Hipkins Chris: Corrections (Contract Management of Prisons) Amendment Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee Third Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Hipkins Chris: Corrections (Contract Management of Prisons) Amendment Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee Third Reading 
[Sitting date: 24 November 2009. Volume:659;Page:8124. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) 
: 
 Firstly I agree with many of the comments that Metiria Turei has just raised. I totally agree with her that it is really important that Maori are involved in the management of prisons and have a meaningful say in that. I totally disagree with the position put forward by the Associate Minister of Corrections Dr Pita Sharples that the best way to do that is to privatise prisons and put them over to the private sector. I think the public sector is perfectly capable of managing prisons. If we extended the Minister’s argument to its logical conclusion we would then start to ask why the public sector would for example have any role in schools in hospitals or in the provision of any other services. If we take that to its logical conclusion it simply does not make sense. 
I will respond to some of the comments that Simon Bridges made. He said that the notion that the incarceration of prisoners—the deprivation of people’s liberty—is a core role for Government was ridiculous. If it is not a core role for Government for whom is it a core role? It certainly should not be a core role of the private sector to deprive somebody of his or her liberty. Where do we stop if we start handing over the power to do that to the private sector? Do we stop at the police? Do we stop at the army? Where do we stop when we are dealing with issues around fundamental human rights? There are very few human rights that are more fundamental than the right to freedom and the right to liberty. So I think that Simon Bridges has completely missed the point. 
The member talked about the fact that he did not want to make this a sterile debate by quoting figures; that is because there are no figures to support the position that he put forward. The figures show that it is not cheaper for the private sector to run prisons. In fact in the case of the Auckland Central Remand Prison it was more expensive for the private sector to operate it which shows that private prisons are not more effective in reducing recidivism. From the few studies that are available from overseas—and we do not have any from New Zealand because of the very short period of time that we had a privately run prison—it becomes very apparent that the privatisation of prisons and the handing of their management over to private prison managers does not reduce recidivism at all. This is absolutely a very clear example of the stark differences between the Labour Opposition and the new National Government. As my colleagues have pointed out the National Government is fundamentally committed to a model that privatises profits and socialises losses. 
Finally I will talk about one technical point; I wanted to raise it earlier but this is the first opportunity I have had to do so. It is covered in Part 1 and concerns the liability of the contractor but it extends to the wider issues that we have been debating. Under the contract provisions in the bill the contract must ensure that “Every prison management contract must impose on the contractor in relation to the management of the prison a duty to comply with—” among other things “the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act”. Members will find that provision in new section 199(2)(b) in clause 5. Hopefully the Minister in the chair the Hon Judith Collins will talk about this matter in her final reading speech. But I ask in respect of new section 199B which is about the liability of the contractor what would happen if a private prison operator were to breach the human rights of a prisoner for example or were to cease to exist for whatever reason. Where would the liability fall for that? 
We have seen some examples in recent years of significant sums of money going from the Crown to prisoners when it has been determined that their human rights have been breached. So I am keen to know from the Minister where the liability for any breaches of that would fall particularly in light of section 199B in the bill—and I did not get a chance to raise that earlier in the debate. I will keep my comments very short because I am aware that the time for this debate has nearly expired. 
This is clearly a decision by the National Government that is driven solely by ideology. It cannot be driven by evidence because there is no evidence. I have sat through the entire debate this evening waiting for any member from National the ACT Party or the Maori Party to actually produce a single shred of evidence that a private prison will be more effective than a public prison in any way but all members opposite have been able to do is talk in very general terms. There is no proof.