Gosche Mark: Land Transport Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Gosche Mark: Land Transport Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:629;Page:1253] 
Hon MARK GOSCHE (Labour—Maungakiekie) 
: 
 With the exception of those who are new to Parliament this term every single member of this House voted for the legislation. It is interesting; being part of this debate is like going to a confessional: “I didn’t know what I was doing and how stupid was that select committee and how stupid was the Committee of the whole House.” 
Let me just read out the list of crimes that we are talking about that the previous Parliament decided should prevent someone from getting a taxi or bus licence. They include the following offences: sexual violation; assault with intent to commit sexual violation; inducing sexual connection by coercion; incest; sexual connection or attempted sexual connection with a dependent family member under 18; meeting a young person under 16 following sexual grooming; sexual connection or attempted sexual connection or indecent act with a child under 12; sexual connection or attempted sexual connection or indecent act with a young person under 16; indecent assault on another person; exploitative sexual connection; compelling another person to commit an indecent act with an animal; bestiality; sexual conduct with children outside New Zealand; organising or promoting child sex tours. That is the list of offences. They have been described by most members today as minor. 
Hon Harry Duynhoven 
: Not all of them. 
Hon MARK GOSCHE 
: Not all of them they say. Well when the House and the select committee were confronted with that list—and given that we knew that the length of sentence for those convictions was something like 7-plus years potentially—nobody in this House said they were minor sexual offences. It is great to be wise after the event but if we look at the offence that people are talking about—sexual connection or attempted sexual connection or indecent act with a person under 16—we see that it does not have two categories within it. One was either convicted of that or one was not. I presume it is what Graham Capill was convicted and imprisoned for and I have not seen anybody jumping up in this House and saying he should be able to drive kids in a taxi or a bus when he gets out of jail. 
So let us just think about this in its correct context. The public were very upset and rightfully so that people who had committed very serious offences were getting taxi licences and bus licences in this country. Some of them had got those licences even though the Director of Land Transport had said they should not. They had challenged in the courts his decision not to give them a P endorsement and the courts had seen fit to allow them to drive. The public said they did not accept that. There were some well-publicised cases of taxi and bus drivers who had committed some very serious offences against their passengers. So Parliament decided unanimously to do something about it. 
The question that the select committee grappled with was where to draw the line. Do we do it retrospectively or do we do it just for people who want to come into the industry afresh? Parliament and the select committee decided to make it retrospective—unanimously. The problem the select committee had was that we felt it might be unfair to some people who had had a blameless life but for one conviction 30 years ago for one of those crimes. The select committee after grappling with that week after week and attempting to get a proper appeal procedure did not get it in the time that the committee had to deal with this bill so in its report it asked Parliament and the Minister to consider putting in an appeal procedure by way of a Supplementary Order Paper. 
That happened. The entire House had a chance to debate it and understand it. It is clear from today’s debate that a lot of members did not bother. I did and I understood what it meant. I understood that that is what the public wanted and that is what Parliament wanted—and that is why we voted for it unanimously. 
However we do not always get it right. Some people have popped up and spoken about their being caught in the net for what they did 30 years ago and they think that is unfair. It is only right that Parliament recognises that the line was drawn for those people in the wrong place. That is what this bill is about. 
But let us not get all self-righteous about it and say that the select committee mucked up and did not know what it was doing. Gordon Copeland raised the issue of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. The select committee asked for a New Zealand Bill of Rights Act clearance and we were told by the officials that the bill was within the Act. We thought of that. We thought of other issues relating to crimes committed in the past that if they were committed today would not be against the law because the law has changed over time. 
We now have a bill that attempts to fix the problem for a very small number of people. The question is whether we as a Parliament believe as the last Parliament did that it should be extended. That is what the bill raises questions about and that is what the select committee will have to grapple with in the short space of time it has to deal with this matter. I say to the House that in the short space of time the committee does have we may not be able to sort out the matter absolutely perfectly. So the Committee stage of this bill will be very very important. Members will have to make a decision whether people with convictions for the crimes I have read out should be driving kids in a school bus. If members decide that it should be up to the system to decide well that is what the bill outlines. The bill states that if people want to appeal against their licence being taken off them or if having one of those convictions they want to apply for a licence they will have to put their case to the director under a very strict set of guidelines. If the director still says that those people should not have a licence they will have to convince a High Court judge that they should have a licence. That is what the bill states now. It is something that the select committee attempted to get as an appeal procedure when we grappled with the bill for weeks and weeks last year. 
I think it is important that we redress imbalances in the law if inadvertently we draw the line in the wrong place. The difficulty is that there is no line in section 138 of the Crimes Act 1961; it is quite straightforward. There is no line in section 134; it is quite straightforward. But people who were convicted of what was described as carnal knowledge would today be convicted of sexual connection or attempted sexual connection or indecent act with a young person under 16. There is a grey area between those whom we would say are genuine paedophiles and those who as 16-year-old boys slept with their 15-year-old girlfriends. But that is the difficulty that the select committee could not overcome when the bill was before us. Hopefully this House the Committee and the select committee which will have to grapple with this afresh will get it right this time.