Bindra MaheshMAHESH BINDRA (NZ First): It is a pleasure to rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak to the legislation arising from the Drug and Alcohol Testing of Community-based Offenders Bailees and Other Persons Legislation Bill. We have supported the bill through its earliest stages and we supported it because we liked the intent of this bill. The intent of this legislation is to hold those offenders and bailees who are in the communities to account. Those bailees and offenders and those on parole—earlier before this legislation was thought of—used to get away with continuing their offending habits and continuing their addiction to drugs and alcohol. This legislation seeks to remedy that situation. Those on bail and other offenders in the community—in the absence of such good and potentially effective legislation—got away with recidivism. So we like this legislation although it has some anomalies which are yet to be answered. We did have some questions which were not answered. However the overall intent of the legislation is good and that is to keep our communities safer. This legislation will go a long way in addressing the reoffending habits of offenders in the community. Having been trained as a drug-testing officer some years ago I have a fair bit of an idea how the drug-testing regime works inside the wire inside prison. It is not perfect but it is fairly effective. I have seen thousands of prisoners going out and coming back through our prisons' revolving doors. About the drug-testing regime within the prisons—those tests are carried out within the close confines of the prison but still some prisoners are able to manipulate the results. They are able to falsify the samples. That percentage is not very high luckily but there are a few prisoners who have managed to falsify their drug results and the Department of Corrections has no means to stop that unless the officers who collect the samples are very alert and they comply with the rules that have been set down for those tests. Also connected to the drug-testing system are the drug-treatment units that are being run by the department and I would like to congratulate the Department of Corrections on being very effective at addressing the drug addiction of prisoners within the wire. This legislation will now bring the offenders who are on parole on bail or on temporary release in line with the prisoners who are in the custody of the Department of Corrections. So they will be as responsible for addressing their offending and their drug and alcohol use as the prisoners inside the walls of the prison. I think it will be a situation where the prisoners whether they are in prison in custody or outside in the community will be responsible for their behaviour. Other than that the other issue that we had was about the modalities of how this drug-testing regime is going to work. We were told that the bailees will be administered by the police and those on parole or on temporary release will be managed as it is by the Department of Corrections. So it will be up to the Commissioner of Police to formulate the rules for the police and the Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections will be responsible for laying down the rules for the department. Our fear was what happens if they do not coordinate with each other. For that purpose I had to fix that anomaly. I lodged Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) 163 proposing that it becomes mandatory for the police commissioner and the chief executive of Corrections to talk to each other and to consult each other while formulating the rules for their respective areas of work. However I think only the Greens saw the wisdom in supporting that SOP and I thank them for that. The Minister thought that it was not necessary for such an SOP to be supported by the Government. She reckons that Corrections and Police do talk to each other so it is not necessary for this legislation to make it mandatory for them to talk. If that is the case our question is what happened when Phillip John Smith escaped the country? What happened when Tony Robertson raped and killed Blessie Gotingco? In both these cases the two departments did not know what the other was doing. It took them about 48 hours to talk about the escape by Phillip John Smith. To fix that situation the SOP was put through but it was not supported by the Government. The Minister went to the extent of implying that the Chief Executive of the Department of Corrections and the Commissioner of Police share information and work very well with each other and therefore there is no such need for an SOP like that. Although we support the legislation given the intent behind it we have some questions that are yet unanswered. Those questions again are about how it is going to work about the modalities of the drug-testing regime. We want to make sure that the offenders who are on parole are kept in line with the bailees so that there is no unfairness in administering this legislation. Overall it is good legislation and we support it.