Collins Judith: Juries (Jury Service and Protection of Particulars of Jury List Information) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Collins Judith: Juries (Jury Service and Protection of Particulars of Jury List Information) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 31 July 2012. Volume:682;Page:4125. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon JUDITH COLLINS (Minister of Justice) 
: 
 I take the opportunity to address some of the issues that have been raised tonight—some of the issues that Mr Chauvel mentioned and raised in I have to say a pretty patronising way frankly. Having said that it was significantly better than the contribution from Mr Andrew Little which I have to say resembled a plea in mitigation more than anything else. 
One of the issues that Mr Chauvel has referred to is that it is apparently now the age of Google. Well it has been like that for a wee while. But we also have a situation where the Law Commission has considered the issue of jury anonymity in its 2001 report  
Juries in Criminal Trials 
 which I am sure he has read—and if not will. The comment was made that some international jurisdictions have implemented laws allowing or in some cases ensuring anonymity using unique identifiers rather than names. That would be something that would help in terms of identification obviously for jurors and their protection. However the commission did not recommend any such provision in New Zealand on the basis that it could be justified only if there was a genuine threat to juror safety in terms of that particular issue. 
But the Law Commission also noted—and I think this is very important because of course juries have to look at the facts they have to be fairly dealt with and they have to be able to deal fairly with the issues before them—that there is some evidence that juror anonymity may affect jury verdicts with anonymous jurors far more likely to convict. I think that is something that we should take seriously that in fact jurors—and I think that is the experience of most people who have had anything to do with them—take their job extremely seriously and do their very best. Sometimes when we only see media reports about cases we might wonder as to how they came to those decisions but actually they have heard all the evidence. They and the judges are the only people apart from defendants and the lawyers who have heard all the evidence and they have come to their decisions having considered it very fully. 
However we do know that there has been this problem of how we provide the lawyer for the defendant with information that can help them decide whether or not a juror might have a conflict of interest or some prejudged comment that they have made—all those sorts of things—and at the same time do what we can to protect the juror. A comment was made by Mr Chauvel a suggestion around the fact that we could make it an offence to google or to try to contact someone or get their information without lawful excuse—that is pretty much what you were saying was it not Mr Chauvel? Well actually the people we are talking about who could be so dangerous to jurors are sometimes murderers. I really do not think they will worry too much about a fine for contacting someone or trying to get information on Google. I do not think that will work but I think the solution that we have come up with is a very sensible solution. In fact the Law and Order Committee felt so too—that it is balanced it does consider the right to a fair trial and at the same time it enables the jury list information that has particular information around the jurors’ address information to be designated as protected particulars so that it can be dealt with by way of a self-represented defendant who would actually not get to see all those particulars. A lawyer would be appointed to look at those for that defendant. The lawyer would be able to certify to the judge that they did not give them the copy of it that they brought them back and they in fact enabled a defendant to be able to say “That person there is someone who used to go out with that witness who is going to say this about me.” That is the sort of thing that they should be able to do. 
So it is actually a balance. It does not solve every situation that might occur. It does not futureproof everything because actually that is not how the law works. The law is not so certain. It is a balance between the right to a fair trial and also for jurors to be able to feel that they are safe that they can be protected and that they will in fact want to serve their service as jurors.