McKee Nicole; Salesa JennyNICOLE McKEE (ACT): Thank you Madam Speaker. I stand in support of the third reading of the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Amendment Bill and before I start on my address I'd just like to talk to some of the issues that the Green Party member Golriz Ghahraman brought up. I actually understand exactly what she says when she talks about you know This is all about the criminal proceeds and it's about the punishment and we're not looking at the causes of crime."—and I understand what you're saying there. But on reflection I too have to think well the Government and the Green Party with them have had five years of being able to look at what it is that causes crime and then try to implement some of their ideas on how to address it. What this particular bill is about is how we deal with those assets of the ill-gotten gains and how we look after victims of crime because from the Green Party what I hear about is the criminals and we very rarely hear about the victims. I would hope that rather than it being purely a revenue-driven bill that we put through maybe some of these proceeds of crimes could actually go back to the victims as well but that would be another bill for another day. The purpose of this bill is to prevent individuals from profiteering from significant criminal activity—not just any criminal activity; it's got to be significant criminal activity—and we'll do this by improving our civil forfeiture regime. ACT agrees that we do need to target the illicit profits of leaders and facilitators of organised crime and transnational offending just as it is outlined in the introduction to this bill. Throughout the select committee process and the committee of the whole House stage we fleshed out—as my colleague across the floor there Vanushi Walters talked about—all the different areas within the bill that we went through. We did have some little disagreements but we pretty much came up with the agreement across the House—well across the select committee—as to how we were going to proceed with this. We have also recorded in the Hansard through the committee of the whole House stage our expectations on how certain clauses within this bill are meant to be worked by both police in their application and by the courts when they deliver their seizure orders. It's really important I think across the entire House that when we talk of taking people's assets of forfeiture and of seizure—and we are also including associates—that we did have significant debate around what an associate was and who could be caught up in this regime because quite often it would be family members. You know the old saying "You can choose your friends but you can't choose your family" and to have your assets taken because of something that a family member has done of course is not anyone's ideal way of making law. So we're changing the way that we address criminal profiteering by creating a two-tier restraining and forfeiture order system so that we can make restraining orders against organised criminal groups who have been structuring their affairs to avoid the existing restraining and forfeiture legislation and I would note that it is important that we have this now. There has been over a 50 percent increase in gang members in New Zealand. We've had a rise of gang members higher than we've had police recruitments. We've had a promised 1800 police that would be delivered by 2020 2021 2022 and we're now hoping it's by election 2023 but the reality is that the criminals and the proceeds of crime are becoming more attractive to other potential gang members—or prospectors as they're called—than what we can get by recruiting police. So we need to make sure that we take that significant criminal activity of theirs and we make it harder for them to utilise their funds and their criminal activities for recruitment and we focus on making sure we have a robust and strong police force able to tackle them as well. I'm left to think of how our organised crime has changed over the last few years. You know we used to just have thuggery in our gangs around New Zealand; now it's become organised thuggery and we don't even see a lot of our criminals even walking around in patches any more. I've seen some that are driving the latest Mercedes-Benzes and BMWs and they're wearing suits—Shanan Halbert: Back to the bill my friend—back to the bill.NICOLE McKEE: —so we need to make sure that when we do go after them—and I am talking about the bill because when we are talking about people that are driving around in a Mercedes-Benz these are significant criminal activities obviously purchased by criminal funds. So this is relevant to the bill.The forfeiture orders will now fall under two types: either type 1 or type 2 and type 1 relates to the organised criminal groups. If the court is satisfied that a person who has had a type 1 restraining order applied against them has been either a member or an associate of an organised criminal group and has property that they cannot explain financing for where the value of the questionably obtained property exceeds the current $30000 restraining threshold and that the property isn't tainted then that order is likely to be successful. But the onus is on the applicant—which is the police—to show the court that the criteria has been fully met. So it's not like we can just apply for this type 1 order on anyone. It has to be significant criminal activity and it has to meet these other thresholds including the $30000 accumulated asset amount that they are wanting to forfeit. The respondent in turn may be required to actually prove that their purchases were legitimate and not from the illgotten gains of significant criminal activity should they indeed wish to keep them. I note again that in my member's bill—which did not proceed past the first reading—we could have approached two key areas of concern to society within this legislation with the two areas being gun crime by unlicensed criminals and an asset or financial deterrent to possession of illegally held firearms. Perhaps that's something we can look at in the future to make this legislation even stronger for our victims and to ensure that illegally held firearms stop being used in the way that they are in our communities. The $30000 threshold would not have been required in this instance to be met if a firearm or arms were found during a raid on an organised criminal group and that firearm was held illegally. So I do think it is something that we should address because we're hearing daily reports again of firearms being used in criminal activity. The type 2 forfeiture orders must meet the same criteria as type 1 in that they've got to be a member of an organised criminal group they can't explain their assets based on their income and the value is over the $30k threshold. But type 2 orders must be made on specific property and it will exclude the value that can be explained by the respondent's legitimate property. If the respondent can prove that ownership is legit then an order must not be made. Under the type 2 regime orders will not be made where it's not in the interests of justice to do so. For example taking the 1980s car away from a mum of four because she cannot show how she legitimately had the funds to purchase it and it is likely that over time she actually could have legitimately paid for it think of a disclosure source order—sorry I'm getting mixed up in my own notes. When we have a mother who has the vehicle the 1980s car—I'm just—bugger the notes sorry. When you've got a mum that has four kids she's got a 1980s car and she can't show how she legitimately paid for it but it can be shown that she did work—and probably could—she's likely to keep it. But if she's the one driving around in the latest MercedesBenz and she's on a benefit with her four kids and can't prove how she could afford to do it then that becomes part of the type 2 asset forfeiture. A further change to this bill was agreed when we discussed self-incriminating statements that could be made by respondents when responding to production orders examination orders or disclosure of source orders. The change we made is in allowing those self-incriminating statements to be used in any civil proceeding under the Act. But we also directed a change to the bill so that respondents are made aware of this when they are provided a disclosure source order. This change to the criminal proceeds Act will take a tougher stance on asset forfeiture for significant criminal activity and we're proud to support that. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jenny Salesa): Thank you. The time has come for us to break for dinner. I will resume the Chair at 7 p.m. Sitting suspended from 5.58 p.m. to 7 p.m."