But his alibi was that he was in Christchurch being assaulted at the time of the murder so he could not possibly have done it. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I heard the Minister in the chair the Hon Paula Bennett minimise the reality of Part 2 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill by saying it follows on from a part that we have been debating at some length. I do not think that is a fair and reasonable response from the Minister. In fact it sounded as though she was trying to put off having to respond to the questions that have been put to her and was trying to encourage the Chair perhaps to close the debate on a significant part of the bill. 
Nobody can ignore the fact that this bill has major consequences for our children. I still cannot hear the Minister use the word “children”. The reason that she cannot use that word is that she finds it really difficult to accept the fact that that is what the law she is responsible for administering says. She is responsible for administering the protection of our children. She has obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and she is completely ignoring them. That Minister has not responded to a single question that I asked the last time that we were debating this issue that Jacinda Ardern asked earlier and that Rajen Prasad and now Moana Mackey have asked. All of us have asked a series of questions around the implications of this legislation for New Zealand’s standing in front of the United Nations. 
The Minister of Justice is in the Chamber. He has been in front of the United Nations responding on our human rights standing. This bill was not even mentioned then even though it was before the House when he appeared in front of the UN. 
Hon Steve Chadwick 
: What? 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: No it was not even mentioned yet it was before the House at the time. I want to know what the Minister’s advice has been from her officials about what New Zealand’s standing with the United Nations will be when this bill is passed into law. I think that she has had advice that this legislation breaches the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. It seriously challenges that convention not only in Part 1 but especially in Part 2 where we are dealing with compulsory DNA testing. I think the Minister should respond to that question. 
I have had feedback on this debate. I do not often have people walking up to me at functions— 
Hon Simon Power 
: That’s OK. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: No they come up to me at functions— 
Hon Simon Power 
: Oh generally speaking. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: Generally speaking. But they do not often come up to me and say they thought I gave a really good speech in Parliament this week. I was surprised at that. I keep forgetting that we have Parliament TV now and people channel hop and stop when they see something interesting. I asked one guy which speech he was referring to because I had given quite a few speeches last week. He said it was the one about children and who was responsible for them. I had talked about the rights of the child to be protected from a whole lot of adverse effects and had said that responsibility lay with their parents their family and also the wider community. I think that was said in response to some ridiculous comments from the ACT member David Garrett who had been particularly repulsive in his comments about how young offenders were not children any more because of the acts that they have committed. He was not prepared to look at the circumstances of that offending: the deprivation of those children and indeed the damage that had been done to them in the environments in which they had grown up. He did not mind that; he did not seem to care about it. 
The person who approached me fortunately turned out to be a constituent of mine. He was a long way away from the electorate but I was very pleased to find out that my constituent thought that I had given a good speech. He said that while I was talking he started to think about his son who is 11½ years old. He suddenly realised that Parliament was debating the lowering of the age to one where his son a child would in 6 months’ time have criminal responsibility for offences other than murder and manslaughter. Again I think people dwell on murder and manslaughter but the law already allows for criminal responsibility to sit at that level for murder and manslaughter. 
The other question that my constituent raised with me and to which the Minister did not respond was the question of who had murdered Michael Choy. The general public seems to believe that the person who took Michael Choy’s life was an individual called Bailey Junior Kurariki. But he was found guilty of manslaughter along with Phillip Kaukasi Riki Rapira and Joe Kaukasi. Those who actually took his life were Alexander Tokorua Peihopa and Whatarangi Rawiri. Nobody in the House has ever heard of those other people. Why was Bailey Junior Kurariki held up to the public as the face of the youngest killer that this country has ever had? It was because of his age. The Minister wants to open up to that kind of pressure every other 12 and 13-year-old who falls off the track and ends up in that situation in relation to a wider range of offences. 
Nobody is justifying what those children do. No one justifies what Bailey Junior Kurariki did in conjunction with his friends who I have to say were older than him and possibly led him astray. He was 12 years old when that offence happened. He rang the pizza place and that was why the pizza was delivered to that house. He opened the door when the pizza arrived but he has become this country’s entire focus as the individual who killed Michael Choy. It was not Bailey Junior Kurariki who killed Michael Choy but he was involved in that offence. I think what the Minister has completely lost sight of is that in Part 2 we have the situation where DNA testing becomes part of the total package that follows a young person throughout the rest of his or her life. So in the case of Bailey Junior Kurariki he would not only have that following him for the rest of his life; he has the outcome of the media—judge and jury as they are—essentially finding him guilty of the most heinous offence that one could imagine. 
I think that the Minister has not taken responsibility for ensuring that New Zealand is able to maintain its status with regard to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. It is amazing that the Minister of Justice has moved an amendment in a bill that he introduced only a week ago to allow for a change to our adoption laws so that in fact we can actually sign up to one of the convention provisions that we have not been able to sign up to until now. I think that the Minister Paula Bennett does New Zealand a great disservice first by ignoring the fact that we are talking in this debate about children and second by minimising the issue with regard to DNA testing. 
The Minister can play on her BlackBerry as much as she likes but it is not really fair that she is not participating in the debate. She is simply playing on her BlackBerry as she sits at the Table. I would have thought that is probably out of order but there you go. That Minister is not prepared to participate in the debate in a reasonable way and she misses the ultimate point which is that she has an obligation to ensure that New Zealand is always able to provide for its obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Other Ministers stand in front of the United Nations and talk about our commitment to human rights yet on this particular issue this Minister is prepared to stand back and say it is OK to hold children to account in the Youth Court for their actions regardless of all of the reasons that might have brought them there regardless of the damage that has occurred from their upbringing and regardless of the lack of support that they have had from their family and their community. 
These offenders are children. Part 2 is just as important as Part 1. Members on this side of the Chamber will continue to debate the importance of Part 2 until the Minister takes some responsibility and gets up to explain why she thinks it is OK that mandatory DNA testing is applicable to 12 and 13-year-olds—children—under the legislation that she is obliged to oversee. 
Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister of Youth Affairs) 
: 
 Just in response to Lianne Dalziel I will quickly say that some of the offences we are talking about are rape arson wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm and aggravated robbery. I take members back to some of the well-known and very unfortunate criminals whose string of absolutely dreadful crimes have left victims behind them and who have caused a lot of distress and say that if they could have had DNA samples taken from those criminals back when they were first offending would they not have done that? Would they not have taken DNA samples then to try to prevent those unfortunate and distressing future crimes that have resulted in people being extremely hurt? We are not talking about the light stuff; we are not talking about indictable offences. I know that those questions have been asked. We are talking about extreme and distressing crimes that leave victims behind them. I say that if we could have taken samples then we would have. We should give the police that sort of power and that sort of control. I end by saying that yes there was a moment when I was on my BlackBerry. The member mentioned before that someone who had seen her on TV had commented about what a good speech she had given. I got a message that said it was appalling. 
STUART NASH (Labour) 
: 
 It is interesting I mentioned in my maiden speech something that Harry Holland used to always ask. He was one of the early leaders of the Labour Party and his first test was to ask: is it right for the people of New Zealand? I was speaking at a Rotary club on Monday this week. Rotary has its four principles as well and they are very much aligned with the Labour Party principles. The No. 1 principle is whether it is right for the people of New Zealand. If Harry Holland thought that it was right for the people of New Zealand then the Labour Party would move forward start the policy process and put it into place. I look at this bill with regard to 12 and 13-year-olds and I ask: is this right? It fails the fundamental test. It fails under any test. 
I will tell members a story. I heard an interview with a woman called Celia Lashlie. I think we all know of her. She is a prison reformer. She said she thought that of all the people she had ever met in the prison system only six of them could not be reformed. That woman had met many evil buggers in the prison system but she had met only six who could not be rehabilitated. On a plane down from Auckland one time I was sitting next to Sian Elias. I mentioned to her what Celia Lashlie had said and I asked what her views on this issue were. This was after the honourable Minister Simon Power had said that Sian Elias was not in a position to comment on judicial matters being the Chief Justice and what would she know about judicial matters anyway? I mentioned Celia Lashlie’s comment to Sian Elias and asked what her view was on that. She said she concurred with it. She thought that very very few people who entered our judicial system could not be rehabilitated. 
This is about language. Politics is about language messaging is about language. If we tell a 12 or 13-year-old that he or she is a criminal then we have set that child on a path to jail. That is not what is necessary. 
I read the  
Hawke’s Bay Today 
 I read the papers. There have been a lot of assaults and there has been a lot of crime. Let us face facts: we are all tough on crime and we want to be tough on crime. Crime is a scourge of our society but these are crimes committed by people over the age of 18 or 21 years. 
As MPs we have all been to intermediate schools and seen 12 and 13-year-olds running around the fields and that is where they should be. They should be kicking around rugby balls throwing softballs around and throwing netballs through hoops. These are not criminals. If we label them as criminals then we are labelling them for the rest of their lives. This comes back to national standards and to why all the top academics are against national standards. If we label a kid a failure then that becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. If we label a 12 or 13-year-old a criminal that will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. It is not about that; it is about mentoring. It astounds me. 
My colleague Moana Mackey said that the police will run into a whole lot of complaints about this legislation but I will tell members why they will not. I say this with all due respect to my colleague who is a very articulate speaker and who knows what she is talking about because science and technology are her background. The police will not run into a whole lot of complaints about this because 12 and 13-year-olds simply do not know their rights. If a policeman comes along to a 12 or 13-year-old that child will not complain because at that age children hardly know which foot to put each shoe on. We are talking about children for God’s sake. We are not talking about criminals; we are talking about children. Why can members opposite not say that they are children? 
Sandra Goudie 
: Oh for goodness’ sake! 
STUART NASH 
: I ask when Sandra Goudie last visited an intermediate school. There are kids running around in shorts with bare feet kicking rugby balls. It astounds me that we want to label these children as criminals. 
One of the things we must address is what the cause of this is. It is poverty. For example in Hawke’s Bay 70 percent of the people earn under $40000. Seventy percent of the people in Hawke’s Bay got no tax cut in that Government’s reforms and those people will be screwed when this Government increases GST to 15 percent. It is as if Government members do not even care. 
Where is the caring society that we all came from? Where is the community spirit? It has disappeared and this is just one further step in eroding the community spirit that this party was born to believe in. I would like to think that the vast majority of New Zealanders believe in community spirit. But Government members want to take 12 and 13-year-olds away. We are not talking about people we are talking about children. If you take DNA from these guys then you are labelling them for life. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: The member must not include me. 
STUART NASH 
: I am sorry Mr Chairperson you are not at all—I know that you are a decent— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: Order! 
STUART NASH 
: I am sorry Mr Chairperson. This Government is removing any vestige of community. 
What I think really needs addressing in this House—and the Labour Party works very hard to address this—is what the causes of poverty are. Why do we have 12 and 13-year-olds committing crimes that in the past we just did not see occurring? I will tell members what it is: it is the breakdown that is happening in the community. People are working at second and third jobs simply to put food on the table to put petrol in the car to put clothes on the children and to buy textbooks. National members want to give tax cuts to those earning over $70000—and we are talking about only 8 percent of the population—and to make 75 percent of the population pay more in GST. We all know that is the case. Seventy-five percent of the people in this country earn under $40000. 
Chester Borrows 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. We are debating Part 2 which amends the Criminal Investigations (Bodily Samples) Act and the Criminal Justice Act. The member has talked about national standards GST tax cuts and the causes of poverty and we have had sweet Fanny Adams about Part 2. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: I think the member himself became a little bit elaborate in his explanation. Members know that relevance is one of the issues I consider before taking the closure motion. 
STUART NASH 
: With regard to DNA testing I see taking DNA from 12 and 13-year-olds as being a breach of human rights. These are members of our society who do not have any understanding of their rights. These are members of our society who should be looked after and covered by our society yet by taking their DNA we are in effect putting them on a database and criminalising them for life. It will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. 
As Moana Mackey mentioned a whole lot unintended consequences will come from this. The Department of Scientific and Industrial Research or the Institute of Environmental Science and Research Ltd or whatever it is called these days—it is being restructured because it now has to have a profit motive—will probably be user-pays and GST will be charged on top of that and we all know that it is going up to 15 percent to hurt the most affected. No only are we seeing here an increased cost to society in relation to marginalising and criminalising the most vulnerable in our society but also we are making the Institute of Environmental Science and Research and the police undertake procedures that in effect they know are a waste of time. They know that this will not help society that it is not about productivity and that it is not about protecting society. It is pure and utter politics. 
I know that if the vast majority of New Zealanders looked into their hearts and asked whether they wanted to criminalise 12 and 13-year-olds whether they wanted to take their DNA and whether they wanted to violate the human rights of 12 and 13-year-olds by forcing them to give swabs and asked whether that is what they signed up for whether it is what they voted for and whether it is the sort of society they want or the sort of country they want to live in then the answer to every single question would be no. These are children. 
We are seeing the breakdown of our communities. We talk about a Government that is inclusive that wants economic development yet here we have legislation in front of us that in effect is marginalising those who are the most vulnerable when in fact we should be picking them up and giving them opportunities. We should be providing them with aspiration. It is easy to talk about aspiration as we beat them down as we heap all this stuff on top of them and say: “You cannot achieve because you are a criminal.” It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy and I for one am very proud to be part of this party which stands up for the rights of children—who stands up for 12-year-olds. They are not even in their teens for goodness’ sake. The 12-year-olds whom I know are without a doubt children yet this Government wants to take DNA samples from them. 
We talked about  
CSI 
. I like  
CSI 
 it is a great programme but never in any of the  
CSI 
 programmes that I have watched has there been a 12-year-old who has had a mouth swab on whom all these tests have been run and who has been put in jail. Even the guys on TV who make programmes to appeal to the vast majority know that taking DNA from 12 and 13-year-olds is just not right. 
This bill represents everything that is wrong. It fails the fundamental test that we ask ourselves every day as parliamentarians: is this right for the people of New Zealand? No it is not. 
CHRIS TREMAIN (Senior Whip—National) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the question be now put. 
Ayes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Noes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Motion agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Jacinda Ardern to clause 41 be agreed to: 
to omit this clause. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: We come to a number of amendments in the name of three different members seeking to include an expiry provision in the bill. In order to deal with these amendments I think a precedent has been set earlier in the day and in line with that particular precedent I wish to test the will of the Committee as to whether it wants to accept these amendments. I propose to put the question on the two extreme amendments and on one amendment in the middle in order to test it. I think that because proposed dates are so far apart we need some middle ground as well. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Jacinda Ardern to Part 2 be agreed to: 
to add the following new clause: 
43AExpiry 
This Act expires with the close of 31 July 2010. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Jacinda Ardern to Part 2 be agreed to: 
to add the following new clause: 
43AExpiry 
This Act expires with the close of 22 October 2025. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Jacinda Ardern to Part 2 be agreed to: 
to add the following new clause: 
43AExpiry 
This Act expires with the close of 31 July 2042. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: The Committee has had an opportunity to express its will on a variety of expiry provisions. Therefore I rule out all other amendments adding expiry clauses after clause 43. We will now have a similar arrangement with regard to adding a new clause 44A which is a sunset provision. I wish to begin by putting the question on the amendment with the earliest expiry date that I can find in the name of Grant Robertson. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Grant Robertson to Part 2 be agreed to: 
to add the following new clause: 
44AExpiry 
This Part expires with the close of 19 September 2011. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Grant Robertson to Part 2 be agreed to: 
to add the following new clause: 
44AExpiry 
This Part expires with the close of 1 October 2033. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Grant Robertson to Part 2 be agreed to: 
to add the following new clause: 
44AExpiry 
This Part expires with the close of 23 September 2093. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy) 
: With the House in Committee expressing no desire to amend the bill by adding an expiry clause in a new clause 44A I rule out all other similar amendments as being out of order. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That Part 2 be agreed to. 
Ayes 64 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; United Future 1. 
Noes 58 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1. 
Part 2 agreed to. 
Clauses 1 to 3 
JACINDA ARDERN (Labour) 
: 
 I am pleased to rise to kick off the debate on the clauses of the bill concerning the title commencement and principal amendments to the Act. I will start with the title of the bill. I think this actually comes to the core of the issue. The bill is titled the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. Critically there we are cross-referencing the primary legislation that this bill amends and that is obviously the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act. We heard time and time again in this Chamber and also at select committee that this bill would fundamentally change the core and the principles of that primary legislation. I think to even claim that we are remaining in the realms of the core values of that legislation is actually quite misleading. 
So I am proposing that we change the title of this bill. Perhaps we could change it to the “Most Fundamental Change Since the Inception of the Children Young Persons and their Families Act Amendment Bill”. Just to prove my point I go back to that core legislation and those founding principles because I think had we done that at the beginning that may have better informed the debate. Part 4 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989 sets out under section 208 the guiding principles for our youth justice system. I think it is worth going over some of those. Section 208(a) states “the principle that unless the public interest requires otherwise criminal proceedings should not be instituted against a child or young person if there is an alternative means of dealing with the matter:”. That is an interesting point the fact that it makes the reference “the public interest requires”. I ask who the arbiter is of whether the public interest is being served by having a 12 or 13-year-old being moved to and dealt with by a Youth Court. 
I offer to the Committee the idea that we already have enough flexibility within our judicial processes and procedures in our youth justice system for that test of public interest to be made at that level. To arbitrarily move 12 and 13-year-olds into the Youth Court removes that discretion and public interest test as it sits in the primary legislation. I think section 208(c) is also worth reflecting on together as we go through the final part of the Committee stage. Again it comes to the core issue. It states: “the principle that any measures for dealing with offending by children or young persons should be designed—(i) to strengthen the family whanau hapu iwi and family group of the child or young person concerned; and (ii) to foster the ability of families whanau hapu iwi and family groups to develop their own means of dealing with offending by their children and young persons:”. 
This Act puts the family at the core. It says that if we are dealing with children in particular and they are offending at the level that the Minister claims we are trying to target there must be care and protection issues in that young child’s home. The Act explicitly states that a core principle is that that family that whanau that hapu that iwi should be a part of dealing with that young person’s or child’s behaviour. We are removing that through this change. We are taking the family out of the equation. When we move a child or a young person into the Youth Court we essentially fly in the face of this principle within the core primary legislation. 
I argue that we would be within our rights to look at the title of this bill and say that it is misleading and to say instead that we should pick up on the point made by Judge Andrew Becroft when he said that this is the most fundamental change to the primary Act since its inception. Also at the core of this primary legislation is the idea that essentially our youth justice system unless the public interest decides otherwise should be diversionary and that criminal proceedings should where possible be limited in their usage for children and young people. 
I do have some other proposals for other names that we could use for the bill. I want to be able to offer those to the Committee. I think we can see that this bill contradicts some of those core principles. Perhaps if we go a little further into those core principles we see that age becomes an issue as well. In section 208 it states “(e) the principle that a child’s or young person’s age is a mitigating factor in determining—(i) whether or not to impose sanctions in respect of offending by a child or young person; and (ii) the nature of any such sanctions:”. Again we have a principle here that we are undermining with this legislation. Perhaps then this bill should be renamed the “Removal of Any Discretion to Test the Public Interest as Set Out in the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989 Amendment Bill”. It is not too snappy I acknowledge. 
Hon Steve Chadwick 
: A bit clumsy. 
JACINDA ARDERN 
: It is a bit clumsy but I think it points that we are fundamentally undermining what was ground-breaking legislation at the time that it was introduced. I want to go back to that point because it is internationally recognised that our legislation is unique; it was well ahead of its time when it was introduced and still remains at the head of its game. But the changes that we are seeing here today undermine that and contravene our requirements under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. So perhaps again a better title for this bill would be the “Contradiction of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child Amendment Bill”. That is at the core of things as well. 
I hear members on the other side of the House who are talking about the victims and I will come back to that because they are specifically mentioned as part of the core principles of the Act as well. They are not mutually exclusive. That is why the public interest test is in there. We do acknowledge that we do have some serious offending amongst our children and our young people. But we could not size that in the Social Services Committee. 
Sandra Goudie 
: Oh she’s saying that we do have some problems of offending. Oh my goodness! 
JACINDA ARDERN 
: I will never in this Chamber admit I say to Ms Goudie that she has a point. I am sorry; I will not admit that in this Chamber ever. I do not believe that she has taken into account the far-reaching effects of this bill. 
Again up front at the very beginning of the core legislation in the first schedule it talks about the fact that this an Act to reform the law relating to children and young persons who are in need of care or protection or offend against the law. It states right up front at the very beginning of the legislation what the core principles of the Children Young Persons and Their Family Act are and I do believe this amendment bill flies in the face of those principles. 
So why are we doing it? I want to come back to this in my third reading speech because it is a more appropriate place to discuss that issue but I contend that this is actually about shifting criminal responsibility. It has been tried before in this House and it has failed. It has been tried by other members who are not now part of the Government but were from a party long past New Zealand First. It tried to shift criminal responsibility in New Zealand. It was much more overt about it though. I believe that although this bill may not be as overt as that attempt this is taking us down a similar track. So perhaps this legislation should be retitled the “Shift In Criminal Responsibility Bill”. 
I thank members though for their contributions to the debate. I do hope my other colleagues take the opportunity to share their view on what would be a more accurate depiction of what this bill is doing to our youth justice system. As I have already stated and as stated by Andrew Becroft who is a much wiser person on the issues of youth justice than I this is a fundamental shift and it cannot and should not happen in this Parliament without a robust debate first. 
CHESTER BORROWS (National—Whanganui) 
: 
 At this stage of the debate on the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill it is interesting to recollect a little where we have travelled the number of people who have spoken and the points they have made in this part of the Committee stage which allows us to take a view over the whole bill. 
I will make two or three points. The first point is that during the select committee process the Labour members prepared a three-page fairly extensive minority report but missing from that report was any talk about DNA. It has been quite interesting to see the debate we have had in respect of the conflict those members seem to find between natural justice and the Bill of Rights and the taking of DNA samples. In an earlier speech we heard that apparently 12 and 13-year-old children would be held down to have a DNA sample taken from them. The DNA sample is actually taken by the young person taking what we know as a Q-tip rubbing it on the inside of his or her cheek and putting it into a plastic bag. The DNA sample is not taken by way of a burly policeman holding down the 12 or 13-year-old. It is important for the people who are listening and making an assessment on the validity of the speeches in the Committee stage to know that fact. 
Another point was made about 12 and 13-year-olds being children. Of course under this Act and the Crimes Act “child” is defined as somebody under the age of 14. 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: That’s right. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: So by this definition under the Crimes Act 12 and 13-year-olds are children. 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: That’s right. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: On their 14th birthday they become “young persons”. 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: That’s right. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: On their 17th birthday they become “adults”. 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: That should be 18 as you know. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: We do not hear any disagreement from members on the other side of the Chamber in relation to when children become young persons but we hear disagreement about when they become adults. Those members have a problem with people becoming adults when they are 17. But that is the definition we are dealing with in relation to the Crimes Act and the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act. 
It is important too to restate the point the Minister for Social Development and Employment made in respect of the offences for which DNA will be taken from 12 and 13-year-olds. These are crimes that are punishable by 14 years’ imprisonment or more. We are talking for instance of wounding with intent to cause grievous bodily harm. The Hon Lianne Dalziel has spoken on numerous occasions about a tragic murder that involved half a dozen young people the youngest aged 12. If we think about that situation we see that if the victim of that attack Michael Choy had not died then the 12-year-old offender—who rang the pizza place to have the pizza delivered opened the door to let the victim into the house but apparently did not wield any implement that actually brought about the murder—could not have been charged with anything. He may have appeared as part of a care and protection process through the Family Court and but would not have been charged and a DNA sample could not be taken in any event whatsoever. 
The Minister quite ably made the point that knowing the offending that went on by some of our most notorious offenders—like Joseph Thompson Malcolm Rewa and Graeme Burton—if we had the opportunity to secure a cheek swab that held the DNA of any of those three offenders with them having committed a crime punishable by 14 years’ imprisonment or more why would we not take it? Why would we not take the opportunity to prevent for instance the two of those offenders who went on to have at least 100 more victims in respect of rapes in people’s own homes? If for instance we had their DNA profile on record then as soon as they had left a bodily secretion of any kind they could have been identified and that may well have prevented the crimes against those 100 or so victims. 
I believe very strongly that aligning this legislation with the DNA sampling legislation is a very real step. The DNA sampling legislation will prevent more victims than any other legislation this House is ever likely to pass. Aligning this Act in order to include 12 and 13-year-old offenders who have committed crimes of that magnitude is something that not even Harry Holland would have disagreed with bearing in mind the way we treated 10 12 13 and 14-year-old offenders in Harry Holland’s day. I think it is important to try to take some of the emotion out of this debate and just look at it in real terms. 
Another point that has been made time and time again regards the initial debate we had from fairly high-profile people within the sector who were anti the legislation especially in respect of 12 and 13-year-olds. We have heard Judge Andrew Becroft quoted on many many occasions. The reason of course is that he has huge credibility within the sector. It is interesting to note though that when he appeared before the Social Services Committee initially—he appeared about three times—his concern was that 12 and 13-year-olds who offend on this level and would therefore appear before the Youth Court under this legislation are actually few. But we know that their offending is very sophisticated and very violent and we are now seeing a new trend that involves young women as well as young men. He argued that if we really wanted to help the situation we needed to streamline the process of moving young people through the court system that involves 12 and 13-year-olds. 
We responded to that suggestion and he actually was complimentary about the changes that were made. For instance we allowed the process to move quickly so that 12 and 13-year-old prolific offenders whom the police bring before the court system can appear before the Youth Court quickly so that they can have curfews they can have prohibitions on associations with people and they can be banned from areas of high-level offending. We can get them on to what in an adult court are called bail conditions and in the Youth Court are called adjournment conditions—even if they then go back and appear before the Family Court. When Judge Andrew Becroft came back before the committee after the changes had been made he commented that he did not have a heck of a lot of problem with this because his suggestion was to streamline it and that is exactly where it went. 
When he returned again to the committee at that stage some more flesh had been put on the bones of the military-style activity camps— 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: Without legislation. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: —and the Government had started a pilot course. We did not need legislation. 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: You don’t need it? 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: That is right. Just remember that the court could do it only with the consent of the young person who was appearing— 
Hon Lianne Dalziel 
: That’s right. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: —and we are changing that. Labour agrees with that change so let us not kick it around too much. When Judge Becroft came back before the select committee and found out what was being offered in terms of programmes while people were attending these military-style activity camps he did not refer to them as boot camps; he did not align them with the corrective training that was going on at that time. The members who were present will recall—actually not a lot of members opposite heard him but I am sure that Ms Ardern will recall it—that when he came back and when the programmes that went along with military-style activity camps were explained as they were being run at that time he did not refer to them as boot camps. In fact in a direct response to a question from me he said that they were completely different from the boot camps that had been commented on within the media and by commentators reported in the media. He said he agreed with the programmes that were being offered in the military-style activity camps and he agreed that the style of camp that we were running—and the supervision with activity which is now part of military-style activity camps—was actually having the best results. 
Hon Member 
: No. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: That is what he said. I am pleased to stand here today because a number of us have worked on this legislation for a long time. In Opposition the Hon Anne Tolley and I spent a lot of time looking at the youth justice area visiting a number of providers around the country and working on the youth justice discussion paper that was the forerunner of this bill. Along with the other members of the law and order caucus committee of the last National Opposition I am very proud of this legislation. We believe that people will be safer and young people will be dealt with very well. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I enjoy the opportunity to follow the member because I consider that his contribution unlike the Minister’s was intelligent and reasoned and I feel that he went through the issues. 
Hon Member 
: It’s true. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: I do not think the member was listening to the Minister in the chair the Hon Paula Bennett when she gave a response to a very serious issue that was raised with me. A constituent—and I did not know he was a constituent when he came up to me—said that I had given a good speech because it had made him think about how this legislation will affect his 11½-year-old son. He looked at his 11½-year-old son and said: “At 12 this child would be subject to the jurisdiction of the Youth Court.” It made him think. The Minister stood up and said in response to the questions that I had asked that she had been rung by people who said that I had given a bad speech. Well frankly I do not care what anyone else says about the quality of my speech. I am interested in the issues that the previous speaker raised. 
I think that the previous speaker nailed it when he isolated the differences between Labour and National on this legislation. Nobody has mentioned this and the Minister continues to refuse to do this in her incapacity to deal with the fact that these are children we are talking about. Does anyone in his or her right mind—and I hope Chester Borrows takes some further calls on this bill—seriously think that these children end up committing these terrible offences in isolation from the environment within which they live? Does anyone think that? Does anyone seriously think that the lives of these children have somehow been perfect and all of a sudden they go out and commit a horrendous crime such as intentionally wounding with intent to injure? That is one of the offences we have. Does that happen in isolation of the family or the parents? Does that happen in isolation from a community or from the whanau iwi or hapu? Does it happen all by itself? 
David Garrett 
: No. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: No it does not and even the ACT member agrees with me on that. 
In 1989 New Zealand created a world-leading mechanism for addressing some of these most serious issues. In fact there is an element of what we know now that would make me want to rewrite the opening words of the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act. It states: “An Act to reform the law relating to children and young persons who are in need of care or protection or who offend against the law.” I think all of the children who offend against the law have care and protection issues. Not all of those with care and protection issues end up as offenders but there is a connection. 
I remember that when I first became a member of Parliament a number of issues arose around the practice of having youth justice facilities on the same site as the care and protection units. The member opposite will recall those facilities in Christchurch. There were serious issues because under the law they cannot mix. The irony that the social workers and the managers of those centres talked to me about was that it was crazy; they are the same children. They come in as care and protection cases and then come back as offenders under the youth justice provisions. 
The connections between care and protection and youth justice cannot be minimised and that is what has happened with this debate. The previous speaker did not even mention the fact that these children have a right under our law to have the care and protection of their families their parents and their communities. What has happened is terribly wrong. 
Let us look at some of the care and protection issues: whether the child or young person is being or is likely to be harmed—physically emotionally or sexually—ill-treated abused or seriously deprived; or whether his or her development or physical or mental or emotional well-being is being or is likely to be impaired or neglected. All of those issues lie behind these children. They do not end up being offenders simply because they have grown up to be offenders. There are issues that lie behind them and they are always every time about care and protection. 
Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister for Social Development and Employment) 
: 
 I want to take members back to the title of this bill which I think is entirely appropriate: the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. It covers this legislation incredibly well. The bill states that only those children who commit absolutely terrible heinous crimes will be seen in the Youth Court. They can then be sent back to the Family Court if necessary. I think the title and the commencement date fit well with this bill and I am happy to speak briefly on that part. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD (Labour) 
: 
 I speak on the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill with some sadness. When I heard Mr Chester Borrows talking about this bill and what it intended to do with young children I was reminded of my days in practice. I was reminded of the Act under which I worked the Child Welfare Act 1925. Under the provisions of that Act I was working in South Auckland with young children young people and their families. 
In those days after committing a very small number of reasonably minor offences those young people were railroaded which was the practice of the day. What we did then with those young children was very much what this bill tries to do with our 12 and 13-year-olds. The Minister might not recall those days but I am sure her officials can inform her and show her the research. We sent those young children to national institutions to undertake discipline training. There was one place called Hokio Beach School in the Horowhenua. There was Kohitere and places like Kingslea Residential Centre and others. They were sent there to go through so-called intense training. 
At one point these young children were taken out to Camp Peak owned by the then Department of Social Welfare in the forest at the foothills of the Tararua Ranges which is where these young people were given this kind of training. They were then brought back to Kohitere and sent back to South Auckland. We were supposed to provide wraparound services for them at the time. Within a very short period of time these young children ended up in youth justice facilities and in the criminal justice system. The recidivism rate was over 70 percent. 
It was because of those experiences that the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act was designed. It took 10 years to design. I was very involved with it because of the work I was doing in those days. It took a long time to design the Act but it really set out the major difference between care and protection and youth justice. My colleagues have read out parts of the Act and the purpose behind it. But this bill takes us right back to pre-1974 days. I am confused as to what it delivers. I think it does nothing more than deliver the Government’s punitive agenda. 
During the election campaign National members talked so much about violence. They talked about how they would be very strong and punitive and this is the unpacking of that agenda. Sometimes it is best to stop and rethink and say: “I now find myself in a different place. I now have material that officials have put before me and on that basis I will design a much better and much more effective system.” 
But that is not what this bill does. It takes us to someplace else. That is why the title of this bill should be the “Shifting the Age of Criminal Responsibility Bill” because that seems to be its driver. It has a punitive mindset. It will do again to our 12 and 13-year-olds what the 1925 Child Welfare Act did. It was all of those kinds of things that were in the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act that focus on care and protection for that age group. We are talking about children and we are talking about care and protection needs. We know that the science and the opportunity are there. The system is there to do better for that particular group than where this bill takes us. Submitters to the select committee made it quite clear that this was a radical shift. 
DAVID GARRETT (ACT) 
: 
 We have heard the name Judge Andrew Becroft from both sides of the Chamber today in the time I have been here. It just so happens that I was in Christchurch last Monday and I ran into Judge Becroft whom I had never met at Christchurch Airport. I went up and spoke to him because I had read in that morning’s paper an account of an address he had given the previous evening. The article said that Judge Becroft had talked about our having produced a lost generation of valueless children. I thought that that sounded remarkably prescient. So I went up introduced myself and asked him whether he had been accurately reported and he said that he had. He smiled slightly when I said “We’re pretty much of a mind then Judge.” He did not fall about making silly comments like Miss Dalziel would in that circumstance. 
Judge Becroft went on to say that we have produced a generation—fortunately of only about 1000 in his estimation and he would know—of young people with no values no morals and no idea of what is right or wrong. That is where 20 or 30 years of the kinds of policies that Mr Prasad advocates have got us. During his contribution I asked him by way of interjection how many child killers there were in 1974. I am sure he heard me because I have a loud voice but he ignored me because there were none. The terrible system at that time that he was talking about funnily enough did not produce Bailey Junior Kurariki aged 12. 
I heard that Bailey’s case had been discussed and as I came in Chester Borrows was talking about him. When he was arrested at aged 12 and convicted of manslaughter he was sent to a youth justice facility and given intensive treatment if you like for want of a better word. He was given schooling psychological assistance and counselling. When he came to be released at age 18 I recall the Parole Board being quoted as saying that he was now a fine young man with a bright future. 
Everybody knows that very shortly after his release he breached parole and breached parole again and again. 
Dr Rajen Prasad 
: He was hounded. 
DAVID GARRETT 
: No he was not hounded into beating up his girlfriend I say to Mr Prasad. Sadly—and I say “sadly” very seriously—there is very little doubt that that man and he is now a man will reoffend seriously enough to be returned to prison for a long time. I feel sad about that both for him and for his victim. But it is no surprise. 
I remember seeing his mother on TV—a dreadful-looking harridan from South Auckland with several other children by different men. She has been facilitated in that lifestyle by the welfarism that Mr Prasad says is a great idea. That is just the point. The system that he thinks is so good has produced over the last 20 and 30 years a lost generation—Judge Becroft said it himself. 
I was talking the other day to a policeman in South Auckland who talked about going to houses where 4-year-old children were referring to the police as “effing pigs” and “pig c___ts”. Those children have no hope at all; they will become Bailey Junior Kurariki. How can they not? They have been dragged up with no values—as Judge Becroft said in his speech in Christchurch—with no morals and no idea of what is right and wrong. Members on the Opposition side are very fond of talking about root causes drivers of crime and all that stuff—and it is not just members on that side. 
This bill the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill is the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff—it is. It is necessary because of what we have produced with 20 or 30 years of welfarism. Until we face up to that root cause we will have this happening again and again. The 4-year-old children whom my policeman acquaintance talked about will be in 10 years’ time Bailey Junior Kurariki. How can they possibly be any different after being dragged up in that environment? 
Mr Prasad and others over there like Miss Dalziel talk about the whanau the family—the whole philosophy that the family is best. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I have to respond to Mr Garrett’s speech because I feel there has been an utter misrepresentation of the position that members on this side of the Chamber have taken on this bill and on why the bill is such a fundamental change to our Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989 which was world-leading legislation when it was introduced and which has been looked at by other countries as a means for trying to get underneath the problems. 
I cannot believe that that member can describe another human being as a harridan and then describe her circumstances. That member does not know the circumstances she was brought up in; nor does he understand the environment Bailey Junior Kurariki was born in. I think it is really unfair to use that one example of a child who was convicted of manslaughter because he was part of a group. He rang the pizza place and he opened the door when Michael Choy arrived but I do not know how much he was led. I do not know how much pressure was put on him to do that. He was 12 years old; he was a child. I cannot believe—and I think it has been absent from this debate—the lack of responsibility that the ACT Party is prepared to take for what is as the member says a loss of values in our society where we have children brought up who are so utterly and completely damaged that their lives will never ever fulfil the potential they might have had at the moment they were born. 
I am really interested in what we can do across party lines to get underneath those drivers of crime. That is why I attended the ministerial meeting on the drivers of crime that was co-hosted by the Hon Pita Sharples and the Hon Simon Power. I really enjoyed that day because I was able to sit there listen and discuss issues with people who were all there with a common thread which was to determine what we could do to intervene earlier in the lives of these young people to ensure that they do not become the horrible offenders we are dealing with. 
After I attended that meeting I was so struck by the passion of everyone in that room that I went back to the Labour caucus and said that I wanted us to do something we did not normally do: I wanted us to offer to work with the Government collaboratively on the underlying drivers of crime. I said: “Let’s do the 0 to 12-year-olds. We are not going to agree on 12 and 13-year-olds and we are not going to agree on boot camps but we do want evidence-based interventions for 0 to 12-year-olds. Let’s do that.” Did I get a positive response from the Government when I made that offer? No. I have been told that the Government is prepared to work with us on the Sale of Liquor Act but is not prepared at this stage to work on other legislation. Government members are saying: “Let’s just see how we go with the Sale of Liquor Act and if that works then maybe we’ll sit down and talk to you about what really matters.” 
I can tell members that there is not one single person working with children in this country who does not want both sides of this Parliament to put down the battle lines on the 0 to 12-year-olds. They want us to work together to come up with the solutions that will address the fundamental change in our society which happened in the 1970s or whenever Rajen Prasad was working as a social worker on the ground. The difference then was that we had parents in employment but I know that in the days of Roger Douglas the number of people working for the railways went from 22000 to 7000 over the course of 2 years. If members want to look at the cause of youth suicide and if they want to look at the cause of some of the issues that affected children in the 1990s they need look only at the massive redundancies that occurred in the 1980s. 
I think we all have to put aside some of the concerns we have about protecting certain positions and actually get real here. We are talking about children being given the responsibility of young people who are much older than they are—children who really have not had the chance to achieve their full potential in life. I believe that New Zealanders will back us for doing that. 
Chris Tremain 
: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. The debate has been somewhat wide-ranging and I just want to bring it back to relevancy. This debate is on the title and commencement of the principal Act and in future speeches I ask you to make sure we are focusing on the title. 
Hon Member 
: Speaking to the point of order— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Rick Barker) 
: No I do not need any help with this. The member makes a fair point but the title clauses and so on are generally construed to be in the nature of a summing-up debate and I think members should cast their comments in terms of summing up. I think we have strayed a bit beyond that but with points well made; the Committee needs to debate things on occasion. I just say to future speakers that when I call them the debate is in the nature of summing up the evidence. That is what this is about not starting off on a first-reading speech. I know that passion is running high and that is a good thing. But let us stick within the rules and have summing-up speeches. 
Hon GERRY BROWNLEE (Leader of the House) 
: 
 I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. I think that it is a fair thing that people do sum up in this title debate but they should at least refer to the title I think. It is all very well to sum up an argument but to advance the same old argument again does step outside that. You have called it right; I am not questioning that but I think that it would be good to hear the title mentioned a few times—or some alternative perhaps. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I thank the honourable member but I tell the Committee that experience has shown that people will mention clause 1 and then go off and mention clause 2 and other things that they can technically make reference to. I hope that members who speak from now on will address the clauses under debate in the nature of a summing up not a relitigation or an advancing of new arguments. 
SUE MORONEY (Labour) 
: 
 I accept the invitation of the Government member Chester Borrows to make sure that we have a good debate on clauses 1 2 and 3 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. I think we are really getting to the crux of the matter now. 
I particularly want to talk about the commencement date because I am interested in what it means for the Te Hurihanga facility based in Hamilton. If people have been following the debate they will know that this case really again demonstrates a difference between what the Government is proposing and what Labour believes is a really comprehensive approach to youth justice issues and youth crime. In Hamilton both Catholic Bishop Denis Browne and Anglican Archbishop David Moxon have come out calling for the Government to continue the funding of Te Hurihanga. I think the Hamilton community is looking at that decision and saying that on the one hand the Government is saying that it is wrong—it is the wrong model it is too expensive and we should shut it down—but on the other hand the two leading clerics in our city are saying that they want it kept open. Who is right in this debate? It is interesting that the Labour Party also sides on that side of the debate. I know which out of those choices I would put my faith in. 
Hon Gerry Brownlee 
: Where’s the title? 
SUE MORONEY 
: The honourable member wants to hear what the bishops have to say and I am happy to oblige. They said: “This decision has been based on the belief that the cost of turning 16-year-old frequent offenders into good citizens outweighs the benefits of having young men fully functioning in society as family members workers and taxpayers”. The article that quoted them goes on to say: “The bishops were unimpressed by the Government’s replacement ‘Fresh Start’ policy due to be in place by October.” The reason that the bishops made a comment about being opposed to the Fresh Start policy starting in October was that that is what the Government has said it will replace the Te Hurihanga model with. The two principal clerics in our city were saying that they think it is the wrong approach. 
Let us have a look at the title of this bill. When I am talking to people about what this bill does and I mention its title they have no idea what it actually means. But when I say to them that it is the “Boot Camps Bill” then they understand. That is what people know the Fresh Start programme as. It is actually about boot camps. 
Hon Member 
: The Prime Minister called it that. John Key called it that. 
SUE MORONEY 
: John Key first labelled it as boot camps; in fact that is what it is about. People are not fooled. The people of Hamilton are asking why a programme that has been running in our city for 3 years as a pilot proven to work with the most serious and most difficult offenders— 
Hon Gerry Brownlee 
: What about the title? 
SUE MORONEY 
: I say to Mr Brownlee that I am talking about the commencement date: Te Hurihanga finishes in June and Fresh Start starts in October. What will happen in the intervening period? 
Not only that but what will happen come 1 October? I have heard three different versions. I have heard that that Te Hurihanga will be replaced with a programme where offenders go through a 12-month process. That is eight offenders going through a 12-month process. Members should remember that this is an 8-bed facility. Yet the Minister for Social Development and Employment is standing up at every opportunity and saying that it will deal with many many more offenders than it was and that is why the Government had to close down Te Hurihanga. But if only 8 offenders are to go through this programme for a year then where will it deal with those many many more—with the many many more that the Minister has promised? It cannot. Some people may say that we can shorten the programme so that it is only 2 months and then we will be able to push them through faster and we will get the numbers that the Minister wants. What will that achieve? It will not actually rehabilitate anybody. These young men have committed an average of 23 offences before they even walk through the door. If they are going to be pushed through in a matter of 2 or 3 months— 
CHRIS TREMAIN (Senior Whip—National) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I am prepared to entertain another speaker but I invite the speaker to address the bill in the way intended in this debate—that is a summing up. 
Hon STEVE CHADWICK (Labour) 
: 
 I am delighted to take a call on the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill tonight. The title of this bill is rather clunky as it is. But having looked at what will result from this bill—and also from its commencement date; my colleague Sue Moroney has very clearly pointed to this—I say we will need to have a children’s prison bill. I will just talk about the youth justice central site which has been built in Rotorua. The National members of our community led a campaign not to have that youth justice site built in Rotorua. Ruth Dyson and I spent a long time looking for it because we said these were our kids and they needed to be looked after. We knew that they were children and that they needed to be given wraparound services. But National members very clearly said we should not have the facility at Kaharoa. They grew vociferous about that and the meetings about that site were some of the most difficult public meetings that I went to. 
There is a delicious irony here tonight: National is building a youth justice central site in Rotorua and closing down Te Hurihanga which is an hour’s drive away in Hamilton when the call from the provisions of this bill and the requirements that it gives to the Youth Court are to criminalise children of 12 and 13 who will need to be placed on short-term programmes of about 13 weeks in order to turn their lives round. There is an irony here. National members complained during the election campaign that they did not want to have these facilities in their backyard. They said we should take the youth justice facility out of Rotorua and put it up in the forest. We fought—I fought—to have that facility sited in our community. Now the Minister is coming in with Todd McClay the member for Rotorua and lauding how fantastic National is in dealing with the young kids in our community. Yet just 1 hour away from Rotorua National is closing down a model facility in Hamilton that is second to none in the country and that we learnt from in terms of its success when already we are being told that not enough beds will be built in the Rotorua facility. 
National has done no long-term planning. The commencement date of October for this bill is absolutely totally unrealistic. This is all because National went out on the campaign trail with rhetoric and slogans saying it would get tough on crime. But this bill does not fix the criminal offending of young children. The title of this bill is I suggest quite wrong with regard to the provisions that it gives to the Youth Court. I think that we should have called the bill the “About Children and the Family Court Bill” in light of the provisions around jurisdiction and orders that are required in order to fix the drivers of crime in our community. 
So here we are crammed into urgency tonight in absolute chaos I have to say. There was no question time in the House today because the Government could not bear to go under the scrutiny of the media. We are going until midnight tonight in a shambolic way; proceedings have been managed absolutely shambolically. We succeeded in moving a part in the bill that we were debating previously and the senior Government whip quickly looked embarrassed so the Speaker came to the House and the Government tried to fix things up. We will argue and debate this bill tonight. The commencement date is a shambles. The bill is just a farce. It is about the Government saying it will fix the issue of youth offending by October. Well we will not have our youth justice site in Rotorua ready in October. By October Te Hurihanga will be closed down— 
Hon Ruth Dyson 
: By June. 
Hon STEVE CHADWICK 
:—by June—and that is a sign that this Government is in absolute chaos about addressing criminal offending ranging from children right through the spectrum to young people who are classified as adults when they are 17 years of age. 
TODD McCLAY (National—Rotorua) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD (Labour) 
: 
 I want to speak to the commencement date of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill. I take it that the Minister in the chair the Hon Paula Bennett is satisfied that the time frame allowed for this bill to come into operation is enough to do the complex development work that must be done in order to satisfy the direction that this Minister is trying to set. I have a sense that the time frame is too short. I will explain. 
I say to Mr Brownlee that it may be useful for him to reflect on what it actually takes to design a new model to begin to address the complex needs of people of this nature. If everything was working a bill like this would not need to be brought to the House. A whole new science needs to be brought together. “Wraparound services” is a term that is very easy to use. I have heard for the last 10 years or longer that they are what we are trying to do and many have tried to design wraparound services and apply them to the lives of troubled young people and difficult families. In fact many of them have been highly unsuccessful. They have been highly unsuccessful because the political masters have not allowed enough time for the complex models to be developed and tested before we subjected the lives of people who are at a vulnerable time to them. That member over there talks a lot. What is it that he is trying to say? 
David Garrett 
: The political masters over the last 10 years when you have been saying that the system has failed were the Labour Party. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: Thank you. I heard the member and I would like him to hear me now. I wonder if that member knows how it long it took to develop the particular model of Te Hurihanga? 
David Garrett 
: No I don’t. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD 
: Well the member should not speak if the member is not aware. That model was one that has been shown to be successful I say to the Minister and it took a long time to design and put together. It is successful yet what is the Government doing with it? I use that example only to show that these models that the Minister believes will materialise will take some considerable time to design. It will not be like the national standards which are untested untried and are having a lot of problems and will not succeed. 
But this particular time frame—[ 
Interruption 
]—I am reasonably informed about this I say to Mr Lotu-Iiga. It is not possible to design a model in a short period from what will be a relatively standing start. If it were not being designed from a standing start it would be in operation already and it is not. The Minister will probably regret it when we bring up case after case in the coming years of failure. When we do I hope the members sitting up the back there laughing will apologise. Indeed that is what they will need to do. I say that to the three members—the troika—who are sitting there the new members of the National Party including Mr McClay and Mr Sam Lotu-Iiga. They should take the time to have the courage of their convictions and say that this October 2010 start date could not possibly be adequate to design the models test them resource them and put them into operation. 
The model that has been successfully operating will come to a close in June I have been told. Fresh Start is not designed to deliver on the needs of this group of seriously needy young people or service their families. I believe the Minister ought to explain how that will be done and in some substantive way not just by saying that the Government has tried a little of the boot camp model somewhere and some of it works or that the Minister attended a graduation of some sort therefore it will work everywhere. I think trialling something like this on the vulnerable lives of our children requires a lot more thought and a lot more time. We need some assurances that indeed that development time will allowed for. Therefore this particular commencement date is inadequate because it is not easy to bring a model together; unless it is brought together carefully it will not work. 
CHRIS TREMAIN (Senior Whip—National) 
: 
 I move  
That the question be now put 
. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the question be now put. 
Ayes 64 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; United Future 1. 
Noes 58 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1. 
Motion agreed to. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Jacinda Ardern to clause 1 be agreed to: 
to omit “Jurisdiction and”. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the amendment be agreed to. 
Ayes 53 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Progressive 1. 
Noes 69 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; Maori Party 5; United Future 1. 
Amendment not agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That clause 1 be agreed to. 
Ayes 64 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; United Future 1. 
Noes 58 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1. 
Clause 1 agreed to. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That clause 2 be agreed to. 
Ayes 64 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; United Future 1. 
Noes 58 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1. 
Clause 2 agreed to. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Rick Barker) 
: The amendments in the name of Jacinda Ardern to insert new clause 2A an expiry clause are ruled out of order because they are inconsistent with Standing Order 3: “preliminary clauses means the title clause and the commencement clause and if applicable a principal Act clause”. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That clause 3 be agreed to. 
Ayes 64 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; United Future 1. 
Noes 58 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1. 
Clause 3 agreed to. 
House resumed. 
Bill reported with amendment. 
The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Rick Barker) 
: I move  
That the report be adopted. 
A party vote was called for on the question  
That the report be adopted. 
Ayes 64 
New Zealand National 58; ACT New Zealand 5; United Future 1. 
Noes 58 
New Zealand Labour 43; Green Party 9; Maori Party 5; Progressive 1. 
Report adopted. 
Third Reading 
Hon PAULA BENNETT (Minister for Social Development and Employment) 
: 
 I move  
That the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill be now read a third time 
. Others deserve to be recognised for a lot of the work that went into this bill. Some of them worked on the bill when I was in Opposition and others have worked on the bill since I became the Minister. I recognise Anne Tolley and Chester Borrows and Simon Power had a lot to do with this bill as well. They paid a huge part in bringing it together in those early days. 
I recognise the chair of the Social Services Committee Katrina Shanks for the work she did in getting the bill through the select committee. We certainly took on board some of the changes that were recommended by the select committee members after they heard from submitters. I thank Child Youth and Family and not just the officials who sat there for many many hours going through the very detailed implications of this legislation. I recognise those who have actually done the work so far to implement the bill. We heard a previous speaker talk about how these things do not happen quickly or lightly and that person is right. It takes a lot of evidence-based work and it means going back to what really does work. But a lot of this bill is of course about extending current orders. 
I also recognise those amazing people who work in our youth justice sector. There are so many of them both in non-governmental organisations and within Child Youth and Family. They work with young people in our communities and they work hard to try to turn their lives round. There is also a whole bunch of people who work in our facilities which are pretty daunting places in which to work at times. I acknowledge that I admire the work they do. It is probably the most important work we do and this bill I hope will back them up. That is the bill’s purpose. 
The bill represents the most significant changes to New Zealand’s youth justice system since 1989. It underpins this Government’s Fresh Start programme which is our rock-solid commitment to dealing with serious youth crime. New Zealand’s youth justice system is rightly regarded as world class in delivering a sensible criminal justice model for 95 percent of young offenders. But it is a well-recognised fact that as in most places in the world the system is not working for the 5 percent at the hard end of criminal offending—anywhere between 900 and 1000 young people who are on a fast track to prison. Fresh Start is aimed at giving those young people a new future. 
We have seen a weekend of young people out of control. There have been serious attacks on members of the police and the public and some of the offenders are very young. The nine Tuakau teenagers who have been charged with the vicious assault of a police officer are aged between 14 and 18. Fortunately these young people do not represent the majority of teenagers but they do highlight the growing problem of serious and violent offences carried out by young people. 
The Government is prepared to provide some real protections for the public. We are demanding real accountability from serious young offenders. We are also offering them practical help to change their behaviour and real opportunities to live happy and successful lives. This bill does that by providing the Youth Court with a toolbox with a much wider range of sentencing options. These new tougher and longer orders will allow us to make inroads into the underlying causes of these young people’s offending. But that is not the whole story. 
The Fresh Start package also supports prevention and early intervention. We want to steer young people away from trouble and say “Well done!” when a young person makes a positive change in his or her life. We provided the places for the 100 young people we saw in January on the Prime Minister’s holiday programme for young people who have been in trouble but have turned their lives round. We saw that what happened was hugely successful. We put them in front of the right sort of role models and we saw something positive happening for those young people. It was really encouraging. 
This summer we had 15000 places for young people on 1-week breakaway holiday programmes. Those young people would not normally have been able to afford something like that. They come from families who were a bit under stress and they were getting to the end of a long holiday period. They were starting to get a bit antsy and they were starting to get into trouble. So we took recommendations from police from sports clubs and from the grassroots people who brought those kids together. It was basic early intervention but we certainly saw a difference in those young people. It got them off the roads and it got them into contact with positive role models. They were with mentors from their own communities who really invested a lot in them. Early intervention is about getting to kids as young as 11 before they make choices and before they go off the rails. 
The Government is also supporting the community sector that helps children at risk. We are developing a new way of working with the community providers that are providing home-based programmes and providing really early intervention in dealing with some of our most vulnerable families—families who are really not doing too well at all. The new high-trust contracts cut bureaucracy and allow providers to be innovative and flexible in order to achieve the best results for their clients and I must say I have a personal bias because for me it is about the children. So they are the services that actually make a difference in our communities. We have heard those providers saying for 10 years that they want more flexibility and the ability to get on and do the stuff that really matters instead of ticking a whole lot of boxes. They want to be able to move their contracts around and have freedom within them. Dr Prasad shakes his head but that is because there was not that level of understanding by the previous Government. 
We are saying to people that they know what works best for their people and their communities and we trust them to get on and do as much as they can by way of early intervention. We heard earlier from another member who said that we have seen that for years and it has not worked in many cases because it has happened too quickly. I would agree in some respects. 
It is quite amusing that last year the criticism from members on the other side was that the bill was taking too long to come to the House. It was October they said. A year had passed and why was I mucking around so much? The other criticism was that it cost too much money. Quite frankly we need to put the right dollars behind it. I am talking a $152 million investment in these young people and it starts with early intervention and goes on to make the differences that are needed. 
If this Government was not backing up this programme with real dollars so that the professionals can work in the right way with those young people then I too would have concerns but I do not. This bill will make a significant difference to young people’s lives. It will make a difference to the young people who quite frankly have been left on the scrap heap of despair that leads to victims behind them and continued offending which leads them to adult jail. We will not give up on them. 
The bill will provide for longer orders. The research tells us we need to work much longer with these tough young people if we are to effect change in them and in their families’ lives. We are doubling the maximum length of the Youth Court’s top-end sentences. The maximum lengths of supervision with activity orders and supervision with residence orders are doubled. The maximum length of the supervision orders that kick in after a young person finishes supervision with activity or leaves the residence is also doubled and that is significant. Common sense and research tell us that intensive long-term supervision of youth in their communities is necessary if these young offenders are to avoid a lifetime of crime and punishment. 
There is a wider range of orders. Serious youth offenders are often the product of their environment. Some families need to take greater responsibility for the path their kids are on. [ 
Interruption 
] I am sorry; the member cannot have heard the beginning of my speech. I talked about early intervention better community programmes and the investment in communities at the early intervention stage all of which this range of Fresh Start packages will adjust. 
The bill will enable the Youth Court to order the parents of these kids to attend parenting programmes. Youngsters who are parents themselves—there are a number of them unfortunately—will face parenting orders too so that they will have the opportunity to learn what good parenting is. Successful people who have overcome the most awful hardship in life can point to a single adult more often than not who has backed them showed them the way and stood beside them through the tough times. The Youth Court will now have the option of mentoring programmes for these often very alienated young people. 
Alcohol and drug abuse is behind many a criminal act. The Youth Court will now have the power to order youth offenders to undertake drug and alcohol rehabilitation and this will be backed up by new community and residential placements. There will be young offenders who fail to grasp the opportunities provided to them under this bill. Accordingly the bill provides the public with better protection by significantly increasing maximum sentences and by way of new orders for repeat offenders. 
Serious youth offenders will face more intensive monitoring in their communities including electronic monitoring and curfews. If they flout orders they will find themselves back before the Youth Court to face the consequences. This bill has been improved by the consideration given to it by the Social Services Committee. It is the sharp end of the Fresh Start programme. I commend it to the House. 
JACINDA ARDERN (Labour) 
: 
 After so much debate I personally see the third reading of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill as an opportunity to say some most important things and to reflect on the core of what this bill represents and what the Government is truly proposing. First I want to acknowledge something that the Government has continually thrown back at Opposition members as we have contested the prospects of this legislation proving to be successful. Opposition members continually face an assumption by members in this House that we do not understand that some people in our criminal justice system just cannot be reformed. 
I say to Government members that we acknowledge that that is the case. In fact I grew up with someone who worked in our criminal justice system. I have always been very open about the fact that my father is a policeman. While growing up I watched as he dealt with some of the most horrific criminal offending that I think a human being would ever want to see. We acknowledge that there are people in our criminal justice system who are beyond help but we have always argued that we cannot tarnish our young people with that same brush. We must acknowledge that we have a tiered system in New Zealand for good reason and that 17-year-olds and under and 12 and 13-year-olds should not by default be moved on in our criminal justice system before it is right to do so. 
I want to reflect on why we have that core principle in our legislation. Why is it that we deem our young people to be different to be a special case as it were? I think it comes down to a very simple reason. It is one that I think even Minister Power would acknowledge; he is after all the Minister who hosted the Drivers of Crime meeting here in Parliament. If we put all of our young offenders even the top 1000 whom the Government claims it is trying to deal with into a room we will see the same characteristics in each of them. We will see young people who are disengaged from education and/or employment. We will see young people who have been subjected to violence either in the home or gang-related violence. We will see young people who have been subjected to drug and alcohol abuse 80 percent of whom would have been under the influence of drugs or alcohol at the time that they committed their offence. We will see social deprivation: young people who claim that their families have not had enough to enable them to get by. 
I find it utterly abhorrent to hear the ACT Party member Mr David Garrett claim that a decade of Labour policies as he put it is to blame for all of those factors existing in a young person’s life and that that is the contributing factor to those young people’s offending. 
David Garrett 
: 25 years of welfare is what I said. 
JACINDA ARDERN 
: I say to Mr Garrett that I grew up from a young age in a town that demonstrated why our young people end up in the situations that they are in. In the 1980s I lived in a small place called Murupara which will be known to Todd McClay. That town suffered under the weight of privatisation and a central government that at that time did not care for its most vulnerable families and young people. When I was young the seeds were being sown for our young people’s future criminal offending. The Salvation Army the Youth Court judge and any number of other people who work in the social sector acknowledge that Rogernomics has a lot to answer for and so do the policies of the 1990s. I am not saying here that that situation is the entire contributing factor to the youth offending encased in this bill but that the bill is a blunt instrument for dealing with a much deeper problem which goes back decades beyond our own time. 
Because we know of all of those causes and because we know of all of those catalysts the obligation sits on us and on our communities to turn lives round. We know what the contributing factors to youth offending are and if we ignore them it means that we are ignoring our responsibility as well. I believe that when communities know about all of these factors that exist it is up to us to make sure that we intervene at the right point. This issue goes beyond the age at which young people enter our criminal justice system. If we already know that 80 percent of our young people are under the influence of drugs and alcohol when they offend why are we waiting to issue court orders on those young people when they hit the Youth Court? What are we doing to intervene before criminal offending occurs? I have seen no deep financial investment into that area. In fact if we speak to the people at Odyssey House they will tell us that we are waiting until it is too late. We must do more. Members on this side of the House would happily work with the Government on any initiative to proactively intervene at an early point in those young people’s lives. 
I do believe—and I have heard the explanations often very rational ones from Chester Borrows about why 12 and 13-year olds are being shifted into the Youth Court—that inherently this is a shift in criminal responsibility and I stand against that. I stand against the notion that the issue is just about expediency; I think it is much more symbolic than that. I believe we are giving away one of our greatest powers here which is to deal with families at the same time as we deal with young offenders. As Lianne Dalziel has pointed out numerous times none of us would claim that a 12 or 13-year-old who is committing an indictable offence with a criminal penalty of 14 years or more is doing that in isolation and has come from a perfect background or family. So why are we disempowering ourselves and taking away the ability to deal with that young person’s family as well as the young person when we know that there are care and protection issues at play? This is a fundamental shift. I acknowledge what the Minister has said; I agree with her. That is why we oppose the bill. 
The second most significant part of this bill that has been discussed probably did not need to be included in legislation. It is the policy change around the much-disputed term “boot camp”. Anyone who is listening to this debate might question why the Government is upset with us using that term although I still maintain that it was the Prime Minister who first used it publicly to describe the Government’s direction on youth justice. I believe he did that just after the election in February I think. Perhaps we called the policy that because it looks very much like corrective training which had a 92 percent failure rate—a 92 percent occurrence of reoffending amongst those who graduated from it. Perhaps we called the policy “boot camps” because almost every submitter who came to the Social Services Committee also believed from the description that National’s policy would be close to corrective training or like every other failed initiative of that type overseas. Perhaps it was because the providers came to us described to us the programmes that they already offer in New Zealand and said that if the Government really was going to do a wraparound programme the providers already did exactly what the Government was describing: getting to the core of offending and issues working with families and trying to move young people into employment. It was misleading to the public for National to claim that its policy was something different from what providers were doing. That was what caused the confusion. 
Whether it was an intentional move or not the cynical part of me says the term “boot camps” came out because it appealed to people. It sounded good. Now we hear the Government disputing that that is what it is trying to do. I believe that the confusion can rest only at the feet of the Government on that. But if the National members are genuinely trying to create a wraparound programme that incorporates all of the elements of multi-systemic therapy for instance why did we not invest in the kinds of initiatives that the Minister has already referred to: those of the people who are already working closely in their communities who already have that experience and who have demonstrated that they are the one person who can turn a young person’s life around? Why did we start something completely new with the army? That is where the confusion has come from. Closing down Te Hurihanga proved only to reinforce that in my mind. Let us evaluate what we have and invest in what we have. That is exactly what we could have had with Te Hurihanga and that is exactly what I think would have led to a successful path forward in our criminal youth justice system. 
To sum up I say youth justice is one of many areas that I feel quite passionately about but I have felt let down by this bill. I feel that it has shifted what was incredibly forward-thinking legislation and changed it fundamentally. I acknowledge that changing it back in a political sense will always be very difficult. I ask that in future debates perhaps Government members may consider a situation where next time instead of talking about those young kids whom they perceive to have already failed we start to talk about how we can intervene earlier and turn those kids’ lives around. 
HEKIA PARATA (National) 
:  
Tena koe e te Mana Whakawa. Tena korua te Minita Take Maori me te Minita whakahaere i tenei pire otira huri noa i to tatou Whare i tenei po tena koutou katoa. E tu ana au ki te tautoko i tenei pire engari me te mihi tuatahi ki te ture matua na te mea pakeke ake i te rua tekau tau tenei ture e mahi ana a kei te haere tonu te ia o tera ture matua i roto i tenei pire na reira e tautoko ana. 
[ 
Thank you Mr Assistant Speaker. Greetings to you two the Minister of Maori Affairs and the Minister responsible for this bill; and indeed to you all throughout our House this evening. Greetings to you all. I rise to support this bill but must first acknowledge the original Act which has been in place for 20 years. Its ethos continues in this bill so I endorse it emphatically 
.]  
This bill is focused on three main things. It expands the jurisdiction of the Youth Court so that 12 and 13-year-olds who commit the most serious crimes can be incorporated in the jurisdiction of the court. It strengthens and expands the orders that the Youth Court is able to make including parenting education mentoring and drug and alcohol programmes. It also creates tougher and more effective sentences to get these young offenders back on track. 
In the past week alone we have seen a number of examples of the kind of offending that this bill is directed at. In Titahi Bay this week a massive fire devastated 75 hectares of Whitireia Park and the offender who is responsible for that arson and who has been arrested is a 14-year-old. Yesterday’s headlines showed that a 15-year-old boy appeared in the Gisborne District Court. He was accused of bashing a young mother on the head with a crowbar as she was out running with her toddler. The young mother was unknown to the boy. The Minister has already referred to the off-duty policeman in Tuakau who was set upon when trying to break up a fight and we have also seen news stories of the tragic outcome for Liberty Templeman. These are just a few examples of a very small group of young offenders who are nevertheless committing very very serious offences. There is no end to the high-profile cases involving youth offenders but there needs to be an appropriate response and that is why I commend Minister Bennett for her work in bringing this bill to the House as well as the others who have worked alongside this kaupapa. 
We need to deal with young offenders in this age group and front-foot the issue. The previous Government seemed happy to wait until they were older and had committed more serious offences and then tried to put them through the adult system and rehabilitation programmes. Andrew Becroft said that there were not enough tools available for the Youth Court and recommended changes which can be seen in this bill. Members opposite have asked whether anybody thinks that a youth offence happens in isolation. No and certainly no member on this side of the Chamber thinks that. But this bill is focused on the fact that it does happen and it happens amongst a very small number of youth offenders. Yes there are other contributing factors such as a dysfunctional home life low or benefit-dependent income poor health poor education poor housing and identity and self-esteem issues. That is why this Government as recently as 2 weeks ago in the form of the Prime Minister’s statement talked about the wide and comprehensive agenda that this Government is committed to. This bill focuses on a specific part of that. 
The Prime Minister’s statement talked about the Government’s priority of growing the economy and the need for national standards addressing low educational attainment. We recognise that young people have the opportunity of getting a good education and using national standards they have an early warning system that identifies that they are failing in the education system and this can be addressed. We understand that a good education will help to divert young people from an otherwise difficult pathway and into having better educational options. 
We understand that growing the economy will lead to better employment prospects and more investment in business and will expand and increase the standard of living. We understand that Treaty settlements will contribute to the restoration of an economic base and the ability for iwi to practise tino rangatiratanga rather than the tino kawanatanga recipe that the previous Labour administration constantly fed into the Maori communities while it was in Government. 
Nobody thinks that a youth offence happens in isolation. Members opposite kept saying somewhat emotively and thereby misleading the public listening to this that these offenders are only children. Of course we are not talking about all 12 and 13-year-olds. Perhaps that has escaped everybody’s attention including members opposite. We are talking about the very small group of 12 and 13-year-olds who have invaded homes and grievously assaulted other people. Let me assure members that the victims of those crimes do not think they will not be upset because it was only a 12-year-old or it was only a 13-year-old who committed the crime. 
When we talk about rights we also have to talk about reciprocal responsibilities. When we quote United Nations conventions we need to quote a wide range of them. Let me give members an example. Article 40.1 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child states that children who offend should be dealt with in a way that “reinforces the child’s respect for the human rights and fundamental freedoms of others …” as well. 
Hon Steve Chadwick 
: Yes children that is right. 
HEKIA PARATA 
: Yes we are talking about children but we are talking about that very small group of children who are seriously offending. No it does not apply to all children. Yes this bill expands the jurisdiction of the Youth Court but no it does not create child criminals. It allows the court to deal with those who commit crimes. Yes it provides an expanded range of tools but no it does not assume that the judges will suddenly go mad and apply that jurisdiction indiscriminately. In fact I can tell members of this House that a very constructive project is going on right at this moment in the Porirua District Court working with and talking with the very diverse communities that make up Porirua about how the court can better serve the interests of the community. 
The Youth Court jurisdiction is being expanded in order to give a wider range of tools to judges so that they can deal with the issues that confront them. They will not be used willy-nilly; they will be used only on the youth offenders who break the law. We are not talking about all 12 and 13-year-olds and members opposite would do the country a favour if they stopped scaremongering and focused on that fact. The Youth Court said that youth offending has remained at the same level for the past 5 or so years after a steep increase before then. A recent newsletter from the court claims that it is reasonably certain that the age at which young people begin to commit violent offences is getting younger and that the violence committed by young people is becoming more serious. It continues arguing that the real solutions will be found in coordinated inter-agency properly funded early intervention programmes. That is what this Government is doing. We agree and we have committed to funding tens of millions of dollars to reduce youth offending because unlike members opposite when we commit to a policy we put real dollars into it. We do not talk about it; we get on and do it. 
The Minister has outlined a range of those coordinated integrated agencies that are working with each other to ensure that we can assist these young people to get back on a path of leading a quality life not only for themselves but for the whanau hapu and iwi which members opposite find easy to trip off their lips but do not understand how hard it actually is to work within those whanau hapu and iwi who every day try to ensure that their young people make good choices in life. I commend this bill to the House. I thank the Minister for the work she has done on this bill and the officials who have worked alongside her to make this possible. No reira tena koutou kia ora tatou katoa. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I believe that this Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill is a shameful bill. It is without hope for a generation of young people who have been referred to tonight and it undermines the philosophy of the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act which it amends. 
I draw the attention of the House to just a few of the provisions of this Act: the principles upon which it is based. First and I have already mentioned this in the Committee stage it is: “An Act to reform the law relating to children and young persons who are in need of care or protection or who offend against the law”. The comment I made in the Committee stage was that for those who offend against the law there are always—always—care and protection issues. The purpose of the Act is also “to advance the well-being of families and the well-being of children and young persons as members of families whanau hapu iwi and family groups:”. It talks about making provision for families “to receive assistance in caring for their children and young persons:” and its purpose is also “to make provision for matters relating to children and young persons … who have offended against the law to be resolved wherever possible by their own family whanau hapu iwi or family group:”. The intention of the legislation is summarised in that introductory provision. 
Then we have the principles of care and protection in Part 2 of the Act. The care and protection principles state first of all the utmost concern of this legislation which is: “the principle that children and young persons must be protected from harm their rights upheld and their welfare promoted:”. The second principle in section 13 of the Act states: “(b) the principle that the primary role in caring for and protecting a child or young person lies with the child’s or young person’s family whanau hapu iwi and family group”. That is all very well and good when things are good at home. It is not very good for those who do not have the range of opportunities available to them that all of the members of this House have had. 
Then we have the youth justice principles. There is one thing that I do not think this House has taken into account. We have heard the Minister for Social Development and Employment and others say that one of the reasons why we have to have this legislation is to provide for some clout as it were to ensure that orders can be put in place before the matter goes before the Family Court. Yet one of the founding principles of the youth justice provisions in Part 4 is: “the principle that criminal proceedings should not be instituted against a child or young person solely in order to provide any assistance or services needed to advance the welfare of the child or young person or his or her family whanau or family group:”. Again we are seeing an undermining of the essence of the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act. 
We had a most extraordinary contribution from the previous speaker Hekia Parata who said that we should not care about the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child obligations. We have signed up to those and I was absolutely astonished to hear that we have a member in this House who does not think that is important. In the entire time that we have been debating this bill in the House not once did the Minister comment on the advice that she received on the challenge to our obligations under the convention that this measure will entail. Does it matter? The previous speaker said no it does not. I say yes it does. In fact the Minister of Justice is currently amending the Adoption Act so that we can ratify the optional protocol to the United Nations convention on the rights of the child on the trafficking of children. It certainly matters to the Minister of Justice that we are able to ratify an optional protocol but it does not matter to the Minister for Social Development and Employment that we are failing to meet our obligations under this convention in this most fundamental change. 
The Minister for Social Development and Employment said in her opening statement in the third reading—and I think others would have heard it as well—that she accepted that this was a fundamental change in a law that was world-leading when it was passed in 1989. The irony is that this Government thinks that children who have grown up in the most appalling set of circumstances should simply be punished for their subsequent wrongdoing without addressing any of the underlying issues. That is why I say that there are always care and protection issues involved. 
I have heard the Minister repeat the list of offences that will be covered by this change in jurisdiction from the Family Court to the Youth Court. Let me again make it clear that murder and manslaughter are already covered by the Youth Court jurisdiction. I think that we hear these different examples to try to put the numbers on the table. I ask the next Government speaker to please get up and tell us how many 12 and 13-year-olds have been charged with murder over the last few years. I am sorry but I could not find it in any of the documentation associated with this bill. 
Hon Member 
: It’s not an evidence-based approach. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: It is not an evidence-based approach. Only once in the entire time that the Minister spoke—and it was right at the tail end of her contribution in the third reading of this bill—did she talk about the environment within which the children are brought up. The offending does not occur in a vacuum. I thought that finally we had an acknowledgment from the Minister that that is the case but there is no ability to address the underlying drivers when we are talking about such young children. 
I asked the Minister a serious question during the Committee stage on this bill. She did not answer that question at all. It is a really horrible question to ask because there is no comfortable answer. The question was that if Chris and Cru Kahui had survived the attacks that they suffered in the very early days of their young lives which were snuffed out so early what would they have grown up to be like? What sort of adults would they have become if they had survived the brutality of their environment? What would they have become? 
I am hearing from the other side of the House a sense of disquiet or discomfort about actually addressing the underlying drivers of crime. We know that those drivers are fundamental to how these children are able to see themselves as part of the world and as part of a community and to what they are able to do in terms of responding to the challenges that they are confronted with. 
The ministerial Drivers of Crime meeting actually reinforced my very very strong views that we need a collaborative approach across the House so that when there is a change of Government—as there is from time to time; it happens—the non-governmental organisation sector is not thrown up in the air. The Minister of Maori Affairs was there and he will recall the number of non-governmental organisations that said that they are sick and tired of one thing coming in with one Government and then going out and a new thing coming in with the next Government. It is time we actually dealt with this and the public want us to do this collaboratively. That is why members on this side of the House made the offer to do so. The pilot we had been operating Te Hurihanga has been tossed out to be replaced with a programme that is not even ready to take its place. That is simply not good enough. That programme was designed to make the long-term difference to incredibly damaged children so that real change could occur. 
Then we move to the boot camps. I think Jacinda Ardern nailed it when she said that the Government used the language of boot camps to garner public support and then criticised everyone else because the public thought that boot camps were contained within the legislation. I have the Te Hurihanga evaluation and I have gone through the issues that it raises. It is not just about reoffending rates; it is about turning round the children’s whole lives which is quite a different model. 
Children need strong adult role models in their lives. Children need to feel a strong sense of belonging. Children need to feel safe in their homes and in their communities. All children who offend have care and protection issues and those issues must be addressed so that they can learn to take responsibility for their actions. It is hard to tell people to take responsibility for their actions when nobody intervened when they were being violently abused raped sodomised and everything else that has happened to these young children who have ended up in this category. I would rather see us work collaboratively to make a difference in the lives of these children so that they grow up to be responsible members of our community. 
METIRIA TUREI (Co-Leader—Green) 
: 
 Before I deliver the address prepared for this third reading I acknowledge the work of colleagues in Labour—Lianne Dalziel Jacinda Ardern and others—whose contributions have been very valuable over the last week or so of debate on this bill. I reiterate my support for what has been said and for their view. I think they have done a great job of expressing the concern of the community and particularly my concern on a number of issues. 
It is with genuine sadness that we see the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill come before the House. It will cause children and their families considerable harm. The Green Party came to Parliament because its members want to look after our country; we want to look after its people and its place. We are here to make change for families—for those families in particular who need us the most. This legislation will only damage those families and communities and in fact make our communities less safe. It should not be brought before the House or supported. 
I make it clear that the Greens recognise that this bill makes changes to the way that child offenders who commit the most serious crimes are dealt with. Although we oppose this legislation for the changes that it makes and its fundamental purpose we do not in any way undervalue the significance of the loss and the harm that is caused by young offenders who commit very serious violent offences. These are often terrible crimes that can seriously damage or destroy whole families and whole communities and they are always an awful tragedy. But this is why the Greens are so strong on issues around victims’ rights for example and why the Green Party initiated the victims inquiry. It is why we have consistently argued for greater recognition of victims’ rights and their voices in the legal process. It is why we have been so committed to restorative justice in particular as opposed to the punitive approach of this Government and the means by which that process gives back power to victims—those who have been deprived of it by offenders. 
Restorative justice not only opens the justice process to victims of crime but directs the whole legal process towards a proven means that ensures that crime can be prevented. The truth is that we must invest our resources into preventing further crime. To do anything else is not only to waste scarce public funds but to waste human capability. It is a waste of our people. We cannot afford to continue to lose child after child young person after young person to the legal system which causes them so much harm and keeps our communities unsafe. That itself is enough of a tragedy to shift the thinking. 
The Greens are most concerned that harm does not continue and that as best as possible our legal system protects all children and their families. It is our view that the age of criminal responsibility should never go under 14—there is a very good argument for increasing it—and that there should be a much greater emphasis on establishing small-scale and dispersed youth rehabilitation centres in order to end the detention of young people in police cells and adult prisons and to intensively address serious offending within a small-scale environment that can reflect their needs. Family group conferences are a key part of that process. The undermining and distortion of the family group conference process within this bill is greatly regretted. But we will strongly support marae-based Youth Court and youth justice programmes and these should be increased. I acknowledge that there has been an extension to the Hoani Waititi Marae for Youth Court processes which is great to see. 
The problem of course is that this bill fails all of our criteria. It is flawed at its core because the premise on which it is based is that 12 and 13-year-old children should be treated as young adults in criminal law for serious offending. That is simply wrong. I was very surprised to hear Hekia Parata undermine and dismiss the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. The failure to address its core concerns was really quite surprising. The fact is that this bill is contrary to that convention. The bill attacks the child’s right to be treated in accordance with his or her age. It undermines the ability of the child to be reintegrated into the community. It undermines any rehabilitation that might ensure that the child does not reoffend. The bill fails the family and the community by exacerbating the social exclusion of the child and the inability then for that family to recover. The treatment of a child as young as 12 as a youth in the Youth Court will make our communities less safe not more. Parliament is wasting precious time on the demonstrably failed boot camps ideology which I am sure will go given the chance. 
The evidence proves that access to drug and alcohol rehabilitation and counselling if it is extended both in breadth and in length of time can resolve many of the violence and dysfunction issues faced by children and young people. Early intervention as has been mentioned by Labour colleagues is the key. But the Government is failing to close the gaps on the provision of these services. It is futile giving the Youth Court more powers to require young offenders to attend these programmes because the places in them simply do not exist. The statement about millions and millions of dollars being invested is just wrong. There are not enough places to meet existing need and there will not be enough places to meet ongoing need because resources are being diverted into punitive action like boot camps rather than into those programmes that we know will work because they are proven to. No provisions in this legislation will be effective unless there are high-quality best practice and properly funded long-term services for young offenders. On that basis it is with regret that we understand that Te Hurihanga has been closed down. That was a ridiculous decision to make. 
The evidence also proves that family focused services that treat the child within the context of the family will greatly maximise the chance for the reintegration of that child into family and community life. That surely has to be the goal—not punishment and not punitive action but reintegration and restoration of that child in their family. 
Thirdly we know that violence is more common in unequal societies. We know that incarceration leads to reoffending. The longer a person is incarcerated the more likely they are to reoffend and that is a fact. We know that the incarceration rate is greater in more unequal societies and incarceration frankly includes boot camps. We know that unequal societies are more punitive in their approach. We know that child abuse is greater in more unequal societies. We know that children experience more bullying fighting and conflict in unequal societies. Inequity is at the heart of violence in New Zealand society and New Zealand society has one of the highest rates of inequity in the developed world. We are not an egalitarian society. We are not an equal or fair society. Every day this Government moves us further and further from the ideal of being such a fair society causing further harm and suffering to New Zealand’s children and their families. The Government is choosing to ignore the roots of violence. 
Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga 
: Rubbish. 
METIRIA TUREI 
: The member over there can say “Rubbish.” but he needs to look at the evidence. The evidence proves this country has one of the highest rates of inequity in the developed world and inequity is the root cause behind social dysfunction including violence injury and damage to children. 
We know that rangatahi will be the ones who suffer most from this legislation and the proposals of the Government. Rangatahi already suffer disproportionate punishment and degradation in the Youth Court. The judiciary has been very upfront in stating that rangatahi are more likely to attract harsher penalties for less serious criminal offending when they attend the Youth Court. We know that when children and young people move through the Youth Court into the adult system the bias against rangatahi and Maori is even greater and that is proven and demonstrable. We know that the only way to deal with the offending of rangatahi is within the context of a tikanga approach within the whanau which is why we support so strongly marae-based processes for justice Youth Court and youth justice processes. In fact this bill entrenches institutional racism. 
Hon Members 
: Oh! 
METIRIA TUREI 
: I know that National Party members will whinge about that but it is true. 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: That is a phrase that should not be used. 
METIRIA TUREI 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It has been a practice in this House that the use of the word racism to describe institutional issues or contextual issues is accepted but not in any context where it is an attack on a person or a group of persons. I think that is the right approach to take. My comment was concerned with structural and institutional racism. 
Dr Rajen Prasad 
: I want to underscore that point because institutional racism does not accuse any individual of anything. It refers just to a system that produces disproportional results and that is a fact. That being so it would be a travesty if we could not use a technical term to refer to what is a fact. 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: I thank the member. I refer the member to Speaker’s ruling 42/3. The member Metiria Turei was right on the margin of using that phrase and I ask that for the remainder of her speech she is very mindful of crossing that line. 
Charles Chauvel 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. It is really just a point of clarification. As I recall the reference by the member she was criticising the bill as— 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: I have ruled and I am allowing her to continue. 
Charles Chauvel 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I am just trying to understand how her reference— 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: Look I have already ruled and I am allowing her to continue. I have said that she was right on the margin. I am allowing her to continue. 
METIRIA TUREI 
: In the last remaining moments I simply say the Green Party is opposed to this legislation. We are very disappointed that it has been pursued as far as it has. We are very pleased that there are other parties in this House—the Maori Party and the Labour Party—that oppose it. We hope to see real change in the very near future to protect our children rather than punish and accuse them as this National Government is doing. 
Hon Dr PITA SHARPLES (Co-Leader—Maori Party) 
: 
 Tena koe Mr Deputy Speaker. Last night I got an email about young people. That is not an unusual occurrence by any means as we frequently receive comments about young people often in association with criminal activity or youth unemployment. But this email was different. The writer felt sufficiently enthusiastic about our young people to take to her computer at 11 p.m. to tell us about the excitement she was witnessing at home amongst the iwi of Whakatohea. She described the 10 projects that Whakatohea have going under Community Max which have employed some 40 young people in their rohe. The rangatahi are involved in upgrading marae developing community gardens mara kai clearing tracks on maunga restoring old pa sites restoring whenua and planting native trees and plants. 
I will quote from the email to share the optimism that she feels for our youth: “To see the mana and confidence these young people show they feel wanted and appreciated they are contributing to our communities they take on any training they need to help them to better their future. These are young people who believe that they are useless and no one cares. I am so proud of them all the more so that our whanau were able to employ them to make our marae and whenua a place to be proud of. This is the beginning of Whanau Ora.” 
I choose to bring these comments to the debate as it is rare for our discussions in this House to make an explicit link between young people and pride confidence and mana. All too often as indeed in the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill we focus on problems of youth. In this bill the intention is unambiguous. It proposes tools to deal with the 1000 or so serious offenders aged between 12 and 16 years. The young people who are the focus of this bill are mainly repeat offenders. Eighty percent of them are male just over half of them are Maori and the majority have left school or are near to leaving school. 
In this Chamber we debate a range a menu of initiatives including supervision and residence orders treatment foster homes lowering the jurisdiction of the Youth Court to include 12 to 13-year-olds military-style activity camp programmes electronic monitoring and the like. The contribution I would like to make to the debate is to encourage us to take a broader perspective on those 1000 young people. We need perspectives that provide us with an optimistic view to remind us of the potential of all our young people to plan proactively for our future. I was pleased that the Social Services Committee recommended amendments that specified as for example in the issue of placing child offenders in residences that the chief executive must consider all reasonable practicable less restrictive alternatives. But the general thrust of the bill remains to focus on a wide range of sentencing orders to be made for dealing with offenders. In doing so it appears to ignore some of the strongest opposition from key submitters on the bill. 
Judge Andrew Becroft the Principal Youth Court Judge described the proposal to include 12 to 13-year-olds within the youth justice system as “constituting the most fundamental change to the system since its inception in 1989.” Kim Workman from Rethinking Crime and Punishment encouraged Parliament to remember that the 1989 Children Young Persons and Their Families Act has worked well and that any amendment should not detract from its focus on treatment rehabilitation and restoration. Dr Cindy Kiro the former Children’s Commissioner promoted the need to heed the research conclusions that the most effective responses are those that include a child or young person’s family and wider community. That view was strongly supported by Jono Campbell the manager of Te Ora Hau Otautahi. As the manager of the urban Maori youth organisation he described this bill as being counterproductive to building strong communities noting that it alienates whanau community and collective responsibility and will be particularly harmful for Maori. 
The youth justice area as the House will be aware is one of the most well-researched policy areas of debate. Dr Gabrielle Maxwell from the Institute of Policy Studies right here in Wellington concludes from her analysis of the research: “If you are going to make a difference in the lives of young people who have been abused and traumatised it is necessary to provide them with close and sustained supportive pro-social relationships.” 
She also suggests that they will need education and skills to enable them to find their meaningful role in the community and they will require help in dealing with any addiction problems. What we know is that prison youth institutions and boot camps are not a conducive environment for habilitation rehabilitation or restoration. It all depends on the quality of leadership that can embrace our young people: the connection that offenders can make to positively engage in change. We know that “getting tough” approaches do not work. Our young people need to be exposed to opportunities to learn new behaviour and values to be taught new skills in active ways. 
Although it may be heresy to some the leadership to inspire change can in itself come from ex-offenders who are committed to working with young people to reduce offending and reoffending. Examples of this include the Delancey Street Foundation in America the Salisbury Street Foundation habilitation centre in Christchurch and Moana House in Dunedin which were all founded by ex-criminals. Yet the Government and officials all too often cannot accept that offenders have anything constructive to contribute towards preventing offending behaviour preferring to see them as recipients of services and not people who have something to offer. 
I go back to the recommendation from Dr Maxwell to focus on close and sustained supportive pro-social relationships as the key element of change and I want to refer to that broader context of the situation for youth in Aotearoa. One of my key concerns for our young people is the lingering effects of the recession in relation to employment in particular on the 15 to 19-year-old age group. Maori unemployment is approximately 1½ times the non-Maori rate. For Maori youth there is a twofold effect: the effect of being young coupled with the fact that Maori unemployment is consistently higher than that of non-Maori. 
How do we support these young people to continue to promote a situation of hopefulness and to focus on their future? We do that by reminding them of their connection to us—that our collective aspirations include them and that they are worthy of work that they are people whom we care about. During the select committee process Manu Caddie from Te Ora Hou Aotearoa told the committee that the bill is focused on the individual and not enough on the whanau community. It was the advice of Manu that funding for the very worst offenders might be better spent on strengthening communities to support their young people rather than on ordering individuals to be mentored or counselled. Our focus should be on further investigating those interventions and programmes that are whanau and family-based that are effective based on evidence and that represent value for money. 
The 1989 Act stimulated the social sector to consider the centrality and importance of the whanau to the care and protection of tamariki rangatahi and to youth justice. This bill in focusing on individual strategies for individual youth undermines the very intention of the overriding legislation such as greater whanau involvement in decision making and including hapu and iwi in the plans and policies. 
The Maori Party is very clear in our commitment to Whanau Ora. We want to support communities to develop and implement their own solutions. As part of this we require Government agencies to work with families and whanau on issues affecting them. We are tired of servicing the symptoms; we want whanau to be part of the direction forward and we are unable to support this bill at its third reading. Kia ora. 
CHESTER BORROWS (National—Whanganui) 
: 
 I will start with a few comments about the process that the Social Services Committee went through. Although it was a fairly heated debate at times and colourful at other times what was quite overwhelming was that the committee agreed on a number of things. I am sure that each member of the committee engaged in a positive way albeit we were not free from politics. Given that it was a parliamentary select committee no one should be surprised by that. 
It is also important to note the history of the legislation that the bill amends. The Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989 replaced the Children and Young Persons Act 1974. The drafting of that legislation included the responsibility to deal with families. When the legislation was written it was a world first. Funnily enough it was written in the same year that the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child was written. It seems unusual to me that the Government of the day in drafting the bill and being aware of what the convention entailed did not include within it the provisions that the Opposition seems so drastically to want today. The fact is that around the world different jurisdictions classify the various ages of people appearing before their criminal jurisdictions in different ways. A person who is legally a child in New Zealand might be a young person in another country or an adult in yet another country. If we look at all the countries that are signatories to the convention we will see things interpreted in different ways. 
It does not mean that with the benefit of hindsight we would not go back and change some stuff. For instance I do not believe for a moment that given the opportunity to go back Labour would not have made some significant changes—changes that it is actually voting against in this bill—soon after 1990 when it was elected to Government. In fact Labour set about making a number of those changes in a piece of legislation that is still on the Order Paper as I understand it and that the Green Party was supporting. It does things like extend the term of supervision with activity and supervision with residence. This is in spite of the fact that we have just heard the Green Party member Metiria Turei complain that incarceration for longer terms can only be a bad thing. Legislation that the Green Party was supporting in the last two elections did pretty much what this Government is doing in terms of those sorts of sentences. 
We also have to remember that under this legislation the number of young people aged 12 and 13 who will appear in the Youth Court will probably be fewer than 100 based on current statistics. Those statistics not only come from the ministry but also have been given to us by the Youth Court. The person who will make the decision whether the 12 or 13-year-old appearing in the Youth Court—the child—will continue down the track within the Youth Court is the judge. The person who has been applauded the most by both sides of the House—we all want to grab hold of his every word and glue it on to our policy statement—is the Principal Youth Court Judge Andrew Becroft. It is within his jurisdiction and by judges acting under his direction that the decision will be made whether that 12 or 13-year-old has offended in such a way that he or she should continue through the Youth Court and access the provisions of this legislation or whether he or she should go back to the Family Court and be dealt with in that way. It is very very important to remember that those judges are the people who are making that decision. 
I have another interesting point. The Opposition has raised and protested against only a very small number of things. The Opposition actually supports longer terms for supervision with activity and supervision with residence which is in effect what our Fresh Start camp is but with further wraparound services—and the Opposition supports that as well. It supports the removal of the consent required for community service orders. The only problem the Opposition really has is with the use of the term “military-style activity camp” and with the provisions relating to 12 and 13-year-olds. The Labour Government accepted that there needed to be closer supervision and a closer look at the impact of programmes on people after they had finished a residential sentence. But Labour has not said that if it were returned to Government it would turn this back. It has not said that when Labour is next in Government it would unwind this measure and undo it. It does not say that. It knows that it supports the bulk of this stuff. It is only those two provisions that it does not like. 
The fact is—and I take issue with the previous speaker Pita Sharples—that this legislation includes parents family and whanau far more than they have been included to date. This legislation is actually a step towards where the Maori Party would have us be in terms of inclusion and in terms of getting some semblance of Whanau Ora operating within the criminal justice system. I accept and applaud the fact that the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989 took that process a long way down the track—far further than it ever had been under the previous legislation. A lot of us cynical cops at the time were absolutely convinced that it was going to fail and I am absolutely convinced that it did not fail. The only problem with the provisions it instilled within our youth justice system reaching their full potential was that a lot of cynical policemen and women out there did not apply it in the way that it could have been applied because it took too much paperwork and it was too cumbersome to deal with in a speedy and timely manner. Young 12 and 13-year-olds who should have been appearing in the Family Court and who should have had their care and protection issues dealt with because their offending displayed a need to do that never made it there and that was because of the attitude of practitioners operating in the field. 
I also supported the separation between care and protection social workers and youth justice social workers that the previous Government implemented to try to deal with exactly that situation. When people sit in the Youth Court as I have sat in the Youth Court they see young person after young person appear before the court only to have their cases put off again because the social workers who are in charge of case-managing the proceedings before the court have not done the notifications that they should have done. All of that eroded the confidence and the trust that people had in the youth justice system. 
This legislation shifts responsibilities towards parents but it does not cut them adrift and hold them solely responsible. It has the ability to hold parents accountable for their children’s offending and so they should be. I am proud of this legislation. I thank the people on the select committee who worked towards it and those who worked against it. Thank you for their engagement. 
Dr RAJEN PRASAD (Labour) 
: 
 In coming to Parliament after doing most things that I had wanted to do I expected and looked for those rare opportunities when I could sit down and really work across parties on solutions to fundamental problems of concern to our society. I liken it to having spent most of my professional life pulling bodies out of the river but one day deciding to go upstream and work with people to build fences so that people did not fall into the river. This Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill was an opportunity to begin to address some of the concerns that Government members had and for all members to try to work our way through the legislation to address those questions and come up with a set of solutions with which we could engage in a productive kind of way. My sadness is that that opportunity has been missed because members on only one side have been trying to do that. When members on the other side are constantly trying to focus on political capital—making political capital out of the situation—it becomes very hard. I will talk about that more as I go on. 
Labour by its record since the change in Government has always supported reasonable legislation to address fundamental problems. Labour members have always taken an optimistic view on that but when I came from the select committee and into the legislative process that is almost at an end now the feeling I had was that here was a Government juggernaut that had already made up its mind and that was disregarding any advice that could be put before it. It was determined to go down a particular track; I likened that to a punitive approach. Somehow in the process leading up the election—the pre-election campaign—there was this notion that the only response was to be much harder on crime through every level. Of course there was the action of 100 days which came into the select committee hearings as well but the juggernaut prevented us from taking the opportunity to develop this set of proposals in a far more constructive way. 
I have a lot of respect for every member of the select committee. The committee was very ably chaired and every member of the select committee really struggled to engage with the issues and with the submitters. But in the end I had the impression that National committee members were prevailed upon not to follow what the select committee was being advised but to deliver on what was a punitive approach to the legislation. Chester Borrows as well has talked about how an opportunity was missed. 
The bit that Labour members have major difficulties with in this particular bill is the ideology driving it. That ideology is a punitive ideology and it automatically leads us somewhere. No matter what safeguards we write into the bill over time those who interpret the provisions will begin to internalise that particular ideology. There is a lot of legislation where that is the case. 
Two days ago Unicef New Zealand put out a press statement. That organisation is a group of people who are concerned about young people and who think about New Zealand society quite a bit. The organisation makes reasoned statements from time to time. Its New Zealand executive director says: “The Bill is a backward step in the treatment of children who commit serious crimes.” Indeed that is Labour’s view but this is a large credible organisation that is making these comments. Its statement continues: “Lowering the age at which children can enter into the realm of criminal jurisdiction takes New Zealand in the opposite direction to that proposed by international and national experts on criminality and human rights.” My good friend Pita Sharples has articulated that far more comprehensively than I could ever imagine and I tell the Minister that he is absolutely right. Indeed all of the advice that he has talked about advises us to go in the other direction. 
The select committee was going in the opposite direction. It is no wonder that the debate in the second reading the Committee stage and this third reading has been quite tetchy. It is because the opportunity has been missed and the advice has not been taken at all. The bill really is about lost opportunities for the Government to address what it saw as problems with young offenders. It is almost as if the kind of bravado that the Minister displays from time to time in the House has driven the thing this far but members of the Government in the select committee have not been able to let loose and begin to think their way through it. They are all honourable members and they all have good brains they could have used to come up with much better amendments than the ones here. 
On this side of the House I say that some provisions in the bill have our support. Extending orders and giving the Youth Court more orders are not things we dispute at all. However the way is also opened up for orders that have been known to fail elsewhere. There is any amount of evidence on that. I have not heard the Minister or speakers from the Government side tell us the evidence on which they have built their set of proposals. An ideological position has led the provisions not substantive research or examples from national or international experiences that say: “This was achieved.” I refer of course to boot camps which come in under the “Supervision with activity order” substituted in clause 25. 
Where is the evidence for the camps’ success? Why was the evidence not put before us? The signal given was that the Government’s analysis is that all that is missing in the lives of these young people is discipline and once we give them discipline through military-style boot camps and activities then we set them with wraparound services on the right path. But there is no evidence to suggest that that will come through boot camps. Members have heard the Hon Pita Sharples tell us very clearly that a whole series of complex factors work in consort one with the other—many around family many around community and many to do with age and other things—and need to be put together. Proper services that brought all those factors together would have been much more effective. So those are the lost opportunities which is why this bill is disappointing for me. 
Perhaps the one aspect that has bothered us more than anything else has been the sending of children to the jurisdiction of the Youth Court because that also signals and is consistent with the Government’s ideological position on punitive treatments. The problem with that I say to the Minister is the question of what happens when the issue is about 11 year-olds. What will happen when it is about 10 year-olds? Pressure will come on us but I do not see that this legislation will produce dramatic change over the time of this particular Government. It will not. We will still be talking about the cases we have heard about today; members opposite have been talking about very recent ones. In the end we will force ourselves to become more punitive and to push the age of criminal responsibility further back but those positions are really unprincipled. It was really important for us to hear from the Minister what her deeply held philosophical belief was around children. It was really important for us to hear that and for her to put that on the record of the House. But that has been missing. At least if we had heard that there might have been a difference in the discussions. But the Government has been arrogant and has not listened to experts and the legislation is disappointing and a lost opportunity. 
Perhaps the final point is that it is surprising that Government members who have spoken have really demonstrated the limits of their understanding of the complex issues around this particular— 
Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER 
: I am sorry to interrupt the member; his time has expired. 
TIM MACINDOE (National—Hamilton West) 
: 
 Tonight’s debate is a milestone because it completes the enactment of the Government’s major commitments to New Zealanders at the 2008 general election. But it is even more significant because it demonstrates once again the resolve of a Government that cares enough about troubled youths to want to break their cycle of delinquency and crime and give them a fresh start and a brighter future. It is a Government that cares about communities that have had enough of selfish and unacceptable behaviour by a worrying number of young people who are running amok in this country. I say to Dr Prasad that it is a Government that is facing up to the considerable evidence that the current system is not working and has to be fixed. 
Labour members’ solution of more of the same demonstrates that they have learnt nothing from their comprehensive rejection at the last election. Opposition members claim to be concerned about these young people but they have consistently and deliberately misrepresented the key provisions of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill and ignored the seriousness of the issues it is designed to tackle. 
In my electorate of Hamilton West we have at Hamilton’s Fraser High School one of the oldest and most respected school cadet schemes. It is if anything growing in popularity. Fraser’s cadet corps teaches its students discipline values and respect. It gives those young people a sense of purpose builds their self esteem and encourages them to aim high in other aspects of school and community life as well. Just last week some Fraser High School students who admitted that they were at risk of going off the rails asked to be signed up. I am very proud to represent Fraser High School in this House and I ask members to reflect on what that school and its cadet scheme are achieving. 
I mention that scheme because those benefits are exactly what military-style activity camps will offer the young offenders who are the focus of this bill. I am very disappointed that Opposition members of the Social Services Committee continue to parrot the dishonest “boot camp” slogan when they know that their imagery is dishonest and irresponsible. Worse it insults the fine men and women who are already offering programmes of this nature with great success around New Zealand and those who will lead the new military training activities provided for in this bill. I know they will do it well yet Opposition members would prefer to denigrate those people by conjuring up irrelevant images of screaming and abusive drill sergeants from B-grade American movies. That is offensive. 
Miss Dalziel talked earlier about a disservice yet she overlooked the irony that her party is doing a huge disservice to the people of New Zealand and especially the young people who are off the rails by demeaning and opposing the intent of this bill. Mr Nash lamented the fact that some of our young people are being labelled criminals when they may be just 12 or 13 years of age. We are talking here about young arsonists young aggravated robbers and young home invaders. These are serious crimes and I say to Labour members that people who commit crimes are criminals whether they are 13 or 93 years of age. It is sanctimonious claptrap for Labour members to deny that these young people are already on a dangerous path to a lifetime of serious adult offending. They are not innocent and they need our determined intervention. Worse it is actually heartless of Labour members to say we should not tackle the issues because to do so would damage the self-esteem of our country’s most serious young offenders. I did not know Harry Holland but I am confident that he would tell Stuart Nash that such politically correct puffery is just not right. The package of measures in this bill confronts the reality of New Zealand in 2010; not the mythical Peter Pan dreamland that exists in the minds of members opposite but not in a single town anywhere in this country. 
We are talking about mentoring that is tried and tested. It works in my city and it will be extended under this bill. We are talking about drug and alcohol rehabilitation programmes that will be essential if many young offenders are to have any chance of breaking out of the damaging environment and lifestyle that so many of them have known for far too long. These programmes are not heartless or offensive to young people but failing to tackle those problems certainly is. Actually the words “heartless” and “offensive” better describe Labour’s approach to this whole debate. It is offering nothing new and nothing that deals with the magnitude and reality of the problem and it would rather stick with the status quo despite the overwhelming evidence around the country that the current system is just not working. Ignoring the plight of serious young offenders does a disservice to use Miss Dalziel’s word to those young people to their families and whanau to their victims—who members may have noticed have been conspicuously missing from any consideration by Labour’s speakers this evening—and to New Zealanders who suffer day in and day out from the consequences of juvenile delinquency in their communities. We are talking about parenting education to give those young people the skills they will desperately need when many of them become parents while still not much older than children themselves. Without that commitment we condemn their offspring to a future just as bleak and I am 100 percent sure I say to Mr Nash that Harry Holland would say that that just would not be right. 
This bill is appropriate. It is realistic and it is compassionate in the manner of tough love initiatives. It reflects the commitment of the Minister for Social Development and Employment and of this Government to doing much better by our troubled youth and all who care for them or live with the consequences of their behaviour. That is why I am proudly supporting this bill and that is why I am confident that it will make a positive difference in one of our most challenging areas of social policy. With the passing of this bill we will give our Youth Court the tools it needs to tackle one of our country’s most serious challenges. 
Debate interrupted.