Cosgrove Clayton: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
Cosgrove Clayton: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:653;Page:2436] 
Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) 
: 
 This is an interesting report. I note—because we are also discussing current operations—that the Minister in the chair has adopted on coming into Government a very interesting strategy. The Minister inherited when she came into Government an escape rate from prison that had dropped by 84 percent over a decade. The Minister of course took the credit for that as she went around and told us that she had visited a number of prisons—not to propose measures that she ought to put forward but to ask people how she should do her job. As we have noted in this House under the previous Government there was an 84 percent reduction in prison escapes. If members look at the litany of escapes suicides and assaults that have occurred in the 3 or 4 months since this Minister took office—we will not go into the area of the police because sadly we are not in the position at this point to debate the financial review of the New Zealand Police—we can see that there have been more escapes in that time than there were in the last 3 years. 
This Minister has embarked on a very interesting strategy but I think it will be seen as having been fraught with danger when we review it in the coming years. She paraded around the country and was going to be the tough person. She was the Minister who was going to crack down on everything including when the Auditor-General delivered a very robust report that outlined that procedures in the Department of Corrections had not been put in place. The department failed to do this even though it had been instructed to do so under the previous Government and even though the Wellington Coroner reviewed those procedures and had no recommendations to make because—in his view—the procedures were there and were up and running. This Minister said she would sort that out. On the back of the Auditor-General’s report came a thundering from across the House from Judith Collins. She said heads would roll—members may remember that the Prime Minister was into that as well as her—and there would be accountability. The chief executive officer of the Department of Corrections was put on notice; everybody was put on notice. 
But I will give the Minister credit for this: she did quite rightly call in the State Services Commissioner the employer of the Minister’s chief executive—he reported direct to her—and ask the commissioner to do a report that would tell her what was going on and who was accountable. But prior to that the Minister bagged and gagged the chief executive officer of the Department of Corrections so he could not respond to the Auditor-General’s report. She also pre-empted the report she had asked for from the employer of course. The Minister then put taxpayers’ money in jeopardy. We know this because the chief executive officer told the Law and Order Committee that he had not ruled out legal action at least at the time in respect of his employment arrangements and that would have been a cost to the taxpayer. When the report came out the chief executive officer said he was staying. The Minister stated that she had no confidence in the chief executive officer before the report had come out and no confidence in him after the report came out. 
The question we have for the Prime Minister is who is accountable? The New Zealand people sit there and hear a lot of bluster and bluff and stomping of feet from the Minister. She stomped around the country and said she would get tough and sort the department out. But is the Minister accountable today? Is the chief executive officer accountable? Of course the New Zealand people sit there and wonder who is accountable. The report notes a very interesting thing. It says under the accountability section—I know National members wanted this to be included—that New Zealand Labour Party members asked extensive questions about the working relationship between the Minister and the chief executive. The working relationship goes straight to the heart of public confidence in this department. I say to the Minister as she embarks on her strategy and tries to make a case for private prisons that if she cannot get accountability out of a department that she has direct control of via her chief executive officer—a single report—then how on earth will she get accountability from a private sector organisation with a contract that is far removed from that relationship and in a situation where the chief executive must participate in the tender and also decide effectively who gets the tender? I ask that Minister how on earth she will get accountability because she cannot get accountability now. 
Is this just a case where Judith Collins will be able to say—as she says when anything goes wrong in her departments whether it is in respect of the New Zealand Police or the Department of Corrections—that it is an operational matter and she will wash her hands of it? It was not an operational matter when Labour was in Government according to the speeches that National members made. Not only will it be an operational matter but it will also be a matter that is in the hands of the private sector if the Government goes down the way of contracting with a private sector company. The relationship with the company will be far removed from the Minister. I ask members whether the Auditor-General will be able to investigate such a company in the way that he did in the case of the department or whether the select committee will be able to do so. I ask whether this Parliament will be able to call people in and question them and whether the Official Information Act will be able to come into play. As we were told at the select committee we will now have a layer of highly expensive monitors who will do the Minister’s job and monitor the performance of this department.