Ghahraman GolrizGOLRIZ GHAHRAMAN (Green): Thank you Madam Speaker. It's with a heavy heart that I stand to speak on this bill. It's a disappointing turnabout from the Labour Party Government away from evidence-based policy on justice; away from framing that policy within not only evidence but what we know to be true of what happens in our communities and what we know to keep them safe. It's not often that I agree with an ACT Party member—and I don't think that he meant it in the way that I do—but Chris Baillie is right this seems like knee-jerk reaction to an election. It feels like moving toward the Opposition in the worst possible way.We none of us in this House stand here without compassion for victims of crime. We feel that fear that is valid as communities face violence or property offending—a crossroads of which is captured in this new term that we use ram raids". Nobody here is saying that they stand for crime; that they lack that compassion for those communities; what we disagree on are the solutions. But the thing that breaks my heart about youth crime in particular is that it is where we have the most data the most reports the most evidence of who these young kids are what works and what doesn't. And what we actually also have is a fulsome child rights framework that we can work within to bring kids that come into conflict with the law out into healthy thriving lives. We actually have that evidence—we don't need to debate it anymore. We don't need to talk about a "tough on crime" approach when we're talking about something that's tough on human persons involved and actually really making it easier for crime to grow and propagate in our communities. Because what we do know if we step into the child rights framework it is where New Zealand's most clear breaches of any international human rights law sit—in our age of criminal responsibility which is 10 rather than 14 years age-mixing in places of detention and laws like this one.If we actually step away from the National and ACT Party frame—because New Zealand voted for a Labour Government—and we look at the child rights framework we would see that children who are bought into formal criminal justice mechanisms and in this law 12- and 13-year-olds to be proceeded against in the youth court without being previous offenders there was that little bar already existing in our already breaching laws and we're removing that. Bodily samples being taken from 12- and 13- year olds who are proceeded against; specific criminalisation of ram raids which is already contained in other crimes. When we look at how far this proposal works to bring very young children into extremely invasive formal criminal justice processes and we ignore the evidence that says that is what creates recidivist young offenders we are not being tough on crime; we're actually being reckless; I'd say callous. We are choosing the taglines that make politicians look tough on crime rather than keeping our communities safe. It's not even about just compassion for these kids that we are damaging—because that's what all of the data and the evidence says. It's not just about these kids that we are actively sending towards a life of crime and a life of gangs. Let's just focus on the victim communities: more crime means more victims so we're letting everyone down.And I am so disappointed in my Labour Party colleagues that leaving the story of what actually resolves the upsurge in crime; leaving aside the equity frame of everyone having a life where they can go to sleep in a warm dry home can get access to mental health care and addiction treatment can have jobs that pay for the lives that they need—and if they don't have those jobs that they have the social safety net that will lift them. Leaving aside the fact that they have failed to tell that story for three years for right now right before an election to pivot towards the frame of punishment and away from what we know actually works—you're not going to "out - Paul Goldsmith" Paul Goldsmith or Mark Mitchell. You're not going to do it. We have to hold the line for what we know our communities need rather than just the rhetoric. So this bill is not only disappointing because it will not manage crime; it is not tough on crime—it's actively harmful generationally harmful and it degrades our system of justice. It degrades our ability to fulfil those rights for young people and children. We know who those young children will be we know they'll be Māori and Pacific kids. We know they are kids with a history of trauma. If they're girls—because all of the data is there—we know that they will have had very recent trauma. We know that they are kids with neurodiversity. In under-19-year-olds around 89 percent of those we bring into formal justice processes will be then diagnosed with a serious learning disability. We know that the ball is dropped in education in health in incomes and in housing. And now with this bill we're going to harm them long term. We're going to raise the rate of youth crime because we failed to tell those stories to have the courage of our convictions to rely on the evidence and keep telling those stories in the face of the likes of Paul Goldsmith and Mark Mitchell. So I don't commend this bill to the House."