O'Rourke Denis: Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (2012 Expiry and Application Dates) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
O'Rourke Denis: Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (2012 Expiry and Application Dates) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 26 June 2012. Volume:681;Page:3317. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First) 
: 
 This Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (2012 Expiry and Application Dates) Amendment Bill as we know simply extends the current regime for a further year while new legislation is developed. I want to emphasise that because New Zealand First does not expect that the current regime will simply carry on after the delay of another year. What we do expect is that there will be a rigorous examination of the current regime under the current legislation to see whether it does work whether it is worthwhile whether in fact it is necessary at all and whether it has achieved or is capable of achieving its current objectives. We do not know whether or not that is the case yet but for the time being New Zealand First is happy to accept the bill as it is to extend the date for a further year and to support the bill on that basis and also on the basis that there will be genuine consultation and a willingness to listen by all parties in the House so that we can in fact get some legislation for the future that is really worth having. 
I am not saying that necessarily the current legislation is a failure—I do not know whether or not that is the case yet—nor am I saying that it is needed. It is yet to be seen whether that is the case. But I do know that there are some underlying principles that I think we should always observe in considering the new legislation to be developed. First of all we must make sure that the penalty a person who is imprisoned gets is just the loss of liberty. That is the penalty they have been sentenced to and nothing else. I do not believe that it should get in the way of opportunities for rehabilitation education and reorientation of their direction in life. I do not believe that it should result in the loss of other rights such as the right to vote and the right to protection from personal or mental abuse while in prison or result in the loss of services like decent medical care and it does not mean either the loss of a right to accident compensation for genuine— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch) 
: Order! The member must refer in the Committee stage only to what is in this bill. He cannot expand it out. 
DENIS O’ROURKE 
: What I am saying is simply this. We have a year within which to develop new legislation and this is the basis upon which New Zealand First says that this new legislation should be developed. Central to this are rights; whether prisoners should be able to have the same rights to compensation—accident compensation or compensation for mistreatment—while in prison. That is central to this bill so I do not see why that should not be discussed right now. And it does not mean of course the loss of other rights as well. 
On the other hand there is no doubt that there needs to be a balance of the preservation of all of those rights with the fact that some prisoners do attempt to abuse those rights and we have seen some of that happen in recent years. We certainly should not mollycoddle prisoners and we should make sure that there are no rorts attached to their exercise of the rights that they have especially those that I have mentioned—for compensation. There does we believe need to be the development of some special rules around what sort of compensation and what circumstances prisoners can claim compensation for whether it be for an accident or whether it be for mistreatment while in prison. Those are the sorts of rules that we expect to see developed as part of the coming legislation. That balance needs to be there to meet community expectations and to make sure that rights are not abused. 
Finally I do want to make some comment on the point that other speakers have made concerning victims of crime in relation to restorative justice. We should consider as part of the rules I have spoken of whether any compensation paid to a prisoner however it may arise should be capable of transfer to their victims and therefore the need for restorative justice in that way. There are two choices there. Either that should be the case only for the victims of a particular prisoner’s actions or the compensation should be available to all victims of crime in a pool or fund held for that purpose. I believe that it is only appropriate for us—