Upston Louise; Rurawhe AdrianRIGHTS FOR VICTIMS OF INSANE OFFENDERS BILLSecond ReadingHon LOUISE UPSTON (National—Taupō): I move That the Rights for Victims of Insane Offenders Bill be now read a second time.This bill is about victims' rights and it's another step to ensuring that victims are at the heart of our justice system. This bill gives victims a voice when they haven't had it before and gives them rights that they don't currently have. For too long there's been a vast gap between how victims of crimes of sane offenders have been treated and those of insane offenders and I believe that's wrong. There should be equal rights for victims of crime so there isn't a difference whether the person committed it as a sane or insane person and whether or not they are being dealt with by the justice system or the health system.A victim through no fault of their own has had their lives impacted by the actions of another. The fact that someone is found to be insane doesn't change the enormous harm that victims and their families suffer. This bill proposes a new finding of proven but insane". It changes the finding so victims don't hear the phrase "not guilty". It also gives victims a voice and it provides victims information to help them keep themselves safe. What it doesn't do and one thing that the select committee was very careful about is disadvantage or harm the person who committed the act.Providing equivalence for victims whether the person who caused the harm was insane or sane and dealt with by the health system or justice system seems like a no-brainer. Can I tell the House that it hasn't been that way. I want to give my thanks to constituent Graeme Moyle who has doggedly pursued improvements to the system so that no other victim would have to go through what he and his family have gone through following the death of his brother Colin. The person who killed Colin was found not guilty on a count of insanity. Colin was killed in 2007 and Graeme has been fighting for change since then. Graeme if you're watching I fought for you for 12 years and the finish line is now very close.I want to give a very special thanks to all parties in this House for supporting the bill at first reading unanimously. It is unusual and I'm very grateful for that. I also want to put on record my thanks for the enormous efforts of the members of the Justice Committee so very ably chaired by Ginny Andersen of the officials and of parliamentary counsel because this was indeed a very complex issue to be dealt with through a member's bill and I appreciate the amount of time and energy that was committed to doing this.What I'd love to say is that I think examples like the select committee through this bill are examples of Parliament operating at its best. I only wish that more members of the public were able to witness some of the important and collegial problem-solving work that is done in select committees often behind doors. I also want to put on record my particular thanks to the Minister the Hon Andrew Little for his support and for allowing his health officials to give the full remit to improve this bill in the select committee process. I think it's fair to say that drafting a member's bill that alters four pieces of legislation was very complex and the bill is in far better shape now than it was when I first introduced it to the House.I want to thank those who have submitted on the bill. Victims that we heard from were very courageous and I know that many of the submissions moved those who were on the select committee. Victims shared their stories and their experiences. Some shared their stories for the very first time. What was also very special was that the victims even of some absolutely horrendous actions were very generous and very clear about the fact that any changes we made to the legislation did not cause any disadvantage or harm to the special patients.I'd like to go through some of the changes proposed and agreed unanimously in the select committee. The first one as I mentioned is the most significant and that is the change to the finding that we will now know if this bill passes through all stages as "proven but insane". I do have to say that my first attempt was quite clumsy. Instead what I had was "the acts or omissions are proven but the defendant is not criminally responsible on account of insanity"—which let's be fair is a mouthful. To get it to "proven but insane" is very clearly understood and I think that's really important for any victim who doesn't now have to hear the words "not guilty". It's very clearly a better recognition. There's no doubt about the person that committed the act or who did the act and I think that's really important for the victims and being able to heal from this horrendous act.The four pieces of legislation that are amended are the Criminal Procedure (Mentally Impaired Persons) Act 2003 the Mental Health (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Act 1992 the Intellectual Disability (Compulsory Care and Rehabilitation) Act 2003 and the Victims' Rights Act 2002. So in terms of changes to the first part of it which is of course the most important—changing the finding to "proven but insane"—there were some other changes that were made that actually weren't intended in the drafting from a policy perspective. Again I'm very grateful to my colleagues on the select committee who used their legal expertise to make sure we got this into the right place.The second significant change is around victims' rights. One of the things that we heard more often than anything I think was the fact that victims wanted to have a voice. They wanted to be able to have the equivalent of what in the justice system is providing their victim impact statement. Again in the original drafting of the bill it was at a later stage in the proceedings which wasn't necessarily what victims wanted but they did want their voice heard. So what in the select committee we improved it to was basically creating a new class of victims where the victims of defendants if the court recorded a finding of "proven but insane" were also able to make a victim impact statement in court. At that stage it would be in the deposition hearing which I think is a significant improvement.The third part of the changes was really about providing information to victims so they felt informed and in some cases could keep themselves safe. We were quite clear about what the scope of their submission would be. Some of that was around decisions for leave which of course sit with the Director of Mental Health and in some cases the Minister. It was making sure that the victim had the ability to provide a submission if they so chose and it also as we heard from the Director of Mental Health was useful for their process in terms of providing leave or approving leave because what we heard in one instance was a victim basically then bumping into the person the special patient when they were on release. That was devastating both for the victim but equally for the special patient and that's why we wanted to make sure in the select committee process that we were doing what was in the best interests of both.There are a number of other changes which I won't go through the detail of but that provides the gist of it in terms of the first area changing the finding to "proven but insane" which is so exciting because that's what I wanted to do initially and we just couldn't find a way to draft it. So we did in the select committee—victims having a voice and being able to keep themselves safe if they knew that a special patient was on release. We hope that this bill gives victims and their loved ones comfort knowing their voices have been heard by members of Parliament and that action has been taken. I'm very optimistic that the unanimous support of this House will continue for the readings to follow and I'm very grateful for the support of this House. Thank you.DEPUTY SPEAKER: The question is that the motion be agreed to. Members it's come time for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break.Sitting suspended from 5.57 p.m. to 7 p.m."