Utikere Tangi; Mitchell MarkTANGI UTIKERE (Labour—Palmerston North): Kia orana. Thank you Mr Chair. I'd like to touch on some clauses that I understand have not been referred to in the committee stage at this point and that starts at clause 36 which is part of Part 1. This is really important because it's relating to the rights of prisoners who are charged with an alleged offence internally in prisons Minister. Section 133A relates to the role of a hearing adjudicator. My experience of hearing adjudicators is that they are well trained they do an excellent job in the prisons in terms of conducting. They're not just anyone; they have to undertake specified training in order to do that. This bill introduces a new change in that process and it relates to the ability for a hearing adjudicator to basically proceed with a disciplinary hearing without the prisoner being present. Up to now prisoners are expected and required to be present for proceedings of this nature. There is also an opportunity for a prisoner to appeal a decision that a hearing adjudicator has made to a visiting justice. Now I've spent five years as a visiting justice in prisons in this country before coming to this place so I'm very very familiar with this process. What does concern me though Minister is that the new subsection (3) basically indicates that there is no right of appeal to a visiting justice solely against the decision of a hearing adjudicator under subsection (1) on the basis that the hearing adjudicator made the decision to proceed in the absence of the prisoner. Now I can recollect countless occasions where there would be prisoners who'd be brought to the hearing and for some reason it wouldn't immediately become clear as to what the issue might be. Now there might be circumstances for example where the hearing adjudicator makes the decision to proceed with a hearing in the absence of the prisoner. Now yes there is an evidentiary threshold that's required to be met but there's no further detail about what needs to happen. It just needs to be that the adjudicator receives evidence from an officer that the prisoner has refused. Now there are circumstances where there might be family bereavements and there might be issues that the prisoner is dealing with that may not be apparent at the time but that is the genesis upon which the prisoner makes a decision to refuse.My question to the Minister is as I understand it that new section actually provides no discretion at all for a visiting justice who is at the appellate level to basically consider reasons for the failure to present the prisoner. And if so is he open to make changes in that particular space? Because it would seem to me that that would be an affront to natural justice if the visiting justice simply was not able to consider an appeal without all of the information. So that's the first one.The second one is in relation to clause 40. So this is where the visiting justice themselves makes the decision and they may actually make the decision themselves that the prisoner is refused etc. There is a requirement for the visiting justice to proceed with the hearing. If they do so they must record the decision in writing and the reasons for it. Now my experience with visiting justices is that the reasons that are recorded are in the prison visiting-justice book. Often it's a ledger where there are maybe five compartments—date who the person is what the penalty is whether it's proven—and then you sign it or stamp it. Is that satisfactory for the purposes of the decision? Because it is extremely rare in my recollection for visiting justices to effectively dictate what in the courts would be delivered as a written decision. So I'd like some clarity around what it means by must record in writing the decision and reasons for it." There is also no expectation that that decision would be made available to the prisoner. So in a court context that would be open to the prisoner. But if the prisoner chooses not to actually attend the visiting justice goes ahead with the hearing in the absence of the prisoner and makes a decision which needs to be recorded in writing. But how will the prisoner know what the outcome of that is apart from whether they perhaps are on their way to self-confinement or loss of privileges? So I think it is an important distinction between the two and there are a couple of other areas that I'd like to pick up on as well but perhaps I could leave it there in the first instance.Hon MARK MITCHELL (Minister of Corrections): Yeah I think the whole purpose of why this was put into the bill is to make the disciplining process more efficient and safer leading to safety for our prison officers and the other prisoners as well. I think that the reason why—clearly the reason why the prisoner can't appeal the fact that he wasn't there is because he's refused to actually attend. So he can still appeal the actual outcome of the hearing but he doesn't have any appeal rights in terms of failing to appear because he's been given the opportunity and he's chosen not to appear. In terms of whether or not there's personal mitigating circumstances that is very operational but my experience is—and I'm sure it's the member's experience too—that Corrections will work around that. They'll give them every opportunity to appear and if there's mitigating circumstances like a death in the family or for some reason they just don't feel up to it then Corrections will take that into account and work around it.The other point in terms of—of course the matter has to be recorded by the justice and of course the prisoner will be informed of the outcome of that hearing."