Ryall Tony: Corrections Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee Procedure 
Ryall Tony: Corrections Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee Procedure 
[Volume:617;Page:12978] 
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) 
: 
 The National Party in Opposition will be leading an extremely vigorous debate against the Corrections Bill today. We want to highlight to the people of New Zealand a number of important deficiencies in this legislation. We want to highlight the ideological drive behind what is being proposed in this legislation and we also want to highlight the fact that this bill is full of potential litigation risk for the Crown. This Government knows that but it is continuing to push the bill through. 
In the next while numerous speakers from the National Party will be taking calls in this debate and will be covering a number of issues. We will be drawing the attention of the Committee to the fact that the liberal people opposite are proposing to bring into this bill the woolly definition of “family”—which it tried to shove down the throats of the people of New Zealand with the Families Commission Bill—that provides that any prisoner is guaranteed visits from anybody he or she has a “psychological attachment” to. That means every gang member is going to have a right to be visited by every member of his or her chapter because that apparently is part of a gang member’s family group. Mrs Judith Collins from our side of the Chamber will be spending some time debating that as well. 
Led by Mr Brian Connell we will be spending some time talking about the purposes of the corrections system. The purposes highlighted by this Government are completely wrong. Where is the word “punishment”? Where is the word “incapacitation”? Where are the words “reintegration into the community”? Those words do not jump out from the face of the legislation because they simply are not part of what this Government is on about. Where is “prison to work”? Where is “punishment”? Where is “just desserts”? Where is “being incapacitated”? Where is “being off the street helps prevent crime”? None of that is mentioned in this legislation. 
Our other speakers in this debate including Richard Worth will talk about why the principles of this bill are all wrong. The principles of this bill are all wrong because they give lots of new rights to prisoners that they do not deserve. This bill gives prisoners the right to go to court and litigate their treatment by the Department of Corrections. I want to give one example of a provision that we would remove from the bill and we have tabled an amendment to do so. That example is the principle in clause 6(1)(c) which states that in order to reduce reoffending the sentence planning where appropriate has to take into account the cultural background ethnic identity and language of offenders. Well that is all motherhood and apple pie but what does it actually mean and what are the new legal rights that will be created because of what is in this legislation? That principle has never featured in the law before. What it means together with clauses further on stating that prison treatment has to be culturally appropriate is that prisoners on legal aid will be able go to the courts and say that they have not been treated in accord with their cultural background ethnic identity and language. 
Judith Collins 
: What about the victims? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: Mrs Collins is right. What about the victims in these crimes? They get in this bill three lines’ reference in the principles. So we have a section of the bill that is over a page and a half—75 lines—and how many lines do the victims get? Three. That indicates what is wrong with this bill. Later during the debate on the other parts we will highlight the fact that the Department of Corrections is happy to have legislation that states it will tell the family of the offender when the offender is being moved to another prison but it will not tell the family of the victim if the victim wants to know whether the prisoner is being moved. This bill does not favour victims.