Prosser Richard: Bail Amendment Bill — In Committee Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeProsser Richard: Bail Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading[Sitting date: 27 August 2013. Volume:693;Page:12872. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]RICHARD PROSSER (NZ First): I am pleased to rise on behalf of New Zealand First to take a short call in this the first part of the Committee of the whole House as we give consideration to the Bail Amendment Bill. New Zealand First supports this bill. We support the broad aims of the bill and we welcome its passage through the House and into law. As I have alluded to in the earlier debates on this bill if New Zealand First has any reservations they would be to say only that in some certain key areas we do not believe that it goes far enough.We accept that there were and are some misconceptions surrounding the bill in the eyes of the public and that some of this may have come about because of a gap in understanding between what the public might rightly expect from such a bill as this and what this bill is able to actually deliver. Some of that gap may have come about because of publicity surrounding the tragic events of the ChristieMarceau case. As we know there are elements of the Christie’s Law petition that the select committee on which I sit the Law and Order Committee was not able to consider because the appeal in the case was still before the courts. Because of that and for other reasons it remains our hope that the Government will see a need to revisit the matter of court bail again as soon as is possible in order to address these concerns and others that have been raised during the submissions process. We would look forward to working with the Government again on any such revisited bill.In the meantime however I have introduced two Supplementary Order Papers to the bill and I want to take a few minutes to speak about these. The first is Supplementary Order Paper 334 which seeks to amend clause 8. I quote from the explanatory note: “This Supplementary Order Paper amends the Bail Amendment Bill. The Bill added 6 more offences including kidnapping and aggravated burglary to the list of now 18 offences that are subject to a reverse onus of proof (all strike offences). But the threshold for that is still too high as it requires the accused to have been previously convicted of one of those specified offences. This Supplementary Order Paper proposes the bail application should not require a previous conviction. The reverse onus of proof should apply upon being charged with one of the 18 specified offences.”This Supplementary Order Paper also dovetails with my second Supplementary Order Paper Supplementary Order Paper 335 in that it specifies an applicability to persons aged 17 years and over. Supplementary Order Paper 335 seeks to amend clause 9 by replacing in clause 9(1) the words “sentenced to imprisonment.” with “convicted of an offence punishable by 3 years imprisonment or more.” It states: “The Bill proposes that the strong presumption in favour of bail remains in place for 17 year olds unless they have previously been imprisoned. 18 and 19 year olds will now be subject to the standard adult tests … This Supplementary Order Paper proposes the threshold should be lowered and based on the seriousness of the offence of the conviction …”—rather than being based on the imposition of a sentence of imprisonment for that conviction which may not necessarily always have been the case—“A 17 yearold’s application for bail should stand or fall on its merits rather than being strongly presumed.” It is our contention that a 17-year-old having been convicted of such serious offences would indicate that that person was no stranger to the court system and the imposition of a sentence of imprisonment is too high a bar in terms of their assessment for bail given that a conviction has already in fact been entered.New Zealand First hopes that all members particularly those from the Government side will give consideration to supporting these two Supplementary Order Papers in my name as we believe that they will strengthen and improve the bill. New Zealand First supports this bill. Thank you.