Tanczos Nandor: Third Readings 
Tanczos Nandor: Third Readings 
[Volume:617;Page:12940] 
NANDOR TANCZOS (Green) 
: 
 I rise to speak on behalf of the Green Party on the third readings of the legislation that was formerly the Judicial Matters Bill. I am pleased on behalf of the Green Party to express our support for the legislation because we think it is important that finally in this country we are able to develop a process for dealing with complaints against judges—a formal transparent and fair process. It is important at a time when judges are under increasing scrutiny and criticism by the media the public and not least by members of this House. We believe that a process such as this is important not just to protect the public interest and the integrity of the bench but also to protect the judges themselves so that complaints made against judges can be dealt with in a proper manner and either upheld or dismissed so that they are not left to media campaigns and innuendo. 
It has been interesting to listen to the Opposition speaking on this legislation. There is a strange confusion in the reasoning at least to my mind because we hear the Opposition say that it wants to preserve the independence of the judiciary—and presumably this means the independence of the judiciary from political interference—yet what it wants to remain in place in terms of dealing with complaints against judges is a process that is left up to the political whim of Parliament. If we can muster 61 votes in this House we can oust a judge under the present system. 
It seems to me that if we are really talking about preserving the independence of the judiciary we need a process that depoliticises the investigation of complaints and allows them to be dealt with fairly and transparently. That is what this legislation was set up to do. 
Mr Jones said that the Green Party is party to the ending of a 300-year right that British citizens have to deal with judges. I make the point that it is not a right of British citizens at all. It is only a right of members of this elite club of ours that we call Parliament. Most ordinary people have no show of trying to deal with complaints against judges and Mr Jones would know that as well as I and other members of the committee do. We heard from submitters who came to the committee who talked about complaints that they had against the judges and who got nowhere. They were intensely frustrated because they felt that their concerns were simply ignored and— 
Stephen Franks 
: Half of them were nutters. 
NANDOR TANCZOS 
: That is the point. Whether or not their complaints have merit there needs to be a process so that any independent bystander can look and say that a matter has been dealt with in a fair and transparent manner and that is the end of it. At the moment we do not have a process that can reassure an independent third party that the matter has been dealt with in a proper way. 
 Judith Collins spoke on this as well. She made the point that any member of this House could move a motion for the dismissal of a judge. Members should note that the minority report of the National Party in the select committee report showed how the process did not work—and I made this point during the second reading debate as well—and it raised the matter of Justice Edwards who should surely have been removed from the bench. Because it was left to this Parliament to do something about it Justice Edwards was never removed and ended up resigning on his own account and received £1000 in compensation for his troubles. That is a perfect example furnished by the National Party on why the current process is entirely inadequate and why it needs to be taken out of the hands of politicians and given to a body that is able to look at the issue without fear of its own political favour. 
I do not believe that less competent and less qualified judges will take positions on the bench as a result of a process that will hold bad judges accountable for their actions. I do not see that at all. By establishing such a process the integrity of the bench will be preserved and it will protect judges themselves from the innuendo that comes from a process that does not allow those issues to be properly investigated. 
David Cunliffe pointed out in his speech the contradiction that is at the heart of the arguments. Members of the Opposition are continually criticising the Attorney-General. They have established a spurious and scurrilous campaign against the Attorney-General to criticise her consistently for her political involvement and the politicisation of her decisions. The criticisms are entirely unfair but Opposition members criticised the Attorney-General for political involvement in decisions and then on the other hand they wanted to preserve a procedure to leave those matters in political hands. That is the key issue and that is what this legislation is about. It is about taking complaints against judges out of the hands of politicians and putting them into the hands of a transparent and independent process. 
The Opposition talked about judicial independence. What does that mean? As I said during the second reading debate I do not believe that judicial independence means a licence to behave badly without any fear of sanction. Surely judicial independence must be about the ability of judges to be fearless in their findings without fear of political favour. This legislation does not change that at all. 
In fact the legislation was criticised by some for not going far enough and not dealing with complaints below the threshold where removal of a judge might be considered. So I think it is quite wrong to say that everyone who came to the committee criticised the legislation and opposed it simply because it set up a process. Many submitters said that it did not go far enough. 
Mr Jones misrepresented what the legislation will do when he said that under the system for example if a judge got drunk at some party someone could complain that complaint would go to the Judicial Conducts Commissioner a Judicial Conduct Panel would then be set up and it would go through that whole process. 
Dail Jones 
: It can happen. 
NANDOR TANCZOS 
: As Mr Jones knows that is a misrepresentation of what would happen in that case. The legislation states and we have a lovely flow diagram—an innovation of the Justice and Electoral Committee in various pieces of legislation to make interpretation of the legislation easier for the lay person—that shows that the Judicial Conducts Commissioner would receive a written complaint then he or she would acknowledge receipt of the complaint and notify the judge. The commissioner would not have to provide a copy of the complaint to the judge. The complaint may be minor and the commissioner may not consider it worthy to provide the judge with a copy. However the judge is always entitled to it. The commissioner would undertake a preliminary examination and either dismiss the complaint refer it to the head of bench if it is not sufficient to consider removal of the judge or he or she may conclude that an inquiry is necessary and then would recommend the setting up of a Judicial Conduct Panel. 
In the case of a judge who got drunk at a party and offended someone surely we would have to accept that it is extremely unlikely that that situation would ever go to a Judicial Conduct Panel. It would either be dismissed forthwith or at the most would be referred to the head of the bench and Mr Jones knows that as well as I do. It is about time that a proper process was set up to deal with these things and have the ability to hear and resolve complaints so that those complaints are not left to media campaigns and political innuendo. 
Mr Jones also made the point that the House has never removed a judge from office and asked why we need the process now. The Attorney-General dealt with that forcibly when she made the point that if we waited for a crisis in the judiciary before a process was developed to deal with judicial complaint then we would have a serious crisis. We would have a process that would really threaten judicial independence. It would be policy developed in panic and we have seen many examples of policy of that nature developed in the House. It has always led to problems and to our having to redo the issue because it was done wrongly in haste and out of fear in the first place. The Green Party supports this legislation. We support the development of this process and we commend it to the House.