Barker Rick: Juries (Jury Service and Protection of Particulars of Jury List Information) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Barker Rick: Juries (Jury Service and Protection of Particulars of Jury List Information) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:671;Page:17971] 
Hon RICK BARKER (Labour) 
: 
 I thought that was a very interesting presentation to the House by the honourable member Chester Borrows who is a thoughtful and considered member. I was intrigued I must say by his advice on how to escape jury service by turning up in a three-piece suit and carrying a briefcase. 
Paul Quinn 
: You’d be an expert. 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: I say to Paul Quinn that I have never been asked to be on a jury and it is to my regret. I would like to serve on a jury but have never had the privilege. Chester Borrows has put out this plan for exempting oneself from jury service which is to turn up wearing a three-piece suit and carrying a briefcase and therefore it sends a message to defence counsel that the person might take an interest in the case. I say to Chester Borrows that that says more about the legal profession than it does about jury service. If people are to be judged simply on the basis of what they wear—and presumably according to Chester Borrows’ analysis the person who is wearing jeans and a T-shirt will be less critical of the evidence placed before them than a person wearing a three-piece suit and carrying a briefcase—then I think that says more about the quality of the legal profession and defence counsel than it does about the jury system itself. 
But I do agree with Chester Borrows that the jury system is critical to our justice system; there is no question about that. One of the fundamentals of our jury system is that we are tried by our peers and everybody thinks that that is fair enough. We have the utmost respect for the judiciary and the wisdom they bring but people feel comfortable with the fact that 12 ordinary New Zealanders are sitting on a jury hearing the arguments backwards and forwards and making their judgment. It is part of one’s civic duty to serve on a jury and I say that one of the things this House should concern itself with is that the importance of this civic duty is somewhat lost in our society today. People see it not as a duty but as an obligation and something to be dodged and avoided. 
In part we have brought this about by our own actions. Juries in the past have not been treated particularly well they have not been rewarded very well and we have put them in some very very difficult circumstances. I will give members one example. Historically in Greymouth the conditions for jurors were dreadful. There was no meeting room for jurors to be herded into and await selection. They had to stand outside. On the West Coast it rains a lot so traditionally jurors at the old courthouse on the West Coast used to wait across the road under the awning of Blanchfield’s pie shop. Blanchfield is a name that should ring a bell in this House because Paddy Blanchfield was a former member of Parliament for the West Coast. People would wait under the awning of Blanchfield’s pie shop because the southerly and the rain would be coming through and it was the only dry place to stand. In the teeth of the southerly the door of the courthouse would open the registrar would put his head out and shriek a bunch of names into the wind and people would flick their cigarette butts into the streaming gutters splash their way across the road sprint up the steps and go inside to be either told “Yes” or told “No” and they were out of there. But when the jury was empanelled there was no room for it to retire to. There were no coffee-making facilities. The best that could be done was that the registrar would move some files out of a room—which could be done only on a fine day because one could not put the files in the car park and there was no other space—or people would have to troop their way down to Revingtons Hotel nearby through the rain to have a cup of tea and then troop their way back again. 
This was by any measure mickey mouse. It was only barely tolerated on the West Coast because the West Coast did not expect Wellington to do much for it anyway. I am pleased to say that Greymouth now has a new courthouse and that those conditions have improved somewhat. But by and large the conditions we put our jurors under were pathetic. They were cramped conditions and we did not look after them. That is the first thing and we have to do much better than that. 
The second thing that we have failed to do is to properly reward jurors for the loss of time and for their service. This is one area that I think the Government needs to pay attention to. I am sure it will say that we have a no-bid Budget and that we have all these other pressures but the fact of the matter is that people do give up their time. They do that at quite a considerable amount of expense and cost to themselves and the community should protect them from that. 
The other thing that this bill seeks to address is a very disturbing trend that has occurred whereby defendants have attempted to interfere with jurors on jury service. They have been able to do so because as Kiwis we have been very open about information. Defendants have been able to easily access the information on jury lists and so on to obtain the names of jurors and their addresses and this has created a very disturbing trend. This bill seeks to address that issue and I agree with that part of the bill 100 percent. We need to protect jurors. I accept that there are some things that we cannot do by way of this legislation but we need to protect our jurors from undue influence being exerted by an unscrupulous number. 
I am not sure why this was not done in a previous justice bill. It could have been done in one that has already gone through the system but the fact that it is here now is a good thing. Parliament is going to pass two pieces of legislation where in my opinion one could have done but if the Government wants to make work for itself more difficult then that is its problem. 
I am pleased that this bill will be coming to the Law and Order Committee. The honourable member Paul Quinn enjoys the Law and Order Committee. It is a place of good debate and we have some very interesting discussions. 
Paul Quinn 
: Visionary foresight. 
Hon RICK BARKER 
: Well the committee on occasions has some members who have vision and foresight. Unfortunately some of the bills it gets from the Government and individual members lack vision and foresight and we try to give legislation that when we can. 
Labour will support this bill’s referral to the select committee we will look forward to the representations being made on it and we will do everything we can to improve the quality of our jury system. As I have said the jury system is critical to our justice system. We need to protect it but we need to go further. That is beyond the scope of this bill and it is beyond the scope of the select committee but I would impress upon the Government that it needs to take a lead in promoting jury service as a greatly rewarding and important part of our civic duty as citizens. The jury service can work only if good and competent people put their names forward and are prepared to undertake jury service. If we construct a system where we have so many loopholes and where people feel that the job is so onerous that they use those loopholes to escape from it then the legal system is the poorer for it. We want to make sure that we have a jury system that encourages and supports people to undertake jury service so that we have the best of people sitting on the jury whenever defendants are facing a charge so that they are tried by their peers. 
I am sure that everybody in this House should anyone ever be in the unfortunate situation of being a defendant in a case would want to have the finest jury possible. We would all expect that for ourselves. It is our responsibility to ensure that we put in place not only a legal framework but other supports to encourage the best of New Zealanders to put forward their names and to undertake this civic duty. New Zealanders should see it not as an obligation or something they have to do because they are compelled to do it but that New Zealanders take up this responsibility because they want to do it as part of their civic duty in making this a much better country so that it is their contribution towards the goodness and the well-being of New Zealand. 
This legislation does that in part. But there are many other elements that need to be taken into account—not just the housing and accommodation for jurors when they undertake this service. It has to also be a matter of the support services we put in place for them: looking after their cars helping them with baby sitting and reimbursing them against the costs of undertaking jury service. It cannot be solely at the expense of the individual undertaking jury service. If people undertake jury service on behalf of the community then we have an obligation to support them in carrying out that duty. Just as the community supports members of Parliament and the judiciary in carrying out their roles on behalf of the community we should do the same for jurors as well. We need a much sounder more robust and better system for supporting jurors in undertaking this duty. Thank you.