Radhakrishnan PriyancaPRIYANCA RADHAKRISHNAN (Labour): Thank you Madam Chair. There are some bills that we debate in this House that strike straight at the heart of people's lived existence people's suffering fear and hurt and give us an opportunity to remedy that and this bill really does that. I just also want to say that it was an absolute privilege to be part of the select committee the Justice Committee that went through this bill that heard public submissions on this bill and that actually worked very well together to make some amendments to part of this bill which I will go through today as well. I just want to firstly thank the former Minister of Justice the Hon Amy Adams for her work on this; the current Minister of Justice the Hon Andrew Little for his work on this; and my colleagues on the select committee and of course those who submitted on this bill as well. We heard some very emotive some very emotional submissions and I want to acknowledge that. Part 1 of this bill looks at basically the purpose of this bill—what does this bill do? The reason that we're here today—and this goes way back to the way I began actually—is for those of us in this House there is immense power here to impact people's lives. It's a little bit like fire: sometimes we don't get it right and it ruins people's lives completely and sometimes we have the opportunity to remedy it. Now the Crimes Act 1961 and its predecessor in 1908 criminalised sexual activity between males 16 years and over. Between that time and 1986 when the Homosexual Law Reform Act decriminalised the same activity we saw a number of people who were caught in a space where just being themselves meant that they became criminals or were deemed criminals by society.According to Statistics New Zealand between that time period nearly a thousand men were convicted of indecency between males. About 138 of them had a sentence of imprisonment and many others had either fines or community-based sentences as well. Quite apart from that was the abject fear that they lived in of law enforcement agencies the stigma that they suffered—young men who were thrown out of home for being homosexual—and the huge implications for their health and their mental health. So this bill gives us an opportunity to put that straight. It also sends a really clear signal to future generations of young people in the LGBTQI community.So what does it do? The purpose of this bill is to address that stigma that prejudice that the young men who were convicted have faced. It's all well and good for us to say post-1986 that this is no longer criminal but it's a whole different matter for it still to be on people's criminal records when they either apply for a job or are considered for any position or status of some sort. So this addresses that issue. It enables an application for expungement of a conviction to be made under this legislation. Parts of the bill that I will get into shortly sort of outline who is eligible to make the application—whether it's the person who has been convicted themselves or someone acting on their behalf as well. Actually both are eligible to apply for an expungement and I'll go into that in a little bit.Part 1 also looks at the interpretation—the definitions: who does this apply to and how? It lays that out quite clearly. I just want to draw your attention Madam Chair and that of those who are watching as well to clause 4 as an example of the types of issues we debated in a lot of depth actually at select committee. For example  'criminal record' of a conviction for a historical offence"—initially in the bill it was written down as an "official record". The select committee suggested that that be changed to a "public record" so that we align the definition better with section 4 of the Public Records Act 2005. There are a few other changes in clause 4 as well that will give better meaning to the expungement per se.The other part of Part 1 of course is the definition of historical homosexual offences and it's quite specific as to who can apply—so what sorts of convictions a person must have had in order to be eligible to apply for this. It lays it out in clause 5. Basically there is the time period that I laid out at the start that's between 1908 and 1986—so from the start of the Crimes Act that criminalised such behaviour right through to 1986 with the Homosexual Law Reform Act that decriminalised the same behaviour. So that's the time period within which people who have had such a historical conviction can apply for the expungement.The other relevant part that's outlined in clause 5 and I'll just read this bit because it's quite detailed is the sections that have been repealed—the specific sections of the Crimes Act that have been repealed. They are section 141 and that deals with indecency between males—so that's section 141 of the Crimes Act 1961; section 142 which deals with sodomy; section 146 "keeping place of resort for homosexual acts"; section 153 unnatural offence of the Crimes Act 1908—so that's the predecessor Act—"but only to the extent that the section covers committing buggery with any other male human being:"; and section 154 "attempt to commit unnatural offence" so similar to the previous one but an attempt rather than the actual offence being committed. So people within that time frame who were convicted under any of those five sections that I've outlined will be eligible to apply for the expungement of that conviction. Now this also applies to those who might have passed on since that time. So they may not be able to apply in person but a representative—someone from their family perhaps—can apply on their behalf as well.I'll just at this point draw attention to the fact that some submitters at select committee alluded to the fact that potentially this bill should go a little bit further and apply an automatic expungement to everyone—to those thousand people perhaps that we have details for—who would be eligible. That was considered by select committee but the advice that was received was that that blanket automatic expungement actually might leave a few people out so a proactive application for expungement was actually better. It meant that people could—we potentially included more people in that. The other point to note of course is that these convictions actually brought about a lot of trauma for those who were convicted and so it's not everybody who would want to have to revisit that trauma as well and an automatic expungement might put people in that position. So instead of that it was better that people applied if they wanted an expungement.Now Part 2 is the test for expungement—so who's eligible? We've gone through the time period and the specific convictions under the two Crimes Acts. We've also mentioned that the person themselves or a representative—and that's in clause 8 Part 2 of the bill. Now the test is that the conduct constituting the offence if it were engaged in now—so when the application is made—would not constitute an offence. So basically what we're saying is we had a law back then that criminalised people for just being who they were. We don't think that was right and if the conduct that they engaged in at the time actually happened today they wouldn't be convicted.So that's pretty much the test which then falls out for example cases of rape and cases where there was no consent—that would have been an offence back then also because it was a sexual activity between males. That part of it would no longer hold under current law but the lack of consent would. So those that fall into that category this bill clarifies would not be expunged basically—that particular conviction would not be expunged.So Part 2 of the bill lays out quite clearly the instances in which the conviction would not be expunged. There are also parts in Part 2 that basically say that a status cannot be refused or revoked. So basically a person who has an expunged conviction should not be disqualified on that ground for employment or for any other appointment or post—so quite detailed in the bill.I have a question though for the Minister in the chair Andrew Little and that's around compensation that came out in the select committee as to why that wasn't part of this bill. It would be good to get clarity. Thank you."