Power Simon: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
Power Simon: Debate on Prime Minister’s Statement 
[Volume:670;Page:16687] 
Hon SIMON POWER (Minister of Justice) 
: 
 I will start by saying happy New Year to all members in the Chamber. It will be a very interesting year ahead indeed. I will briefly make a couple of quick comments on the Labour Party reshuffle. 
You see I watched with some interest to see who had progressed who had gone back and who had stayed in the same spot. It is always interesting from the Government side to watch Opposition reshuffles; I have been involved in a few in my time. The thing that interested me was that when we came down for the debate on the Prime Minister’s statement on Tuesday—which I will get to in a moment—I sat here and thought it would be interesting to see the new faces in the nine front-bench seats of the Labour Party. Much to my disappointment nothing had changed. They were the same nine faces who had been there prior to Christmas. They were slightly altered in position but by and large nothing had changed. I do not want to cast any aspersions on Grant Robertson. I think he probably has a pretty promising career ahead but in no one’s book is sitting on the cross benches the same as being on the front bench. Labour’s attempt to sell its two new front-benchers when they are actually sitting on the cross benches does not cut any mustard at all I am afraid. 
I have a couple of interesting observations. David Parker is up to No. 4. He is an astute sort of character who no doubt will make a strong contribution to the Labour line-up. In particular I am looking forward to his making true the headline: “Parker to lead campaign against asset sales”. We have now been in here for two question times but I do not think we have had a question from him yet. He asked for the job and got the job we were told. Unfortunately I do not think that Clayton Cosgrove the Opposition spokesperson on State-owned enterprises was told about that as he did not seem to know anything about that particular delegation. 
It is worth saying there will be people on the Opposition side who will be disappointed with the reshuffle and it is worth mentioning just a couple of those as we pass by. H V Ross Robertson continues to be disappointed with and underutilised by Labour. In fact I was sitting here before and could not see across the benches the seat where his traditional sheepskin cover was located in the new line-up. I see it now over there slightly slumped down and not set up with the usual pride that Ross Robertson would expect from his sheepskin there. It is rumoured of course that he deserved better. The majority in his seat alone would probably tally up to a total bigger than the majorities of all the Labour front-benchers parked up together and it is a pity that Labour does not recognise those who are working hard on the ground. 
Other questions popped into my head. What happened to the promising Clare Curran or in fact the upcoming Ashraf Choudhary and the sturdy but reliable Rick Barker? What happened? What became of those reasonably hard-working characters during the reshuffle? 
What interested me the most though I have to say was to see during Phil Goff’s reply to the Prime Minister’s speech how few of the Labour members lifted their heads to listen to what Phil Goff had to say. Everybody was very busy—very busy. There was lots of important paperwork and lots of correspondence that had to be dealt with. Heads were down; no one was looking. To be fair apart from the Hon Darren Hughes’ permanently transfixed glaze of adoration everybody else was looking down and was absent from the debate. Clayton Cosgrove—good old Clayton Cosgrove—had to be pried from his seat to clap at the end of that contribution to the debate and frankly Ruth Dyson thought that Ethiopia was a better option. 
Who lost out in the reshuffle? Well apart from Mita Ririnui who I see is almost as far back in the House as Chris Carter now the only person who has really lost out from this reshuffle—and members opposite know this in their heart of hearts—was the Hon Phil Goff. It is only a matter of time. 
National on the other hand under the stewardship of the Prime Minister set out in his statement a clear and definitive path for the year ahead. It is a plan for growth a plan for debt reduction and a plan for good use of capital versus what the other side has to offer which is a 58 percent tax rate to try to pay for its uncosted promises in its borrow-and-hope strategy. I will take this opportunity to give the Opposition and others a bit more explanation about the Prime Minister’s statement in respect of the justice sector in the year ahead. 
Members of the House and the public can expect the Government to be focused on victims’ rights during the course of 2011. They can expect to see amendments to current legislation in that area as we move to deal with matters that the previous Government got nowhere near. Under that Government victim impact statements were censored and edited. That will change when this Government brings legislation to the House. Under this Government prosecution services will be talking to victims not leaving them on the sidelines as happened under that Government. Under this Government more information will be made available to victims as they enter the courtroom unlike the situation under that Government when victims were not told about how processes worked or what was going on in a courtroom at any one time. 
The Drivers of Crime initiative will be continuing with a considerable degree of focus this year and this year this Government is prepared to tackle the tough issues about how the justice system treats children. For too long the justice system has been prepared to settle into a situation where an adversarial system a pistols-at-dawn system for dealing with child witnesses and victims has been allowed to continue. The previous Labour Government did not deem it appropriate to deal with this issue at any time over its 9 years in office. It was prepared to see children as victims and witnesses treated badly by the court because it was not prepared to make the fundamental changes that are necessary. That will change under this Government starting with work this year. 
Another area that concerns this Government considerably is why children women in particular and other vulnerable parties have to wait so long for matters to be resolved in the Family Court. In the last 5 years the Family Court saw the number of cases heard increase by 7 percent but costs increased by 43 percent. When Labour was in Government it did nothing. It did nothing to look after those parties in our court system. That will all change under this Government this year when we undertake a fundamental review of how the Family Court is operating to the benefit of those people. Under that Government children were waiting 15 months from the time that an information was laid on an offence that they were in involved with either as victims or witnesses. They waited 15 months before that matter was committed to trial and that lot did nothing—they did nothing! That will all change under this Government. 
Members can expect to see further measures to protect children and to actually hold to account those parents and caregivers who live under the same roof as a child who is neglected or abused but who take no responsibility for what is going on. That Government did nothing about that issue for 9 years. This Government will get on and legislate to make those homes safer for the children and women who suffer in that environment. This Government has introduced safety protection orders and further measures in relation to offender levies to make sure that the victims of crime get what they deserve and are treated with respect by the court system and the justice system. I was very disappointed to inherit a legacy of such imperative and serious issues having been ignored by the Labour members. 
Of course Parliament will deal this year with the criminal simplification legislation and most important legislation relating to alcohol. It will be a busy year ahead for the justice sector. Not only do we have many new initiatives much drive and momentum and a big appetite for reform but we will have to spend a lot of time on cleaning up the mess left by that lot before the 2008 election.