McKee Nicole; Waititi Rawiri; Penk Chris; Salesa JennyNICOLE McKEE (ACT): Thank you Madam Chair. Minister Andersen I'll ask you two questions; one of them's quite quick. The Human Rights Commission: they've been given $14 million and they have two chief executives. Its recent activity is to claim the fundamental illegality of the State" and that the Crown's claim to sovereignty is "illegal". So why is the Government paying for the existence of a body which actively seeks to deny the right of Government?My second question to the Minister is regarding sector leadership and support. At page 100 and 101—the bottom of page 100 and the top of page 101—it talks about "[The] appropriation is intended to achieve timely advice and support by the Ministry of Justice to the Justice Sector." and there's an allocation of $13 million there. But when we look at the assessment of the performance the assessment itself is based on "The satisfaction of the Justice Sector Leadership Board with the leadership advice and support provided by the Ministry" and it's rated eight out of 10. Now that's the key performance indicator just people being happy with a $13 million spend. So I wonder: what is involved in that? What is involved in the satisfaction of the Justice Sector Leadership Board for a $13 million spend because I think the people actually should be well aware of what that entails and what the detail is around that spend.So $13 million in sector leadership and support Minister and $14 million to the Human Rights Commission who are wanting to—actively seeking to—deny the right of Government. We're just wondering why we're funding them to do that. Thank you Minister.RAWIRI WAITITI (Co-Leader—Te Paati Māori): Madam Chair thank you for the opportunity to speak a second time. Just a couple of questions Minister before we end the session around—I understand Operation Tauwhiro Operation Cobalt and the reasons why those particular operations are in action. My question is: what are you doing as a justice Minister around tax fraud and tax evasion in this country that's costing this country $7 billion a year? Where is the operation in regards to tax evasion here in this country? Where is the operation—like Operation Tauwhiro like Operation Cobalt—for those who are costing this country billions and billions of dollars of tax evasion? That's one question I'd like to ask.The other question is around ensuring that we look at a whole transformative approach to the justice system. Again I welcome the Minister to answer the question around the appetite for an independent Māori justice authority to allow Māori the dignity and the mana motuhake to be able to come up with solutions—because the current solution isn't working for us—to allow us some dignity and to allow us the opportunity to reform ourselves as we climb from underneath the bonnet of years and years of colonial violence.And so koina hoki aku whakaaro e te Minita. [those are my thoughts Minister.] If you could answer those questions that'd be much appreciated. Kia ora.CHRIS PENK (National—Kaipara ki Mahurangi): Thank you Madam Chair and thanks to the Minister for engaging in this discussion about Justice and its Estimates and various challenges in the sector. Obviously it's pretty broad ranging and I acknowledge the Minister also has the portfolio of police and of course courts which is very dear to my heart within that broader justice sector as well. I know the Minister will be au fait with some of the issues in our court system having been chair of the Justice Committee before that.As others including my own colleague and friend the Hon Paul Goldsmith and Nicole McKee have both quite rightly pointed out one of the major barriers to justice in this country at the moment from an access to justice point of view is the huge backlogs involved in having cases heard in our court system. I might bring out some of those figures not to quote them all across the different types of courts and tribunals necessarily but to highlight for the attention of the House just how dire the situation is but by way of shorthand Ms McKee is quite right when she says that it can be up to three years that it takes a case to go through. The key aspect of that is actually understanding that it can take you know the majority of that time even to get one's case begin to be heard. It's not even necessarily that the cases take a long time—and of course sometimes there are good reasons for that—but even to get to the start line of being heard is a major challenge in this country at the moment.So I wonder if the Minister can offer her thoughts on using much better than is currently the case much more extensively what's sometimes called virtual meeting rooms sometimes called AVL—audiovisual link—or other remote participation methods. By way of background to the question she'll be aware that it's already possible under the statute book that we have now with the remote participation Act for people to Zoom in—you know as we would say in colloquial fashion now—whether it's from maybe a custodial situation to avoid the security risk and cost of transporting a prisoner to have a relatively minor hearing. We're not talking about full trials or jury matters or whatever but I wonder if the Minister can advise what thought she has given to working with the justice sector to have much more remote participation where that's appropriate and where that would be in the interest of justice. I'm hoping she will reflect on the savings of time of cost of removing the postcode lottery of lawyers being available in one location but not another to take away the challenges of a pandemic situation or other public health challenges—maybe ill health during the winter months in a more ordinary way—earthquake strengthening issues with courts flooding issues in the case of extreme weather events.I hope that she will reflect that there is much more that we can and should do in this country working with the courts—yes recognising that as a separate branch of Government but working with them to provide them the tools to enable that more technology-based interaction through our courts and thereby to improve the lives of those who so desperately need to have their matters heard. They need their day in court. They need for justice not to be delayed and therefore justice not to be denied. I sense the Minister is engaging in various matters of importance so I'll sort of seek an indication of when she's able to address that question.But maybe I'll jump ahead to a related point which is in relation to legal aid. I do acknowledge that the Government has recently announced an increase to the levels of legal aid and I think that's worth supporting but in terms of the structure of how legal aid representation works I wonder if the Minister has received any advice or would seek advice on whether junior lawyers assisting a more senior colleague might be able to attract legal aid funding in a way that will be helpful for the speedy resolution of the matters but also by way of succession training—that is to say equipping the next level of the profession the younger or at least newer practitioners to be able to have the mantle passed to them and so to be able to provide that important representation into the future particularly in criminal justice matters but not exclusively those.CHAIRPERSON (Hon Jenny Salesa): Before I take the next call I'd just like to inform the House and members that I've had a request from the main Opposition party that they would like to move on to transport soon sooner rather than later so if there are no further calls on justice—we will continue with justice?CHRIS PENK (Senior Whip—National): Point of order Madam Chair. I wonder if there's been a slight miscommunication. The point is I suppose we've only got a certain amount of time left and other parties likewise and we'll try and manage that as best we can. I'm sort of keen to understand what will happen if we finish the justice one earlier and I think I understand from you that that would mean we'd go into transport more quickly and if that's the case then so be it but we don't actively seek to move on to transport more quickly than would otherwise be the case.SHANAN HALBERT (Junior Whip—Labour): Speaking to the point of order Madam Speaker just to confirm that we're happy to proceed through as planned."