Prime Willow-JeanHon WILLOW-JEAN PRIME (Labour): Thank you Madam Chair. I'm really pleased that you have given me this call because I have sat and waited and waited and waited for about four or five contributions for the Minister of Justice to answer my question which he never did. He never answered my question so I will just refresh his memory and give him an opportunity while I'm making this contribution to answer my question which was around how this proposal fits with New Zealand's international commitments such as the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. In the departmental disclosure statement it says Māori are overrepresented in the criminal justice system and the funding change may exacerbate this disparity as a higher proportion of Māori (and Pacific Peoples) offenders receive a legally aided section 27 report compared [to] others." So what steps have been taken to determine whether this policy meets our international obligations under that convention? That was my question; that has not been answered.Hon Paul Goldsmith: Do you want me to answer it?Hon WILLOW-JEAN PRIME: No I'm not going to sit down; I'm going to do my next contribution in case it doesn't come back to me again.The Minister talked about a cottage industry and what I want to put to the Minister is in terms of the cottage industry there were other options put in the advice to him that could address some of the concerns that he has outlined with the creation of this cottage industry. The Defence Lawyers Association are imploring the Minister to consider other alternatives to what he is proposing to defund section 27 reports. The Defence Lawyers Association said that "If there is any concern about the cost or the quality of the reports then we don't use those report writers she said. Putting in place standards for [a report writer] was discussed as an alternative to cutting the funding" entirely and that this would be preferable if report writers were actually the concern—and I've heard the Minister say this—but "To scrap the report funding completely is a retrograde step and if the information that was usually in those reports is presented to the courts it will blow out sentencing times and judge time[s]". So this is the Defence Lawyers Association saying that she does not think that the Government has "anticipated the built-in costs associated with scrapping the funding."Now the second point that I want to make on that one is that the Bar Association wants the Government "to consider the evidence about the impact of [the] reports since their use [and] to determine whether the cost / benefit justifies their continuation when assessed against reoffending rates and rehabilitation gains made." Will the Minister give due consideration to the submissions to the points that the Defence Lawyers Association and the Bar Association are making about what could be a better way to address his concerns that this has created a cottage industry? The Government's proposal to simply defund this as we have heard in the debate tonight is creating access-to-justice issues serious ones—serious ones that disproportionately affect Māori in the criminal justice system. So my question to the Minister is: will you consider what the Bar Association has requested and what the Defence Lawyers Association has requested?I want to make a different contribution about costs because the Minister is saying that this is all about a cost-saving exercise. Now in an earlier contribution which the Minister said he would not address until he got to the substantive section—which is now this substantive section—I talked about the cost-benefit analysis of this report. Putting justice aside which I think should be the primary consideration this is a cost-saving exercise by this Government within the justice system but what the evidence suggests to us is that there will be more costs to the justice system from this section 27 defunding proposal that we are debating tonight—and they are significant costs. Is the Minister aware of the costs that he is creating for the justice system and are they going to be more than the costs that you think that you are saving let alone the impact that you are having on people?So what we have here is that the cost of funding section 27—[Time expired]"