Simpson Scott: Victims of Crime Reform Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeSimpson Scott: Victims of Crime Reform Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 16 April 2014. Volume:698;Page:17353. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): As chairman of the Justice and Electoral Committee it is a pleasure to speak during this Committee stage on the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. The previous member Denis O’Rourke made I thought some very valid points in relation to the changes. But first may I speak for a moment or two on the contribution of the Hon Maryan Street who whilst indicating that Labour will support this legislation indicated in her speech that this was by some way a small little step of just not such significance that it would need to be anything other than a minor piece of legislation. Well I take exactly the opposite view. I think that this is a comprehensive and innovative step that the Minister of Justice has brought to the House. In terms of the purpose of this bill which is to change the law relating to the victims of crime and to give victims a much greater voice in our criminal justice system this is an important and very significant step in our justice system.We know that this is an omnibus bill. It amends the Victims’ Rights Act of 2002 the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act of 1989 the Parole Act of 2002 and the Sentencing Act of 2002 as well. As a Government we on this side are absolutely unapologetic about putting victims first in our judicial system and it is partly because the victims are not there in any way other than as innocent participants. They do not get involved in our judicial system by dint of wanting to be there; they are the innocent victims. So I think it is right and proper that as we consider the Committee stage of this bill we do keep a very clear sense of focus on the rights of victims.I want to turn just for a moment to the provisions in the bill that relate to the information that is to be contained in the impact statements. The bill provides that information ascertained from a victim in a victim impact statement may include photographs drawings or visual representations. That is a new step and it is something that I think is quite important. It is particularly of use where there are young victims who may not want to have a process where a formal document is written out but they may want to prepare a picture a drawing or a diagram that is representative of the impact that the crime of which they are a victim has impacted them their families and their loved ones. So I think that is an appropriate step.What it means is that it will enable the victim to provide information to the court about the effects of the offending as it relates particularly to them. Of course it is going to assist the court in understanding the victim’s views about the actual offending. Further it will go to informing the offender who is actually the root cause of the proceedings in the first place about the impact of the offending from the victim’s perspective. Too often that victim’s perspective is not well founded in our judicial system and it is something that has over past years been lost sometimes. So this change is I think an important one.The bill further provides for the procedure relating to how a victim impact statement must be submitted and so there are a couple of important changes that are featured in the new sections 21 to 22B inserted by clause 15. They include that a victim impactstatement may upon request be read to the court if the judicial officer sentencing the offender agrees. In some cases victims are too emotionally distraught and overcome to be able to actually stand before a court—which in many cases can be an intimidating process in its own right—and then have to read out the actual statement. So this provision that allows in certain circumstances for the statement to be read by somebody else is I think a significant and useful step forward. The statement may actually be read by the prosecutor the victim or a person nominated by the victim. So the victim can actually choose if you will to have a voice other than themselves right in the courtroom and I think that that will be a powerful vehicle for sending messages not only to the offender but to others who are involved in the court process. The legislation is good and I support it.