Victims of Crime Reform Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeVictims of Crime Reform Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 16 April 2014. Volume:698;Page:17350. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Victims of Crime Reform BillIn CommitteeDebate resumed from 8 April.Part 1 Amendments to Victims’ Rights Act 2002(continued)Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour): The last time I was speaking on this bill the Committee rose during my second call but I was saying that Labour was in support of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill which we still are. But my word what a difference a couple of weeks can make to the tenor of a debate. This is the Victims of Crime ReformBill. We have seen before us in this House today the most extraordinary performance by the Minister who is the sponsor of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill the Minister of Justice Judith Collins.There are victims of crime. There are people who suffer because of the crimes that are committed against them and this bill seeks to address that. But one of the victims of this Minister’s actions to date has been truth. We see truth as a victim in this particular matter. I see that it is entirely apposite at this point to reflect on the sponsor of this bill because her performance in the House has jeopardised any understanding or any confidence that we might have about her ability to speak the truth to this Parliament. Her ability to speak the truth to this Parliament has been called into question by her own actions—Hon Dr Nick Smith: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. We are debating Part 1 of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. That is not a licence—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I thank the member. Yes the debate is just going through Part 1. When we are on the parts of the bill in the Committee stage these are narrow debates focused on what is actually in the part. That is actually what we will now be focusing on. So we are on Part 1 and I would ask the member to come back to those provisions that are contained in Part 1.Hon MARYAN STREET: In Part 1 of this bill there are of course all of the initial provisions that one would expect: the principal Act being amended the interpretation the treatment and so on. One of the things that does come up here is the purpose of victim impact statements. This is something that members of the Justice and Electoral Committee turned their minds to quite substantially because there were a number of submitters who spoke to this point. This certainly is a matter of some debate. In the course of the submissions that we heard there were comments made by members of the judiciary that it would be better if they still had the ability to control this in a way that allowed the court to proceed without undue delay but also without cutting off the victims’ statements too quickly so that they would still feel that they had achieved something in making their victim impact statement available to the court and have that moment in court to address the concerns that they had and the injury that they had sustained through the crime.This was something that is certainly a matter of balance. Supplementary Order Paper 424 which the Minister of Justice has put up in her own name fundamentally rewrites parts of this bill and addresses the changes to victim impact statements in clause 11 and clause 12. I just want to say that victims should be allowed a chance within the safety and the control of the court proceedings to give voice to their concerns.Where I was about to go in my last speech on this bill was to talk about a case that we knew so well from the media. That was the case of Sophie Elliot and the need for her family to be able to say what the impact had been on them and at the same time to address the kind of trial in absentia of their daughter by virtue of the defence’s ability to misrepresent her—in fact to say things about her that the family felt were inappropriate unreasonable wrong untrue and in need of rebuttal.This bill allows the victim impact statement to be presented to the court. Its purpose is to provide information to the court about the effects of the offending and to assist the court in understanding the victim’s view of the offending and also to tell the offender about the impact of the offending from the victim’s perspective. This is a critical point. This is something that we support. Even though there had been submissions from members of the judiciary who felt that it could lead to some disorder or to some lengthy hearings that were not enhanced by victim statements going on for too long I would err on the side of giving people the opportunity to have their say. So whether a victim impact statement is read to the court by the victims themselves or read on their behalfby somebody else I think it is part of the process in this Victims of Crime Reform Bill that allows us to support this legislation.We have got no doubt that the situation of victims in law and otherwise has improved greatly since Parliament first dealt with the issue in 1987 and we do not oppose that. We do feel that this bill represents another little bit of incremental change. The bill following this one this evening will demonstrate another piece of incremental change that could really have been done with a bit more boldness and a bit more of a comprehensive approach and we could have got more in it.I do not wish to incur your correction again Mr Chairman but I am concerned that the Minister who is presenting and sponsoring this bill and the Supplementary Order Paper that makes a number of changes to the bill has done herself and this Parliament damage. We would not wish to see this piece of legislation damaged by the irreparable harm that has been done by the Minister of Justice sponsoring this bill by virtue of her own admission—by virtue of her own words. This is an omnibus bill that addresses and changes four discrete pieces of legislation and it should be able to proceed. Even if we do believe that it is incremental in its approach it should be able to proceed unsullied in its passage through this House. But quite frankly everything this Minister touches now is sullied and it is that reputation that is part of the shadow that now hangs over everything that this Minister touches. This bill is one of those things that she has sponsored but it is a good bill.DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): New Zealand First does support this bill the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. We see the bill and especially Part 1 as another very welcome step forward in the emerging movement to do more to support and consider the rights and needs of the victims of crime. That movement appears to me to have the support of all of the parties of Parliament because we all do want to see victims of crime better supported and considered than they have been in the past so we especially welcome Part 1 of this bill. New Zealand First also supports the amendments in Supplementary Order Paper 424 for the same reasons.I especially wanted to commend clause 10 which concerns section 16 of the Victims’ Rights Act. It ensures that reference to all of a victim’s contact details as are now listed in the bill will be restricted to ensure the privacy of the victim. That of course adds very greatly to a victim’s sense of security and privacy while allowing them the opportunity to take a full part in the process. It is a minor amendment but it is a very important amendment for victims for those reasons.I also wanted to refer briefly to new section 17 inserted by clause 12 which actually requires a prosecutor to find out from any victim all relevant information about the victim’s injuries property loss or damage and other effects of the offence so that they can be taken into account for sentencing and presumably reparation purposes. The words used are that the prosecutor “must make all reasonable efforts” and that puts the onus on the prosecutor to find out the necessary details so that they can be taken proper account of in the process in the court. That means of course that the prosecutor has to be proactive which was not a requirement in the past. They relied on the victim themselves to make sure that those details were provided and of course they not always were. So I think again that it is a relatively minor improvement but it is a very important improvement to the legislation so that the necessary details actually do get before the court and that is as it should be. So New Zealand First is very happy indeed to see that particular provision in the bill.The information to be sought is actually set out in the new section 17(1A) and it refers to: “(a) any physical injury or emotional harm suffered by the victim through or by means of the offence; and (b) any loss of or damage to property suffered by the victim through or by means of the offence; and (c) any other effects of the offence onthe victim; and (d) any other matter consistent with the purpose of victim impact statements …” as set out elsewhere in the legislation. I think that this is a particularly good provision. It is comprehensive and it does the job.The value of these amendments is that they put the victims first and that is what New Zealand First has argued forfor a number of years. The rights and interests of victims have for far far too long been secondary to the process of convicting the offender. Now we are seeing more and more this movement by which the effects on the victim are being taken account of more and more and real and practical means are being put in place to make sure that they are supported and that their rights are protected. So for all of those reasons New Zealand First is particularly pleased to be able to support Part 1 of this bill as it does the bill as a whole.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.Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): The Labour Party will of course be supporting the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. I think it has some worthwhile measures in it. There is a range of questions that I would like to ask about it and I am curious that the Minister in the chair the Minister of Immigration is not the Minister who introduced the bill the Minister of Justice but I think we all understand the reason for that. With the controversy swirling around her she would not be in a fit state of mind actually to manage this bill through the Committee. I would have to say to be honest—and I am not going to dwell on this—that frankly there is certainly amongst many of the parties in this House a total loss of confidence in the ability of the Minister of Justice. The failure to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth is surely fundamental—Tim Macindoe: I raise a point of order Mr Chairperson. This member who is an experienced member is now straying far from the bill and making allegations that are—The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): I am the judge of that and I know that the member is coming back to the point.Hon PHIL GOFF: Absolutely—thank you very much Mr Chairman. I will just finish that point which is that of all people in the House it really is important for the Minister of Justice—most particularly—to be seen as a person who can judge conflicts of interest who is a person of full integrity and one who tells the full truth.I come to the bill. The bill is incremental in the changes that it makes and I am not saying that hugely as a criticism. We have over time really strongly improved the provision for victims’ rights. It is fair to say that when I started studying law there were only two things that were important in the courtroom. One was the prosecutor who was prosecuting on behalf of society and the other was the accused who was trying to defend their innocence and the victim really was not part of that. It was shameful that our justice system paid so little attention to the needs of victims.The fourth Labour Government began the process with I think the Victims of Offences Act in 1987 if I recall rightly and as Minister of Justice in 2002 I was responsible for passing the Victims’ Rights Act. I have got to say that I picked up that bill from the National Party. I am not sure whether you were here at the time Mr Chairman. If you were you will recall that the Victims’ Rights Bill which was on the table when I became Minister was a very weak affair. It talked vaguely about the rights of victims but it actually did not do anything to cast the vague principles as explicit rights. What we tried to do in 2002 was set out the explicit rights that victims had and the mandatory obligations on specific Government agencies to make sure that those rights were upheld. Victims had to be informed about the progress in the case against the offender. With regard to serious offences I brought in provisions that victims needed the ability to have input into the decisions on bail. I think that was really important. The victim should be able to express their fears and concerns on baildecisions; that should be taken into account. We strengthened the victim impact statements. We promoted restorative justice processes.The interesting thing about this Part 1 of the bill is that it builds on the things that we put in that Victims’ Rights Act of 2002. I think that from time to time we do need to come back and look at whether the Act is working as well as it should do. One thing that happened under Labour in 2007 if my colleagues will remind me was that we set up the Justice and Electoral Committee inquiry into victims. Building on that material and subsequent material we have these changes that I think are worthwhile in their own right. They are not revolutionary but they are worthwhile.I want to pick up a couple of points—probably four major points—in relation to the bill as it has been reported back. The first thing that I want to pick up is the question of funding adequacy. What I would refer you to is page 5 of the regulatory impact statement where it says: “Agencies have indicated that to successfully implement some of the proposals they will need to look to reprioritise funding from other areas. If funding can not be re-prioritised to provide these additional resources then this may result in pressure on services and service delivery may be affected.” Well that is vitally important. One thing we know is that it is one thing to have rights and people responsible for upholding those rights but if you do not fund it properly then how can we be confident that this will work?A specific question to Mr Woodhouse in the chair tonight is what was done in response to that concern raised in the regulatory impact statement? Have the resources been provided? Are they reprioritised resources from other areas in which case which areas have suffered cutbacks? Or has the money not actually been determined yet? Do we face the potential prospect of setting up some very good rights and processes but with inadequate funding to make sure those things are carried into effect particularly if I look at the question of restorative justice? I put restorative justice in the original Act. I am glad to see that there is still an emphasis on that. But in the bill it talks about being subject to resources. I know that everything is subject to resources but will there be adequate resources to ensure that restorative justice processes can be held and that they can be held properly? Again if the resources are not there and it is not done well restorative justice instead of having the positive impact that it might can actually have a negative impact. If the homework is not done and the support services are not there then it can turn out to be negative for the victim when it could otherwise be a very positive experience.There are other things that seem to be missed out in relation to this bill in this part because of a lack of resources. I know that the regulatory impact statement talked about setting up a victims’ centre that would give oversight to victims’ rights and they talked about a victims of crime complaints officer. Both of those seem to have disappeared. They are not in the bill; I cannot find them anywhere. They were recommendations but they have not been picked up. We still do have the code and I think the code is a good idea to ensure that victims have information about their rights and the services available to them—the duties and responsibilities. That goes a little bit further but not necessarily a whole lot further than the original Act. The code itself is a good idea. Minister Woodhouse might like to answer this one too. Why were those other ideas dropped? Why do we not have somebody there who will give oversight? Why do we not have a victims’ centre as was originally looked at by the Ministry of Justice?I think the question of victim impact statements is central. I remember watching a programme where Gil Elliot was talking. He is of course the father of Sophie Elliott who was murdered. He was expressing intense frustration. He was allowed to give a victim impact statement but somebody was censoring everything he wanted to say in it. I accept that there will be a need for certain restraints on victim impact statements. Itcannot be offensive in terms of the language used. It cannot direct the judge what to do but within reason the victim—or the family of the victim in a murder case—has to be allowed to vent their feelings as part of their process of being able to put that crime behind them. There must be nothing more frustrating than a victim being told what he or she can or cannot say to the judge in the court and to the offender who is sitting across from them in the court.So I hope that this bill when it becomes an Act is interpreted in a way that actually emphasises the rights of the victim. It might be uncomfortable for the offender to hear what the family of the victim is saying but so it should be. It should be uncomfortable for the offender if that offender has been convicted and is guilty of sometimes a terrible offence—such as in the case of this family the taking away of their beautiful daughter and the extreme arrogance that the offender expressed in the court during that process which all of us saw in the televised accounts.I think the bill is basically right in that the victim the prosecutor or a person nominated by the victim can read out the statement. I like the wording of the language that the judicial officer must agree to the request made unless he or she considers it inappropriate to do so and there are quite narrow and specific reasons set out. I think the emphasis here must be on this process serving the victim or the family of the victim. The person has been convicted at that stage and the judge is considering the sentence. The judge needs to know exactly what the damage that has been done to that family is and what might be regarded by them as a way of if possible putting things right or certainly going in that direction. There is pretty free rein given to the judge—CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour): I rise to speak on Part 1 of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. In doing so I want to note that this is a step forward for victims of crime that it has taken a long time to get to this point and that some of these steps probably do not go as far as this side of the House would like to see. But along with my colleagues we are speaking in support of this bill. I want to pick up in Part 1 and talk about the impact of crime and the importance of victim impact statements for a particular group of victims and that is victims of sexual crimes. But before I do that I just want to make a couple of general points. There certainly is a need for victims to have a greater role in the criminal justice process and to ensure that there is more information and more weight given to their concerns and the impact of crime upon those victims. That is not just victims of sexual crime; that is all victims of crime.One of the issues though is the particular needs of victims of sexual crimes. For me to be speaking this afternoon on this is quite important having spent several hours this morning on the Social Services Committee dealing with submitters and dealing with the inquiry into services around sexual violence support. Can I acknowledge the member across the Chamber Melissa Lee who I think is doing a very good job of chairing that inquiry. We have heard some terribly moving traumatic information as part of that inquiry. It is an inquiry that is looking at a crime that in the end has very low conviction rates a very low level of reporting in the first instance very low levels of charging people who have committed those crimes and then very low conviction rates of those who do get into the court system. In that case the victims of sexual crime are in a particularly difficult situation because often they are the only witness to the crime.Also the impact of sexual violence is very very significant. Today a number of submitters were talking about it as a form of trauma—that it was a deeply traumatic experience. Being able then to ensure a couple of the things that are in Part 1—first of all information about the proceedings of the court system and making sure that both the victim and their support person where they have them are fully cognisant of what is happening and how it is going to happen are really important in a situation where they are talking about a crime that is so so personal and so traumatic. Also one of theparticular areas that has come up when looking at the issue of sexual violence is making sure that the support people are specialised people. Victim Support is a great service that is provided but actually in this area we need to have people who are specialist and people who particularly understand the nature of this crime and how it is then going to play out through the court system.We were given an example today by Louise Nicholas who talked about having in her court proceeding situation a very helpful person from Victim Support trying to do their best but actually all that person did for her was cause her further anger and grief because she was unaware of the trauma that had been suffered by Louise and was using language that in fact those who had perpetrated the crimes on her had also used to her. So there is a need for very specialist people in this space.In terms of victim impact statements in this bill it talks about the purpose of victim impact statements: “to enable the victim to provide information to the court about the effects of the offending; and assist the court in understanding the victim’s views about the offending; and inform the offender about the impact of the offending from the victim’s perspective.” It is particularly important in cases of sexual violence where those consequences the impacts can be of a physical nature can be around the person’s health can be about injuries they have suffered and can also be of an emotional and psychological nature. Those impacts can be around an inability to trust people they can be around nightmares and they can be around reliving—constantly reliving—a crime that is so fundamental so invasive and so personal that the level of impact at a psychological level is often very significant.Of course one of the particular aspects around sexual offending that is important to understand and why the victim impact can be so severe is that often these are people who are very well known to the victim—members of their own family people they potentially were friends with or even people they were in a relationship with. They are not people who are emotionally neutral to the victim. They are people whom the victim often knows well. Again that can have a particular impact and can make that trauma more significant. Those are all important factors in what might be covered in a victim impact statement in sexual violence cases.The bill goes on to talk about the information to be ascertained from victims and goes through some of those things around physical injury or emotional harm; loss of or damage to property—again that can be relevant in these cases—and any other effects of the offence on the victim. The information that we have been provided with in the Social Services Committee is that those other effects can actually be quite significant. They can be around drug and alcohol abuse and substance abuse. They can be around self-harm. Again we were being given examples of that today. All of those things need to be out in the open and the person who has offended needs to hear directly about the impact of their crime on that victim. I think as Scott Simpson has said the ability of others to read a victim impact statement in the court is an important provision. I think there would often be situations where it would be far too difficult for the person to do that themselves. Again the need for specialist support in the court system is really important.I note that at the moment there is a lot of effort going into raising concerns about better outcomes for victims of sexual violence. There is the inquiry. We have waited a long time to get improvements for victims of sexual violence. There was a task force under the last Government. It did report in 2009 over 70 recommendations most of which have not been actioned. Some of those are around the support services some of them are around prevention and some of them are around the court system itself. We are talking in this part about court processes but can I say something that would seem self-evident: preventing crime in the first instance is the best way to ensure that we donot actually have victims of crime. Every submitter to the inquiry—submitter after submitter after submitter—is saying that we can prevent sexual violence in this country. We actually have to decide that we are going to do that and we have to resource that.I will come back to court processes. The Minister Judith Collins—a Minister who is in a lot of hot water at the moment for her own behaviour—when responding to the Hon Phil Goff about issues for victims of sexual violence talked about this particular bill and said that reforms in this bill would assist victims of sexual violence. Well yes they will but certainly not enough. There is a need to ensure as I have said already that there is effective support in the courts. That is going to require specialist sexual violence support services of a greater extent than we have currently and we need to look at a whole lot of processes around how the court is conducted.MELISSA LEE (National): I moveThat the question be now put.A party vote was called for on the questionThat the question be now put.Ayes64New Zealand National 59; Māori Party 3; ACT New Zealand 1; United Future 1.Noes56New Zealand Labour 34; Green Party 14; New Zealand First 7; Mana 1.Motion agreed to.The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 424 in the name of the Hon Judith Collins to Part 1 be agreed to.Amendments agreed to.Part 1 as amended agreed to.Part 2 Amendments to Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989ANDREW LITTLE (Labour): As my colleagues have said in the earlier discussions on this bill the Victims of Crime Reform Bill at this very important Committee stage it is absolutely crucial that this Parliament continues to recognise the important role that victims must play in the administration of criminal justice. They are the party who have been most overlooked.We have inherited the administration of our criminal justice system from Britain and we have adopted the principles that go with it—that is the interests of the victim are subsumed into the interests of society at large as the court system addresses criminal wrongdoing. But that has not been good enough in the modern age when getting through the requirements of a prosecution—and if there is a conviction then sentencing and the disposal of the matter—has overlooked the impact of offending on a victim.Over the last 20 years the rights of victims and the place of victims in our judicial system have changed significantly and for the better. That is a good thing. It is right that we should gradually and over time improve and amend the way the place of victims is represented in court and that their rights and the rights—The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Lindsay Tisch): Sorry to interrupt the honourable member. The time has come for me to leave the Chair for the dinner break.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.ANDREW LITTLE: Thank you for the opportunity to resume what I was saying before I was interrupted by the ever so important dinner bell and to say as I was saying about how this is a very important area of endeavour not only for lawmaking but for the conduct of the law in the criminal justice system. It is not an area that is taken lightly by this House and the members in it or by anybody whom I am aware of—notleast of course the victims who are affected and who benefit from the laws and the improvements we make in them from time to time. But it is also an area of the law that requires a champion in the form of a Minister of Justice who is beyond reproach and conducts themselves with considerable integrity. The victims look to our criminal justice system for their share of justice if you like so that their interests and their cause are heard by the courts and are taken into account when criminal matters are being disposed of.This is a very crucial area and we should ask the question: what if somebody holding public office were themselves to be convicted of a designated crime a crime that the Commissioner of Police said ought to be one of those affected by this piece of legislation? Who is the victim of somebody who commits a crime in public office or who misconducts themselves in public office? It is the people of New Zealand. So we need to make sure that when we are making rules for every other citizen—for those who transgress the law and those who are victims of those transgressions—we are ourselves people of principle and operate with integrity.With that in mind I come to Part 2 and these provisions here and these relate to the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act—at least to those parts of that legislation that cover the administration of justice for young people and children who commit crimes or at least have allegations of offences made against them. These changes extend victims’ rights to those who are victims of crimes committed by children and that is right. So when the Youth Court is dealing with young people and when the issue of for example their being considered for bail is considered by the court then it is right that victims of that criminal offending should know about it and should have a say on that because they are the ones who have been affected. Even though it is a bail hearing and the issue of guilt or non-guilt is yet to be determined—there is no issue of a conviction being entered—nevertheless generally speaking by that time the issue is not whether the person before the court has done anything wrong. That is usually clear. It is of course whether or not they are guilty of the specified offence and that the elements of the offence have been made out and therefore a conviction entered. But even at the bail stage when all that there isis an allegation or a charging document laid it is still appropriate for the victim of an offence in those circumstances to be heard and that their views and their interests are considered. We accept that and we think that this makes a reasonable addition to the rights that the primary legislation provides for.The next significant change is the right to attend a family group conference. This allows the victim of an offence to attend or to be represented at a family group conference that is dealing with a young offender. Again that also is an appropriate measure. For a Government that creditably has been doing good things in relation to restorative justice this is effectively a restorative justice measure. The Sensible Sentencing Trust is not a fan of restorative justice and there is a story about an offshoot of the Sensible Sentencing Trust meeting in a hotel last year at the same time as a national conference on restorative justice was being held. That offshoot of the Sensible Sentencing Trust approached the hotel management and instructed the hotel management that if the folks in the hotel who were meeting to talk about restorative justice were not evicted from the hotel and did not have their meeting shut down then this offshoot group would itself leave the hotel and would not be paying its bill.It is a bit sad that a victims’ advocacy organisation and its offshoot should take that attitude towards restorative justice. Our view is very clear: whether a victim participates in a restorative justice process is a matter for the victim because it is not just about the perpetrator of the crime; it is about the victim having an opportunity to confront the perpetrator of the crime against them. It is an opportunity to come to terms with theoffending and for them to understand. The victims I have spoken to who have been through a restorative justice process have said that usually their expectations are exceeded.It is right that this process is available for the victims of adult offenders and that the victims of young offenders should also have the opportunity to participate in those processes that are about trying to get the young person back on track and hopefully avoiding a recurrence. And if there are underlying problems—social health-wise or other—then that is an opportunity an early intervention that can take place. Why should the victim not have something to say about that? Why should a young offender not be able to hear from a victim in a controlled setting about the impact of the offending on them? That is a worthwhile and good measure in clause 36 of this bill and we support it.The other significant change is in relation to one other aspect—which I shall name shortly when I see it. It is the provision in relation to what happens when a youth offender or a young offender goes through the system and the matter is disposed of—ensuring that victims are kept apprised of that. If they are to be further processed in the criminal justice system or if having been processed they are then to be released or released on any conditions then the victim of the young offender is to be notified as well. Sadly also if a young offender who has been detained in a facility—whether it is a prison or whether it is a youth facility—dies during the course of that then the victim is to be notified of that as well. That is a tragic occurrence that happens occasionally and hopefully not too often.My colleagues have said in relation to the other parts of the bill that this does make good and important changes for the administration of justice and for victims and we support it. This particular part that deals with young offenders and young offending and the victims of them has useful changes that I think will go some way to addressing our criminal offending rate helping the fate of young offenders and stopping them graduating on to harsher offending through the involvement of their victims in the processes set up to deal with them.PAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): It is a pleasure to rise and take a brief call in this Committee stage for the consideration of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. I want to focus on two particular areas of this part of the bill Part 2 that I think will be of benefit to our most vulnerable and littlest citizens in New Zealand—the children of our country.In particular I think there is a very positive measure in this bill that will allow the submission of victim impact statements in a variety of formats and media. The ability for a child to depict their feelings and the consequences of the offending that they have either witnessed or been subjected to themselves I think is a very positive measure. This will allow people—and particularly children—to submit paintings or pictures or short stories that describe the sorts of consequences and impacts that the offending has had on them.Another very positive measure in my view is the ability of those who have witnessed domestic violence incidents but who have not necessarily been subjected to them themselves to be considered as victims and to receive the support and the assistance that victims of crime get in this country. So for instance having a child or a young person seeing a parent or family member being assaulted or abused in a domestic situation would then deem them to be able to be in receipt of all of that support. Again that is a very positive measure that will help our most vulnerable and smallest citizens. So I commend this bill for further consideration.Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): Can I begin by first expressing my disappointment that the Minister in charge of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill the Hon Judith Collins is not the Minister in the chair. I thought that perhaps under the cover of darkness she might have snuck back into the Chamber through the back way—The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Order! The member would say that he is not referring to the absence of a Minister but he is indirectly doing that and I just caution him to not proceed down that line.Hon PHIL GOFF: I am sure you will not mind me saying that it is better in the Committee of the whole House stage to have a Minister in the chair who is the Minister in charge of the bill. When that Minister is here then she might be expected to answer questions.Having expressed that disappointment can I say that I acknowledge at least that in the chair is Chester Borrows. Chester Borrows is not only the Minister for Courts but also the sort of man who could recognise a conflict of interest and avoid it and if he made a mistake would tell the truth to the House about what he had done. So in that sense the Minister in the chair is a distinct improvement over the Minister who is in charge of the bill.Hon Christopher Finlayson: Totally washed up. What a hack—what a low-grade hack.Hon PHIL GOFF: Can I just say if the Attorney-General stops prattling on—if he wants to take a call then take a call. Perhaps he could stand up and explain to us why Judith Collins did meet with an unnamed official in a clear conflict of interest. If he does not want to take the call then he should shut up and I will invite you Mr Chairman to tell him to do that. Otherwise I will continue to ask him questions about his colleague the Minister of Justice and why the Minister of Justice should not be relied upon to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth.The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Order! I am on my feet. Right we will debate Part 2 of this bill from this point on.Hon PHIL GOFF: I am happy to do that. Can I say that I welcome this bill and the improvements that it makes but express another disappointment—notwithstanding the importance that I am sure the Minister in the chair would say is attached to the provisions in this bill—and question why it has taken 2½ years to get this bill back to the Committee of the whole House when these rights are being denied to victims and when every party in Parliament supports this bill. This is the sort of bill that you would have thought would be facilitated through the House. We will not hold it up unnecessarily. We have indicated that we are showing support for it. Once again we have a bill that took damn near 3 years from the point when it was introduced to the point when it goes through. There is no reason other than the incompetence of the management of this House that that should have happened with this bill.This part of the bill deals with amendments to the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act. The purpose of the clauses in this part is to ensure that victims’ rights in the adult jurisdiction are applied in the youth justice jurisdiction and I support that absolutely. It is also about increasing the participation of victims at hearings in the Youth Court and providing support for those victims. I want to come back to Chester Borrows to ask a question about the nature of the support that will be provided to victims who appear in the Youth Court. As the Minister for Courts will be aware court services for victims are not currently available in the Youth Court. So I would very much like the Minister in the chair to take the next call and explain to us whether the court services for victims will now be available for victims appearing in the Youth Court. It is a valid question. I am sure that the Minister will have the answer to that.The reason that I ask the question about whether those resources will be available—[Interruption] And still the Attorney-General prattles on. The reason that I ask about that is because in the regulatory impact statement it states: “Agencies have indicated that to successfully implement some of the proposals they will need to look to reprioritise funding from other areas.” The fact that the agencies say that suggests to me that no additional resources have been provided to ensure that the rights that we are supposedly giving to victims will be backed up by the services that are there ensuring that they get those services and that those rights are upheld.So it is a valid question to ask the Minister whether court services for victims will be available and if so how they will be funded. If it is reprioritisation can he assure us that those are not funds taken from another part of the justice system diminishing the rights of victims in that part of the service? They say that if they cannot reprioritise then this will result quoting from the regulatory impact statement “in pressure on services and service delivery may be affected.” That is bureaucratese for the fact that if there is no money there they will not be delivering the services properly and maybe they will not be delivering the services at all.I think that those are valid questions to ask the Minister in the chair and I invite Chester Borrows to take a call after I have finished and address those questions. Members on this side of the Chamber believe that that is the very sort of thing that the Committee of the whole House is here for and that the Minister should be prepared to answer them. Chester Borrows is one of the better Ministers. He will probably be willing to do that.I want to say that the things that I think are really important here are firstly that we do get the recognition of the automatic right of the victim to attend a Youth Court hearing. That is not currently the case; it will become the case. Having said that in the youth jurisdiction family group conferences are perhaps the best area where victims can participate in the process and where the process is properly restorative. At the moment the victim is encouraged to attend a family group conference to have a say on reparation to have a say on rehabilitation for the offender and to express how the actions of the offender have affected them. In fact under a Labour Government New Zealand led the world in 1989 in making these sorts of provisions for restorative justice for the family group conference and for the victim to be part of the process and not excluded from it. That is great.I am not sure why in the past we did not include the Youth Court jurisdiction in this. I can back up the words of the Principal Youth Court Judge who noted that sadly under the status quo the court is often left without any information on the victim. That is plainly unsatisfactory. This bill remedies that. It makes sense for the judge to have complete information about the offence when sentencing a young person in the Youth Court. There is absolutely no reason why the age of the offender should reduce the rights that victims have under the Victims’ Rights Act. So we are supporting this part of the bill because those two areas are remedied. The Ministry of Justice has rightly recommended that victims should have the automatic right to attend a family group conference that they should be able to provide a victim impact statement—that is really important—and that there should be amendments to clarify the application of the Victims’ Rights Act in the youth jurisdiction.The clauses in the bill that I think are important are clauses 35 and 38. Clause 35 sets out the rights of the victim to be consulted when a hearing is being held on the custody or potential custody of a child or young person and that the prosecutor must make reasonable efforts to ascertain the views of each of the victims. That is important. The Commissioner of Police must inform each victim of orders made by the court and any conditions such as conditions on bail that are applied. So this is a sensible provision. Itis not a political party - orientated clause. It has been recommended by the Ministry of Justice. It makes sense and it has been supported by the Principal Youth Court Judge.The other area is clause 38 which sets out the entitlement of the victim to be present in the Youth Court and also—I think the Justice and Electoral Committee made this amendment—to have a support person alongside the victim acting as their representative or as a support person for them. I think that that makes sense as well. Other clauses like clause 38A and 38B are about areas where the victim should be notified of certain things. When young people abscond from custody of course the victim should be told about that. If the offender dies then obviously that is a piece of information however regrettable the death of the young offender might be that the victim is entitled to. So I think this is a good area.I just come back to the Minister because I know he has been taking advice from the officials. It would be good to know why it took so long to get this bill back to the Committee. But it would be particularly good to know whether the resources are there to provide court services for victims whether the resources are there to ensure that the rights of the victims will actually be delivered upon and where that money is coming from. Was there any new money provided for the victim support services or is it going to be stolen from another area which will detract from the ability of the justice system to deliver elsewhere?Hon CHESTER BORROWS (Associate Minister of Justice): I rise in response to the comments made by the previous speaker the Hon Phil Goff and speakers previous to him. It is important to note the point that the honourable member Andrew Little made about restorative practices within the Youth Court and within our criminal justice system generally which are being enhanced all the time. Obviously as we all know they are world recognised because especially within the youth jurisdiction they are world leading and we need to be able to keep them up at that pace.Comments have been made around for instance derogatory messages given by some lobby groups against such things as restorative practices and in particular restorative justice conferencing. People have been suggesting for instance that restorative justice conferencing is more about the offender than it is about the victim. What we know of course is that that is absolutely incorrect. When we look for instance at the reoffending rates of those who have been through a restorative justice conference when tested against a control of those who were willing and able to attend a conference but it was withheld from them what we found was that in community-based sentences where restorative justice was completed there was a recidivism rate that was about 57 percent less and where it happened behind the wire in prison it was about 34 percent. That was a study by a young doctor HeatherStrang of Cambridge University a few years ago. So it is interesting to note that the complete opposite of what is being put about by the likes of the Sensible Sentencing Trust is actually true. Another point is that as I understand it—and I have been made aware of it on a number of occasions; I do not know whether the position has changed but I doubt it—the president of or the spokesperson for the Sensible Sentencing Trust has been given the opportunity to attend a restorative justice conference anywhere any time and although he said he would he never has. I think it is a terrible thing when people operating within a sphere of ignorance put themselves out to be experts.In respect of the matters raised by the Hon Phil Goff I make the following comments. Firstly about the time delay for the Victims of Crime Reform Bill all I can really say—he will know as well as anybody else—is that this Government has been extremely busy. The amount of legislation it has passed through—all of it is important and none of it is blatantly out there to do things like win the next election like theElectoral Finance Act was which we had to put up with in years gone by. But I am pleased to see that the bill has finally made its way to the Committee.In respect of youth within the Youth Court jurisdiction victims wanting to be represented within the Youth Court jurisdiction and funding when this Government came into office in 2008 one of the first pieces of legislation we put through was the offender levy contribution—$50 for every offender appearing before the court to be paid and that money to be used for victim services. That money was used to set up a number of different initiatives or to support a number of initiatives to support victims going through the criminal justice process. So it is that money used for those purposes that will now be extended to victims within the youth jurisdiction as well. But there are a number of specific rights that are extended pursuant to this part. The member will realise as I go through them that a lot of them are not expensive and will easily be met within the funding that has been set aside for those specific purposes under the offender levy.The first right is to attend a family group conference. An invitation is made for all victims to come to family group conferences. Whether or not they make themselves available for that family group conference largely depends on their own feelings towards it and their feeling of safety or feeling of really wanting to be in the room. Of course we are very sensitive about anything that could be seen asrevictimising a person who is already a victim but the ability to be able to attend a family group conference and take part in that along with their support people is a right that is extended. Another one is for victims to be informed about the services each agency provides and their ability to be able to access the support of those agencies. If the offender is a child or a young person they also have the right to choose whether to be informed of the progress following the family group conference plan. That is progress through that family group conference rather than necessarily through the court process which would also flow on automatically. There is a right to choose whether the victim wishes to express their views and they have a wide range of abilities to be able to do that. They can make a victim impact statement. They have the right to express their views in other ways as has been mentioned by my colleague Paul Foster-Bell which may not necessarily be in writing. That may be difficult if that person is a very young victim so they will be able to do it by way of pictures or speech or other ways. There is the right to make a complaint if any person from an agency does not provide the service consistent with the principles of this particular code that I am reading from at the moment.There are also additional rights for victims of specified offences which might be sexual offences or serious assaults and they include to be informed of and to express views on bail and other orders that may be sought by prosecution or by the offender. There is the right to read the victim impact statement in court or obviously to have it read for them. There is the right to choose to become a registered victim so they go on to the victims register for continued notification. There is the right to appoint a representative to receive information on behalf of that victim. There is the right to receive after the sentencing information and notifications as to the progress of the offender through incarceration and future appearances before the Parole Board. There is the right to choose whether to make a submission to a parole hearing or in respect of extended supervision orders. And obviously there is the right to be able to attend and to speak and be heard in respect of those matters.Just to allay the fears of the Hon Phil Goff the cost of this will be picked by those services that already exist. In effect it is extending down the services that are there within the adult jurisdiction. Obviously if there is a higher volume of victims requiring these services then there will be an increase of cost. It is expected that that will be metwithin the current funding arrangements and there is no suggestion that those would not be met. Thank you.CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour): I also wish to join my colleague the Hon Phil Goff in acknowledging the Minister in the chair Chester Borrows and in fact to reflect on the point that our junior whip Iain Lees Galloway made that you would make a fine Minister of Justice. In fact you may have an opportunity to be so quite soon.Iain Lees-Galloway: There’s a vacancy coming up.CAROL BEAUMONT: Yes there could well be a vacancy in that area. So I wish you luck with that Minister.Getting on to the bill the Victims of Crime Reform Bill we are speaking now on Part 2 of that bill. As others have said this part is about ensuring that victims’ rights in the adult criminal jurisdiction are applied in the youth justice jurisdiction. So that goes through Part 2 which amends the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989. Part 2 talks about certain situations including family group conferences when a child or a young person is in custody pending hearings and what happens in situations where children and young persons abscond. It talks about who can present at hearings in situations where there is a child or young person who is the perpetrator of the crime.I just want to reflect here for a minute. When I spoke on Part 1 I talked about victims of sexual violence and the particular needs of that group and the particular impacts—very deep impacts often—of sexual violence crimes. Of course that would equally apply in Part 2 and in fact we have seen situations—quite troubling situations—in this country with the so-called Roast Busters case in Auckland not that long ago around young persons and sexual violence where I think very troubling cultural attitudes were displayed by young persons around sexual violence. In that situation in the youth jurisdiction you may well have both youth perpetrators and youth victims potentially affected by the changes in this part.You can see in Part 2 that a number of changes have been made that I think strengthen the provisions here. In terms of better victim support at Youth Court hearings an amendment is in this part—in clause 38 amending section 329—for victims to bring support people without seeking prior permission while allowing if necessary the judge to restrict numbers. Also clause 38A amending section 385 means that victims of offences committed by a child or young person would be notified when the child or young person absconds from a youth justice residence. As the Hon Phil Goff mentioned that would also apply—about being notified—when the child or young person dies in a youth justice residence. In terms of the definition of “victim” in schedule 1 amended by clause 39 that amendment aligns then the definition of “victim” in the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act with that in the Victims’ Rights Act.Those are some of the provisions in Part 2. I just want to pick up a point about funding though because in the regulatory impact statement it does clearly say that “Agencies have indicated that to successfully implement some of the proposals they will need to look to reprioritise funding from other areas. If funding can not be re-prioritised … then this may result in pressure on services and service delivery may be affected.” I am sure that none of us would like to see service delivery affected for victims of crime. It specifically identifies two of the provisions in this part as being within that category of the need to ensure there is adequate funding. That is the automatic access of victims of child and youth offenders to the Youth Court and also the proposals around victim impact statements in both the adult and youth jurisdictions. So I understand that the Minister in the chair the Associate Minister of Justice did comment on that but I would just like to ask him whether he would just really like tocomment in a little more detail given the very clear concerns that were flagged up around this issue in the regulatory impact statement. So in concluding on Part 2 I will leave it there.JAMI-LEE ROSS (Junior Whip—National): I moveThat the question be now put.The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): I would very much like to hear Raymond Huo.RAYMOND HUO (Labour): Thank you—Carol Beaumont: Excellent decision.RAYMOND HUO: Excellent decision—thank you very much Mr Chair. Much has been said about the issues the problems and the situations that victims often find themselves in under the existing legal regime. Victims feel marginalised by the court system and their anguish is often exacerbated by the justice process and the adversarial criminal justice system. Our adversarial criminal system is bipartite and it attempts to recognise only the accused and the prosecution. Victims often feel marginalised and it is not fair to the victims and their families.Part 2 of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill concerns amendments to the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act 1989. The Law Society in its submission to the Justice and Electoral Committee raised concerns about the move to allow children’s pictures in court saying that young victims should be protected from the judicial process. The proposals of this bill would enable the families of murder victims to attach photographs of their loved ones to statements presented to juries and allow child victims to show their drawings to the court.The Law Society in its submission supported the move in the legislation to give adult victims the right to read their statements in court but its family law section chair told the Justice and Electoral Committee that the children who have been victims of crime should not be subjected further to the court process. He said he could not think the move to have them directly involved in impact statements would be an advancement for children’s rights.Talking about the impact statement the Chief Judges of both the High Court and the District Court expressed their concerns in their short but powerful submissions to the select committee. They are concerned that the proposed new section 17AB inserted by clause 11 enlarges the purposes of the victim impact statements. That particular section is in Part 1 but the judges’ views are valid in terms of Part 2 as well. At present section 17 of the Victims’ Rights Act limits those purposes to informing the court about the effect of the offending upon the victim which is information the court must take into account when sentencing an offender. But the proposal under this bill—especially pursuant to the relevant provisions of the Sentencing Act 2002—would create a certain kind of expectation on the part of the victims which the court has no capacity to meet. So that was the reason the judges expressed in their submissions—that it would create a kind of expectation that the court has no capacity to meet and that it would create a further confusion that could well be understood as entitling the victim to express his or her view about an appropriate sentence for that offending.But under the Sentencing Act there is no provision that enables the court to take into account the victim’s views about an appropriate sentence and indeed to do so would conflict with one of the underlying principles of sentencing—that similar offenders should receive similar sentences for similar offending in similar circumstances. So perhaps the most difficult but arguably the most important is the balancing exercise where all aspects of the issues the interests and the concerns of the concerned parties should be identified acknowledged and balanced.Also another concern expressed by the judges is related to new section 22 inserted by clause 15 because it would create a new right for victims. That particular provisioncreates a new right for victims of a specified offence to read his or her statement in court unless the judicial officer considers it inappropriate to do so because of the existence of one of the conditions set out in section 22(2).In cases where there are many victims of specified offences and many victims they believed that a judge would be reluctant to pick and choose between the victim impact statements to settle upon those to be read. The regulatory impact statement given in connection with the revised victims’ policy did not in itself quantify the likely additional demands upon the court system. But in the judges’ view that will be significant.As I said the Chief High Court Judge and the Chief District Court Judge both expressed concerns in their submissions that it would be difficult for a judiciary officer to impose time limits on a victim reading a statement. They would be very unwilling to interrupt a victim to avoid causing the victim further upset. They also noted that when there are many victims in a case as I said previously the judge would be reluctant to pick and choose and the likely outcome would be all victims giving a statement. This of course would add considerably to the length of time that sentencing takes in the courts. The judges believed that additional demands on the court system would be significant. They said that the Victims of Crime Reform Bill could create expectations that a victim could express a view on sentencing that is not provided for in our law.There is a genuine concern and that concern relates to a certain kind of issue of how to strike a balance—on the one hand the victims’ concerns and anguish are genuine and on the other hand the views expressed by the judges and the other submitters are valid. Thank you.Hon MARYAN STREET (Labour): I rise to speak to Part 2 of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill because this is the bit that tries to align the Victims’ Rights Act with the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act. So this is the part of the bill that tries to capture the answers to the problem that victims’ rights in the adult criminal jurisdiction are different from those applied in the youth justice jurisdiction. That is—or was—a problem and this part is the remedy. We support this part as we have supported Part 1 of the bill as well but there are a couple of things that I wanted to draw attention to in particular.First it has been noted and I do not wish to labour the point unduly but given that this was reported back 2 years ago those of us who have found ourselves as I have on the Justice and Electoral Committee for only a comparatively short time—since the end of last year—have not been privy to the submissions because the report was presented on 27 June 2012. That means that going back and trying to capture the sense of what were the top-of-mind concerns for the submitters has been quite difficult. But I am going to refer to the regulatory impact statement in some detail. In the regulatory impact statement on page 14 it said that the current situation is that “the Victims’ Rights Act gives little guidance as to how its various provisions apply to the processes in the Youth Courts to deal with offending by children and young persons.” And so there was this disjunction there was this gap between the treatment of victims in the adult criminal jurisdiction and the treatment of victims of crimes committed by youth offenders and children. So as a result of that disjunction there was some confusion about the application of the Victims’ Rights Act to the particular circumstances that apply in the youth justice jurisdiction.This bill is a good answer to that question. This is a reasonable remedy to that problem. It essentially means that victims should have the right to attend Youth Court hearings. It says that victims of children and young people—that is victims of crimes committed by children and young people—should also be able to provide a victim impact statement to the judge as is provided for in the criminal jurisdictions of the HighCourt and District Court. Amendments are made to clarify the application of the Victims’ Rights Act in the youth jurisdiction. This is particularly found in clause 39 in Part 2 where schedule 1 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act is amended. It is amended by inserting the relevant bits of the Victims’ Rights Act tailored for this circumstance. So for example it says that the definition of a “victim” also includes “a person who through or by means of an offence committed by a child or young person suffers any form of emotional harm;”. It goes on simply to align those provisions in the Victims’ Rights Act—which this bill also amends because it is an omnibus bill—with the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act.People have talked previously in this debate about the relevance and the purpose and the usefulness of children being able to demonstrate through pictures or drawings or some other mode of communication the impact of a crime upon themselves or of witnessing a crime. This does allow those voices to be heard in the children’s and young persons’ jurisdiction. That has got to be an improvement. We are aware that the bill itself amends four pieces of legislation: the Victims’ Rights Act; the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act; the Parole Act; and the Sentencing Act. By making sure we have some commonality between those four amended pieces of legislation we really are moving towards something that is consistent in its approach recognises the impact on victims recognises the rights of victims whatever their age—in this case whether they are the victims of offences committed by children or young people—and allows them the right to be heard and to have their voice heard in proceedings in the children’s and young persons’ jurisdiction. Thank you.The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 424 in the name of the Hon Judith Collins and the following amendments in her name to Part 2 be agreed to:in clause 33 replace “section 2A” with “section 2B”; andin new section 3A(f)(iii) inserted by clause 39 replace “section 2A” with “section 2B”.Amendments agreed to.Part 2 as amended agreed to.Part 3 Amendments to Parole Act 2002Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): Part 3 of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill is a very straightforward part so I want to take only a rather brief call on it. It is an important change. It ensures that victims are informed about an offender being considered for release on parole and that victims are well informed about how they can participate effectively in the parole hearing process. Actually these were rights that were originally in the Parole Act but were inadvertently removed in the Parole Amendment Act 2007. It is a pity that no one on either side of the House picked it up at that point. So it remedies a gap. There are a couple of things to be said about that. A number of members in the last month have sat in on parole hearings. It is a rather unusual right for anybody who is not connected with the offender to be able to do that but I think those of us who sat in on those hearings gained a much greater appreciation of how the parole hearings work and the consideration given by the Parole Board before an offender is released. I think that for many of us it was quite reassuring to see how that process worked and the common sense of the justices and the laypeople who serve on the Parole Board.One of the interesting factors about this is that only about 7 percent of all victims actually apply to make submissions on whether the offender should be given parole. Perhaps the Minister in the chair the Associate Minister of Justice would like to suggest why he thinks that level of participation by victims in parole hearings is as lowas it is because one would think that the release of the person who offended against you in a serious way was an important factor in your life and maybe there are still obstacles that discourage victims from participating in the process. Alternatively I guess Minister you could say that a lot of victims just want to put this behind them and perhaps do not want to berevictimised by the process of sitting—although they do not actually sit in on the parole hearing but they are heard by the Parole Board. It seems to me that that is quite an important right. I would like some assurances that the system is good enough to ensure that all relevant victims are informed about their ability to do that.The other thing Minister that I think is really important because this bill has been around for so long—coming up for 3 years now—is whether this bill is consistent with another piece of legislation before the House which has gone to a different committee and that is the Parole Amendment Bill which is currently before the Law and Order Committee. I wonder whether the Ministry of Justice officials—and I presume that they have but because this is to repair a stuff-up that was made because officials and members of the House did not pick up a past inadequacy—have carefully gone through the provisions of this bill to see that they are consistent with the Parole Amendment Bill which is before the Law and Order Committee and vice versa. I think it is really important that there is that coordination and we have that assurance; otherwise we may be back here in another 12 months because we are repairing something that officials had overlooked and members of the Committee had not picked up on.So those are the two major issues. It is about the low level of participation of victims in parole hearings—having their voice heard by the Parole Board—and whether the Minister is absolutely convinced that victims are fully informed about their ability to participate in the process and that they know for example that if they want to participate in this process they do not have to go face to face with the offender which most do not want to do and know that they also do not have to go to the prison in order to be heard by the Parole Board. The Parole Board in normal circumstances will meet the victims outside the prison environment. So I think the Parole Board is doing a really good job. In fact Minister you mentioned the Sensible Sentencing Trust and its failure to follow up on the offer to sit in on restorative processes but even the Sensible Sentencing Trust with its sometimes rather extreme views acknowledged that the Parole Board under JusticeGendall now and under his predecessor Justice Carruthers is making a real effort to make sure that the victims feel comfortable with the process and that they are treated with respect. I think that is worth putting on the record of the Committee—that our Parole Board is acting effectively in that way. I think members on all sides of the Chamber would be pleased to know that the Parole Board which quite often comes under a lot of flak because occasionally being human its members get things wrong consistently has been regarded as doing its job conscientiously and taking into account the concerns and the feelings of the victims that it is dealing with.So the two things again Minister just so you have got them clearly in your mind—just briefly—are these. First are we absolutely sure that this legislation is now consistent and vice versa with the Parole Amendment Bill which is before the Law and Order Committee but not yet reported back? Secondly is the Minister really assured that everything that can be done to make victims aware of the process and comfortable with the process is being done?The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 424 in the name of the Hon Judith Collins to Part 3 be agreed to.Amendments agreed to.Part 3 as amended agreed to.Part 4 Amendments to Sentencing Act 2002Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): First of all I was very patient with the Associate Minister of Justice answering the questions in Part 2 of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. Unfortunately he neglected to take any call at all to answer the questions on Part 3. Maybe that is because he did not feel he had enough time to do so. So perhaps you would give him the latitude Mr Chairman to enable him to answer the two very clear questions which I think I repeated several times in Part 3 of the bill. So you have not missed out Minister. There is still the chance to come back and answer a couple of questions which I am sure members of your own party would like to hear the answers to just as much as members on this side of the Chamber would. So talk to your officials if you do not know what is going on because you are not the Minister and the real Minister ain’t here and we all know why she ain’t here—The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Order!Hon PHIL GOFF: Just in passing Mr Chairman.The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): No. Order!Hon PHIL GOFF: Just in passing. Can I come to Part 4 of the bill which is “Amendments to Sentencing Act 2002”. Again the amendments that are proposed in Part 4 are I think sensible. They enable victims to be compensated by losses not covered by the Accident Compensation Corporation and we would expect that to be the case. They provide more opportunities for victims to participate in the restorative justice process.The interesting thing about this is that the Minister said earlier that restorative justice works and it improves outcomes—I think Minister you said in 37 percent of the cases. Restorative justice which was in the Victims’ Rights Act which I pushed through the House in 2002 is a good process but again for it to work it needs to be properly resourced. It is not something we force on the victim. It is entirely in accord with the wishes of the victim. If the victim wishes to have a process they should be able to. This is about the victim’s choice. If they do not wish to have that process then that should be up to them. They should not be under any pressure to become involved in a restorative process. But if the evidence is that we are getting positive outcomes and it does provide choices for victims I do want to be reassured that the resourcing is in place for the restorative justice process because again if I look at the regulatory impact statement it says that the current service provision is limited so the court can be required to refer cases only where the services are available. So perhaps the Minister could tell us in what percentage of cases the services are available and in what percentage of the cases the victim actually badly wants a restorative process but because of under-resourcing that victim cannot go through the process.Can the Minister please quantify when the restorative process will be available to a victim who very much wishes to participate in it and when it will not be available? And if the percentage of cases where the process will not be available is quite high which I suspect to be the case what is the Minister going to do to ensure that the resourcing is made available so that the victim’s right—in this case once again it is not a theoretical right but a right that can actually be put in place because the resources are there to allow it to happen? Minister you have been involved in the court process; you know that this is really important. So we need to know that this provision is not a theoretical provision that says “Wouldn’t it be nice for victims to be able to participate in restorative justice but very sad but never mind there are no resources to allow that to happen.” because that is clearly the warning that the regulatory impact statement gives this Committee. Again it is a vital question.I will keep talking for a bit longer just so the Minister can get the answer from officials. I appreciate that he wants to answer this as well as the questions—Hon Ruth Dyson: He’ll probably know it.Hon PHIL GOFF: Oh he might know it off the top of his head. Judith Collins would know but then Judith Collins is not available apparently to answer the questions and we know the reason for that.I listened carefully to the Minister’s partial answer to my question on an earlier clause in an earlier part of this bill and he talked about the offender levy being there to help out but all of us know that that offender levy is pretty limited. All of us know that the warning given by officials was “Hey we can’t do these things unless we reprioritise.”—that is take it from other areas. Again I would like the Minister to address this question of resourcing. Are the rights that we are promising victims sincerely—all of us in this Committee—going to simply lead to disappointed expectations because the resources are not there to allow restorative justice to happen? Perhaps the Minister could indicate in how many cases—[Bell rung] Oh well I will let the Minister answer now and if he does not answer it fully I can come back and ask him again.Hon CHESTER BORROWS (Associate Minister of Justice): It is encouraging to have this level of debate. I am sorry I did not get quickly enough off my butt to answer while we were discussing the previous part. The two questions were about the consistency between the bill currently before the Law and Order Committee the Parole Amendment Bill and this bill the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. I can assure the member Phil Goff that there is no conflict between those two and we will not be running back like we did under all Governments—let us be honest here—and doing little tart-ups later on down the track. So consistency is there.The next question that the member asked was about why victims did not avail themselves of the opportunity to appear before parole hearings. He touched on one reason which was that frequently the victim just wanted to put things behind them and did not want to re-engage. The other part of it though is that a lot of the way that people reflect on the criminal justice system is from a position of ignorance. It is not their fault. I do not mean any malice by saying that. It is just that people watch a lot of TV and they expect that what they see before them in the little square box is similar to the reality of dealing with our criminal justice system and that just is not the case. To try to get around that with the implementation of the code that we have been talking about over the course of this evening all victims will be made aware and completely aware of what it will entail—for instance the ability to be able to take part in a parole hearing without having to be confronted by or sit in the same room as the defendant. The fact that they can do that remotely or that their evidence can be taken at a time that is much more convenient to them and put before the members of the parole board I think is a very very important thing.I must say that people whom I know who have appeared in front of a parole hearing and made submissions have actually found an incredible gathering of strength from that process. I can recall that one of my constituents came to me wanting my assistance when an offender who had tried to murder her was coming up for parole. Unfortunately although I was a member of Parliament I was also the investigating officer in charge of preparing that file for court so I was prevented from being able to go along and make submissions or make any representation.Hon Maryan Street: Do you spot a conflict of interest?Hon CHESTER BORROWS: Yes we spied a conflict. What we managed to do then was draft a complete submission towards the Parole Board and one of the things that she asked for was the ability to be able to have a restorative justice conference with both offenders who had tried to kill her. What she found from that process was an incredible strengthening of her resolve and of her ability to be sure that she did not needto maintain any fear of these people and just the ability to be able to have her say. So I would encourage all victims to reflect on what they might gain from appearing before a Parole Board or any restorative justice process.The next question that the member asked was about resourcing and all I can really say there is that it is more good news. In our last Budget the Government doubled the amount of money available for restorative justice conferences made a priority of pre-sentence restorative justice conferencing and got contracts to make sure that every court in the country was covered by it so any victim of a crime right around New Zealand would now have the ability to access restorative justice conferencing without any cost to themselves. Also what we are extending which we have not really done so much in the past is restorative justice availability in prisons—so pre-release. Although that has been available on the request of the offender we are in a bit of a bind here because you cannot drag the offender into a restorative justice conference and make him—usually him—sit there. In fact there has to be an agreement from both parties to be able to do that. So the offender may well request a restorative justice conference but the victim might not want it so it does not take place and vice versa. The victim may well want to have a restorative justice conference but the offender may not want that to take place.There are some places within prisons where it has occurred through the provision of the Sycamore Tree project which made restorative justice available to people in prisons on a purely voluntary basis and provided by prison fellowship. Here if the victim of the offender was not prepared to take part in the restorative justice conference then a victim of a similar crime—a surrogate in effect—who was happy to appear before the conference would explain to the offender the similarities of the crime the way that he or she felt having been abused etc. etc. There has been some good that has come from that albeit it is not the actual victim and obviously there are times when it cannot be the actual victim.So yes I can assure the Hon Phil Goff that there is consistency between the two bills as he sought. I have explained why some victims do not want to appear before Parole Boards but encourage them to do so because it may well be to their benefit. I can assure him that there is sufficient resourcing for the extension of restorative justice conferencing which is now available for the first time throughout New Zealand in every court.Hon PHIL GOFF (Labour—Mt Roskill): I would just like to put on record as I have on a previous piece of legislation my thanks to the Associate Minister of Justice the Hon Chester Borrows for actually taking seriously his responsibilities in the chair. That is a refreshing change from most other Ministers and certainly the Minister of Justice. I think his credentials for becoming Minister of Justice—a position for which there will soon be a vacancy—are getting better all the time. But I say very sincerely thank you for that.There is just one thing arising out of that that I need a little bit of clarification on. I am aware that there is another I think $2.3 million that has gone into restorative justice. Nevertheless the regulatory impact statement on the Victims of Crime Reform Bill still talked about the service provision being limited. Maybe that is because that regulatory impact statement is so old—because this bill has been around for so long and it does not take into account the money that went through in the last Budget—but the impression that I have got from talking to people who work in the justice system is that nevertheless it still helps it is good but it is not sufficient. Again the thing that I guess I am asking the Minister—I require a very brief answer from him—is whether the assurance he is giving the Committee is that with the extension of this any victim in any part of the country has a good prospect of being able to have a restorative justicesession if that victim chooses it. Although there is extra money there it seems to me that there is still a shortfall in the funding that is necessary for this system to work better. If the results are as the Minister has said—you know 37 percent better outcomes—then surely we would want this to be a universal service. I just need to get clarification about that one small point. Yes there is more money but is there still a significant shortfall that means that many people seeking a restorative justice process may be declined for it?Hon CHESTER BORROWS (Associate Minister of Justice): Yes I can assure the member that the regulatory impact statement was written well before the changes in the last Budget when the budget was increased. Restorative justice conferencing is now universally available across the country. It is expected that there will be an uptake in restorative justice conferencing as a result of the passing of the Victims of Crime Reform Bill. From a briefing I had only a matter of a couple of hours ago there has been a huge decline in restorative justice conferencing mainly because there has been a huge decline in crime and a huge decline in people appearing before the court. There are fewer people seeking restorative justice conferences and so there is a pool of money there available at the moment that is not being accessed and will be available.The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 424 in the name of the Hon Judith Collins to Part 4 be agreed to.Amendments agreed to.Part 4 as amended agreed to.Clause 1 agreed to.Clause 2The question was put that the amendments set out on Supplementary Order Paper 424 in the name of the Hon Judith Collins to clause 2 be agreed to.Amendments agreed to.Clause 2 as amended agreed to.The Committee divided the bill into the Victims’ Rights Amendment Bill the Children Young Persons and Their Families Amendment Bill (No 4) the Parole Amendment Bill (No 2) and the Sentencing Amendment Bill (No 2)pursuant to Supplementary Order Paper 425.Bill to be reported with amendment presently.