Power Simon: Third Readings — 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Power Simon: Third Readings — 
[Sitting date: 07 July 2011. Volume:673;Page:19904. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon SIMON POWER (Minister of Justice) 
 on behalf of the Minister for Courts 
: 
 I move  
That the District Courts Amendment Bill the Land Transport Amendment Bill the Summary Proceedings Amendment Bill (No 3) the Children Young Persons and Their Families Amendment Bill (No 2) the Crimes Amendment Bill (No 4) the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Amendment Bill the Customs and Excise Amendment Bill (No 2) the Disputes Tribunals Amendment Bill (No 2) the Family Courts Amendment Bill the Immigration Amendment Bill the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Bill (No 3) the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Act 1978 Amendment Bill the Personal Property Securities Amendment Bill (No 2) the Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims Amendment Bill the Privacy Amendment Bill (No 2) the Railways Amendment Bill the Residential Tenancies Amendment Bill (No 3) the Sentencing Amendment Bill (No 5) the Social Security Amendment Bill (No 4) and the Tax Administration Amendment Bill be now read a third time 
. These bills have been divided from the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill and as such represent possibly the most comprehensive reform of the enforcement of fines reparation and civil debt in over a decade. 
As at 30 June 2011 $666.5 million in fines including reparation await collection. Although this is $112 million less than when the bill was introduced nearly 15 months ago further efforts are needed if fines are to remain a credible sanction for breaches of the law. Regular surveys of the public perception of courts find that half of the respondents believe that offenders can avoid paying their reparation or fines. This legislation will modernise the collection of fines and introduce new enforcement tools to encourage people to voluntarily pay their fines and reparation. 
The policy development was commenced under the previous Minister for Courts the Hon Rick Barker in 2007 and the Government acknowledges and recognises that. The present Minister for Courts the Hon Georgina te Heuheu has expanded the scope of the legislative reforms particularly to address inconsistencies across the relevant legislation. 
The amendments to the Summary Proceedings Act 1957 establish a single comprehensive definition of “fine” which includes all court-imposed sentences and orders of reparation court-imposed fines infringement penalties filed at court for enforcement court costs and of course the offender levy. Cross references to this definition will be inserted into the other principal fines enforcement legislation. The legislation also aligns the provisions relating to the payment of monetary penalties from the sale of proceeds of seized confiscated and forfeited property across four Acts: the Summary Proceedings Act the Sentencing Act 2002 the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975 and of course the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Act 2009 to ensure that all monetary penalties can be paid out of these proceeds and that priority is given to the payment of reparation. 
The legislation introduces three new enforcement tools to encourage those with overdue fines and reparation to pay or enter into an appropriate payment arrangement. First the legislation allows the amount of the person’s overdue fines to be released to the credit-reporting industry and in turn authorises the Ministry of Justice to use updated addresses and other information supplied by credit reporters for fines enforcement. Second the legislation gives the courts in effect super-priority over secured creditors for the sale proceeds of seized goods when a person has unpaid fines and a creditor lends him or her money to buy an asset—for example a car—that is used as security for the debt. Third amendments to the Land Transport Act 1998 enable the Ministry of Justice to impose a driver licence stop order which suspends any driver’s licences of individuals with overdue traffic fines or if they do not have a driver’s licence prevents them from getting one. 
The amendments to the Sentencing Act will enable the courts to resentence a person who has not complied with a sentence or order of reparation by drawing on the full range of alternative sentencing options that were available for the original offence. The legislation also clarifies that payment of reparation has priority over payment of other fines when distributing funds recovered from the sale of seized forfeited and confiscated property under the Acts identified earlier which is consistent with the Government’s response to the Law Commission’s report on compensating crime victims. 
Finally this legislation importantly will improve enforcement processes for judgment debtors and creditors. In particular the amendments to the District Courts Act 1947 the Disputes Tribunals Act 1988 and the Residential Tenancies Act 1986 will make it easier to establish an attachment order to make deductions from a person’s salary wage or benefit to resolve an outstanding judgment debt as determined by a court or a tribunal. 
The long course of this legislation means that there are many people I would like to acknowledge for their contribution to this legislation including officials from a range of departments: the Parliamentary Counsel Office the Law Commission local authorities the judiciary the Privacy Commissioner representatives of the credit-reporting industry the previous Minister for Courts the Hon Rick Barker my colleague the Hon Georgina te Heuheu and all those who made submissions to assist the Law and Order Committee in its consideration. The reforms contained in this bill will enhance the credibility of monetary penalties as alternatives to prison or community-based sentences and reduce the compliance costs of using the civil debt recovery system. I commend this legislation to the House.