Webb DuncanDr DUNCAN WEBB (Labour—Christchurch Central): Thank you Madam Chair. In that case then I'd like to speak to my tabled amendment that was tabled on 31 October at 9.45. It's an amendment which would replace clause 4 and do two things. It would replace 8 years" with "2 years" but it would give—Marja Lubeck: Very good. Dr DUNCAN WEBB: Absolutely right—it would be a much more reasonable sentence. But actually much much more important than the length of the sentence is the direction that must be given to the court and that is a direction to impose rehabilitative and reintegrative sentences because what we don't want to do is to send people to a training ground for criminal activity and simply teach them how to deal drugs better. Now what we know is that when young people particularly find their way into prison the reoffending rate is extremely high—sometimes up to 70 percent. There are two key reasons for that. One is because there are no resources focused on rehabilitation on teaching these people the skills so that they can re-enter the community. But more importantly—and I think this is the greater gap—is the reintegration. The fact is that prison is an isolating place. It does the opposite of teaching people how to have meaningful social relationships having a relationship in a workplace having a relationship with whānau and having an ordinary relationship with friends. So any court-imposed penalty should have a reintegrative element and we know that if resources are put into reintegration the costs of criminality fall because reoffending rates fall and imprisonment costs fall and what we see is that the whole cycle of criminality is improved. Let's not pretend—and I know Mr Darroch Ball gave an impassioned speech about the evil of these people but the fact of the matter is that many of these offenders are themselves in the grips of addiction. They are themselves in a cycle of poverty of misery of addiction and of mental health trauma and what they need is those problems to be addressed. Simply throwing them into a cell doesn't address that so my tabled amendment from the last session addresses that. It says that we should have rehabilitation as a focal point and when I say "rehabilitation" I would hope that the court would be very directive that it's giving those people the kinds of life skills that will make sure that they can become useful members of the community because one of the difficulties we have is that people find themselves supplying synthetic cannabis for want of a meaningful alternative. So we need to rehabilitate them so that when they come out they know how to operate finances they know how to find a job and they have all of those skills that most of us take for granted and that most of us pass on to our children but in some cases it simply isn't done. That reintegration is the fact that that next step of the corrections process is taking that member and slowly placing them back into a community setting and saying "Here is somewhere that you can belong. Here is someone who will support you. Here is a job."—perhaps a supported job—"Here is building some work relationships."—relationships of trust which sadly for some are not very common in those communities they come from. So what this amendment does is it says "Look we don't need to put people away for eight years." and even if imprisonment is the answer we need to have a humane prison environment. It's something that this party has been looking at for some time and something that we've seen in the new prison being built that will have a mental health facility attached. So in this tabled amendment what we see is a change of direction. Rather than Mr Brown's sledgehammer we see something entirely different. We see something where we accept the humanity in every person and what we want to see happen is that out of that process comes not someone who feels punished and alienated but someone who can move back into the community with a new sense of worth with some healing done and with new and better connections with family and community. CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): Now just before I give the next call I can advise Dr Duncan Webb that in relation to Supplementary Order Paper 164 he has given it to the clerks but not released it I understand. I'm giving him an indication that it would be out of order—so it's an indicative decision—because it would be contrary to the principles and objects of the bill which of course is about increasing penalty and the House accepted that at the second reading. Dr Duncan Webb: Thank you Madam Chair. CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): So I'm not going to argue it. It's—Dr Duncan Webb: No I'm—thank you for your direction. CHAIRPERSON (Hon Anne Tolley): —been ruled—well it hasn't been ruled out. I'm giving you—because we haven't got it on the Table. But that would be my ruling."