Little Andrew: Victims’ Orders Against Violent Offenders Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLittle Andrew: Victims’ Orders Against Violent Offenders Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 06 March 2014. Volume:696;Page:16456. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]ANDREW LITTLE (Labour):The Victims’ Orders Against Violent Offenders Bill has come back to this House in very good shape and that is a great credit to the members of the Law and Order Committee and indeed to the Labour members on it. My colleague Phil Goff has told the House about some of the thorny issues that had to be dealt with and I have no doubt at all that Phil Goff a former Minister of Justice himself and one of the best Ministers of Justice we have had in a long time did put up a good case for the sorts of changes that he talked about. That is the nature of Phil Goff. He is absolutely passionate about this issue about the rights of people and about an effective justice system and an effective criminal justice system. What a pity the current Minister of Justice who really is the laziest Minister of Justice we have had in 40 years does not bring the same alacrity and assiduity to the task that Phil Goff did when he was Minister of Justice.This bill is in good shape and it reflects the fact that the practicality of victims’ rights which have really been developed over the last 20 years is now starting to take shape. There is no point in having fine words on a page of a piece of legislation; actually it has to have real meaning in real people’s lives. The ability for victims particularly those of serious violent offending to be able to take practical steps to protect themselves is a good thing. This bill gives important protection to some of the most vulnerable victims of crime that we have in this country—those who have been the victims of serious and violent crime. It is good that the threshold in terms of the sentence that the offender has received from the court is lower. That is to say as Phil Goff pointed out it is not having been sentenced to 5 years’ imprisonment but to 2 years because that is when the parole system mechanisms kick in. There ought to be scope.It is not explicit in this bill but perhaps a further development would be that the parole system can be used to effect some of these orders. Of course allowing an application to be made before a convicted offender has been released from a custodial sentence makes sense particularly when the threats of harassment or the threats of a presence in the vicinity of the victim have been manifest before the offender has been released. It makes sense to be able to make an application before the offender is released. That is all good stuff and none of that can be criticised. It is good to see as I said before that the committee has been able to effect sensible change for the benefit of the bill and ultimately for the benefit of future victims—and let us hope there are not many of them.There is one important issue left and Phil Goff alluded to this as well. It is an issue that I think is important. I noted it at the time of the bill’s introduction and I notice it now. It is the cost to the victim. These are civil proceedings. The application for an order under this bill is a civil proceeding and therefore the civil rules of the District Court will apply. That means that in the absence of anything else there will be a filing fee. If there is a hearing— and the bill explicitly notes that in some circumstances there may be the need for a hearing—then there will be a hearing fee as well. In some courts—and I am particularly familiar with the Employment Court—there is a specific basis on which a registrar of that court can waive fees. That is not as clear in the District Court and perhaps something that we ought to be looking at—perhaps it could be the subject of a Supplementary Order Paper when this bill comes to its Committee stage—is some explicit provision for a registrar of the District Court who has received an application to be able to waive those fees.If these orders are to be processed as it appears on the face of the bill in some cases on the papers as opposed to having to convene a hearing then we need to be able to keep the cost as minimal as possible. Likewise if there is to be a hearing particularly in relation to a final order as provided for in the bill since the orders have now been broken up into interim orders and final orders or at least temporary orders and final orders if there is to be a hearing for a final order then let us keep the cost of that as low as possible. Let us have some provision for a waiver of those costs and fees. That really is the issue that remains. If we want these orders to be effective and if we do not want victims to feel put upon yet again by an offender who has completed their sentence or is about to complete their sentence and if we therefore want this remedy to be practical and effective then we need to make sure that the orders are accessible and that any barriers or impediments to making an application for an order are stripped away. The cost factor is an important one. Anything that we can do to strip away that cost is a good thing. If it means that we have to give registrars of the District Court specific and express powers to waive fees then we ought to do that. There is a cost of course for making an application or even for varying it once an order is granted. If a victim seeks to vary an order there is potentially a cost associated with that as well. Indeed there is potentially a cost associated with discharging an order if it is not discharged by effluxion of time or through other means. So let us make this as accessible as we can for victims to take advantage of.I just want to conclude really by repeating remarks that I have made in this House before. Although we have been developing victims’ rights in different pieces of legislation over time and notwithstanding the good work that has gone on in previous parliaments and in previous Governments—usually Labour-led Governments—Simon O’Connor: Ha ha!ANDREW LITTLE: —the reality is that it is long overdue and Mr O’Connor knows it for us to have a comprehensive overarching piece of legislation to deal with victims’ rights so that there is one place where victims or their advocates or those who are assisting them or advising them can go to find out how a victim can respond to a particular set of circumstances and what a victim is entitled to. The first thingmust be an understanding of the criminal justice system. The second thing must be access to an advocate or someone to assist them to negotiate the fraught path of the criminal justice system.Let us face it: victims do not choose to be in that position. Victims do not choose to be part of the criminal justice system. They are put there because of the actions of another or of others. It is incumbent on us and I think that we have a moral obligation as a Parliament and as successive Governments to ensure that they are afforded proper assistance to work their way through the criminal justice system. So let us have an overarching charter of victims’ rights. Let us have an overarching piece of legislation that spells out what victims are entitled to what they can expect what assistance they can get and what assistance they will get. I think that is very important and I think it is long overdue. Labour’s commitment is that we will have that. We will have a comprehensive set of victims’ rights rather than them appearing in different pieces of legislation.The final final point I want to make just about this bill is that the practical success of this bill will be in the enforcement of the orders and therefore in a police force equipped to understand the orders enforce them and be on hand if and when they are breached. Protection orders issued by the Family Court are breached every day and we have seen a recent very tragic case where there has been a catastrophic breach of them. We cannot allow that to continue. We need to know that successive Governments will resource our police force to ensure that these sorts of orders will have the backing of the State through the police that they will be afforded priority and that people can rest assured that they will be meaningful once ordered by the court.