Mitchell MarkHon MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's a pleasure to take a call in the third reading of the Criminal Cases Review Commission Bill. Look I just want to start by saying that I think everyone in this House would agree that the Teina Pora case was a terrible miscarriage of justice and it was a tragedy of a series of events that led to a conviction that as we all know shouldn't have happened. Meka Whaitiri the previous speaker highlighted the fact that through advocacy and through some individuals that believed in him and got behind him and supported him actually we are able finally—and it took way too long—to have at least some vindication for him and some compensation to follow up as well. But the reality of it is that the Criminal Cases Review Commission wouldn't have helped Teina Pora one little bit. It wouldn't have changed his outcome. It wouldn't have changed the process. You've got the speaker from New Zealand First Darroch Ball standing up and I don't doubt Darroch's—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Full name please Mr Mitchell. Hon MARK MITCHELL:—that he has a genuine belief in this bill. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Ruth Dyson): Full name of members. Hon MARK MITCHELL: I said Darroch Ball". So I don't doubt at all Darroch Ball's belief in this bill. However he said the threshold—the test—to actually get a case into the Criminal Cases Review Commission is very high. It's a very high test. So if that's the case and if you actually went back and had a look I don't even know whether Teina Pora's case would even have got in front of the Criminal Cases Review Commission. But then you come back to the bill and actually when you look at the test the test is very low. The standard the commission must meet to refer cases back to the appeal court is merely that it is in the interests of justice to do so. That is a very very low test and I anticipate that you'll have a flood of applications to this commission. By the way the commissioners themselves—you would have to challenge and question whether or not they've got the right training and the right background to be actually making decisions like this and all I can see is just a mass referral straight back into the appeal court that will put pressure back on the court. I have to say that Chris Penk who took control of this bill and shepherded it through all stages in the House and the select committee and who has done an outstanding job and who by the way is a qualified lawyer that's been involved in our criminal justice system as a partner in a law firm before he came to this House of Representatives tried to put a very good Supplementary Order Paper into the House to actually strengthen the bill around the rights of victims to make sure that they are engaged and to make sure that they understood what was happening and understand that actually the case was now back in front of the Criminal Cases Review Commission—what that actually meant for them—and it wasn't supported. So I find it a bit rich that we have the Government parties standing up and telling us how strong this bill is and how good it is and yet they wouldn't actually support the people that are adversely affected or who will be materially affected by the cases that come up in front of the commission. I think that we've been very clear and very articulate about the fact that we will support any good legislation that comes to this House that's going to strengthen our criminal justice system and especially around protection for victims but this bill does not do that. It doesn't even come close to it. It's going to be additional cost it's laying another layer of complexity inside our criminal justice system to slow things down when we already have a very good appeals process and on top of that we're going to have victims that aren't even going to be consulted or included or who understand what is actually involved with this process. So we cannot support this bill. We would have liked to have seen changes made to strengthen it especially around victims' rights. They weren't supported and that was unfortunate. Therefore the National Party in Opposition cannot support this bill. Thank you Madam Speaker."