Ardern Jacinda: Third Readings —Text is incorporated into the Bound VolumeArdern Jacinda: Third Readings —[Sitting date: 27 May 2014. Volume:699;Page:18379. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JACINDA ARDERN (Labour): That was a short address to the House from Joanne Hayes. I think though that this legislation arising from the Victims of Crime Reform Bill is worthy of greater analysis than that. I know that my Labour colleagues have been contributing to the debate and the discussion because if we look at the wider context around victims’ rights and the criminal justice system there is still so much more that could be achieved. They are contentious areas though and I think this is the place and an opportunity for us to explore for instance some of those issues that arise out of the fact that we have an adversarial justice system and all of the issues that that brings up for a victim. There is the fact that the repeal of our provocation laws has not truly allowed us to protect families fromrevictimisation and so on. Those are some of the issues that I hope to touch on briefly in my short address.First though I want to discuss the context in which we are debating this legislation which is obviously focused on victims. Let us look at the context in which victims in New Zealand today find themselves. We are often reliant on our crime statistics to make a judgment on whether or not there are more victims out there this year than there were last year for instance. If you ask the Minister of Justice or indeed the Minister of Police she will tell you that crime is down. Therefore the great assumption that is left hanging is that the number of victims has reduced.The issue with our crime statistics—and this has always been an issue; it is not a new one—is that they are totally reliant on an individual reporting a crime to the police the police then recording that crime and it therefore being released in our statistics. The first flaw in that system is that it relies on an individual feeling like they will getsomething out of calling the police in order to motivate them to do that. You might argue that in property offences they will do it because they might have an insurance claim hanging off whether or not they have filed a police report. If you are poor you are less likely to have insurance. Crass as that sounds it is the truth.Who are our constantlyrevictimised victims? They are often our poorer communities. Who therefore are the people who are sometimes less well served by our criminal justice system? They are those same communities which therefore sometimes have a suspicion of the police if they feel less well served and so it continues. Therefore we have to remain with a healthy scepticism about our crime statistics. That is just a fact of life.It is borne out by additional surveys around crime experienced by New Zealanders. These are slightly older statistics but even several years ago 33 percent of all offences were reported to police—33 percent. That is why we have to make sure that we do keep these kinds of debates in context.I am particularly concerned about constantrevictimisation as well. We know that 6 percent of victims experience 54 percent of victimisation particularly our victims of domestic violence. For some reason—Chris Auchinvole: Are you voting for the bill?JACINDA ARDERN: The member Chris Auchinvole over there keeps asking whether we are voting for the legislation. I am sorry if he thinks that the only role we have in this House is to stand up and say we are in favour and sit down again. I think that there is a place for healthy debate and discussion. I am sorry if the National Government has given up on that tonight. When it comes to domestic—Chris Auchinvole: I just wanted to give significance to your statements.JACINDA ARDERN: This is the fourth speech from a Labour speaker and of course all of us have said we are voting for it.When it comes to domestic violence in particular I am particularly concerned because for some reason in New Zealand we tend to track higher when it comes to repeat victimisation than almost any other country. Someone who is a victim of domestic violence is likely to berevictimised over and over again. That should direct us to some of the kinds of interventions that we should be looking at in that space. That is the context. So when we come to look at mechanisms to support victims I think we should think about some of those issues particularlyrevictimisation.One of the issues that I am sure Andrew Little will have raised in particular—because he raised it at the Justice and Electoral Committee and in the Labour Party minority report—was whether or not it is time we looked at the notion of having an advocate for the victim as a formal statutory position in our court process. That is a way of trying to address the imbalance that is created by our adversarial court system but actually it is a really pragmatic idea as well.I remember that when I was quite young for one reason or another I was brought in to support a victim through the court system for a day. I remember how complex the process was and how nervous she was about what might happen in proceedings—whether or not she would see the offender; how she was meant to react at certain points in the process. There were lots of questions that I of course did not have the answers to. It never seemed like anyone who was involved in the court process at that time had the time or the space or the capacity to answer those questions. So at a practical level I can really see a role in our justice system for that kind of position.I think it would also help explain the process and the legal rights around victim impact statements. This has been a particularly controversial part of this debate. Most victims would think that if they were writing a victim impact statement that it is just that—they write down the impact a crime has had on them—and they might ask whythat should be edited or vetted. It is their view and it is their emotional experience that they are wanting to convey and yet there are limitations. Being really clear about that up front is perhaps a way of easing that process—by having someone who is obviously on your side helping you navigate through that part of the process.I also mentioned the importance of the repeal of the partial defence of provocation. I am really pleased that that happened in the last Parliament I think it was. We had some really clear cases where we saw that victims were beingrevictimised through the court process by having offenders trying to claim that they were somehow provoked into their heinous crime. But it still appears to be happening in our court system and I think the case has been made clearly by Labour that there is still some reform required in this area. Sending a reference to the Law Commission on this point might be one way to continue with that work.So those are some of the additional issues we wanted to raise and I think it is right that Labour raised them. We have got a proud history when it comes to enhancing victims’ rights. As much as the Government and the National Party would like torecharacterise the law and order space it was things like the Victims of Offences Act and the Victims’ Rights Act 2002—I vividly remember that Act. I was working for a time in Phil Goff’s office when he was the Minister of Justice. Not only was he working through critical reform around sentencing and parole but also high on his priority list was enhancing victims’ rights. That was when we started to see embedded into legislation the ideas around of course things like the Victims Charter which came out of that and it was also really putting Victim Support on a firm footing to be the recognised agency in working with our victims. I know that those working in our justice system—our police force for instance—absolutely value the role that Victim Support can play locally.One final point I could not speak on this bill without making a note of is that surely our ultimate goal has always got to be preventing victims from becoming victims in the first place—decent prevention. For some time the New Zealand Police has been running an agenda around Prevention First. That is what its focus has been on. Unfortunately the last Budget produced by this Government has severely undermined its ability to do decent preventative work. We have seen over $40 million cut out of the police budget and it is their operational budget so it is literally money that is coming out of both policing and prevention services. It is even coming out of some of the youth services that are focused on capturing young people in their community before they start entering into the harder end of offending by using programmes that I have seen make a real difference in communities. All of those areas are going to take a hit under the last Budget.So if we really want to have a focus on victims we must maintain a focus on preventing the people who are being victimised from being in that situation in the first place. To remove the tools of the front-line workers in our justice system to do that job properly and adequately and basing it on crime statistics alone when there are obvious flaws in doing that is I think very flawed thinking.