Power Simon: Legal Services Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Power Simon: Legal Services Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:670;Page:17005] 
Hon SIMON POWER (Minister of Justice) 
: 
 I am a bit reluctant to interrupt the flow of quality contributions coming from my left but at this point— 
Hon David Parker 
: There’s no risk of that. 
Hon SIMON POWER 
: That is right: there is no risk of that. I will make a couple of introductory remarks but I will not take a large number of calls during this Committee stage because the Legal Services Bill and the process associated with it has been debated widely both publicly and within this Chamber and during the select committee process. 
I will respond to a couple of points that have been made by members of the Opposition. First the most important component of the purpose of this bill is to confirm and to guarantee access to justice for those who cannot afford to fund their own legal counsel at a time particularly in the criminal area where it is absolutely critical that good quality representation is made available to them. 
Secondly it is important to note that although Dame Margaret Bazley’s report referred to some lawyers who were perhaps below par criticisms were also made—and subsequently followed through by the Government—in respect of the performance of the Legal Services Agency so it was a two-way street in that sense. Frankly once professional services are billed and have performed to a reasonable standard those practitioners are entitled to have their fees paid in a timely and efficient manner. We have seen some big changes on the Legal Services Agency side as well as the changes that are going through under this bill in respect of good-quality representation. 
Mr Parker touched upon one or two issues relating to the potential for some further reform in these areas. He tellingly zoned in on one or two areas that the Government could look at further. I reassure my colleague on the Opposition benches that that work is well under way and that this will not be the last piece of work Parliament deals with in the legal aid area in my time. It is an interesting debate which we will continue. 
Affordability for the State which means affordability for the New Zealand taxpayer is an important part of that continuing equation. Mr Parker raised issues about for example multiple defendants and multiple legal aid lawyers and the like. Many of those issues and the question of the efficiency with which the court system deals with them—because all of those defendants are entitled to have their matters heard in a timely way; that is an important component of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act in this sense—are largely being dealt with under the criminal procedure simplification and modernisation legislation. 
When those changes are put alongside the changes to the legal aid system contained within this legislation smart members of the Committee will begin to see a bit of a plan emerging—that is incentives across the justice system are being changed tweaked and shall we say retargeted to ensure that those most in need are getting those services. However it means that the Government will continue to look closely at the broader affordability of the legal aid system. I have said publicly that on the current track of baseline expenditure to vote legal aid if I can describe it as bluntly as that compared with the growth that is expected in this area off the back of current settings—that is to say settings that are not altered by the passage of this legislation—over the next 5-year period we are looking at a gap between those two lines of about $405 million. That gap has to be addressed. 
Some of the issues that Mr Parker raised were at the margins of this bill. None the less some that were raised will be the focus of further consideration by the Government in coming months. In fact I am hoping to make an announcement in that regard shortly. 
We will see continuing tweaking of the incentives in the legal aid system to try to muster taxpayers’ money in a way that focuses solely on the good of those who cannot afford representation through legal services of their own. Currently the system is clearly not incentivised adequately to avoid the slowing of processes the bogging down of matters and the multiple representations of issues which have to be paid for and dealt with by way of other processes in the court system. 
The previous Government through the Hon Rick Barker who was then the Minister for Courts had enough foresight to persuade the then Opposition spokesperson on justice and corrections to support the removal of depositions. I might dwell on that matter in relation to the purposes of the legal aid system for just one second. At that time I was approached by a reasonably significant group—I am not sure what the collective noun is for a group of lawyers but they were a very senior group—of criminal lawyers who told me that if I proceeded with my fountain pen on the parchment and we did away with depositions we would cause major problems for the system. That is why as the former Minister may recall we agreed firstly on a review and secondly to retain in the legislation an application to the judge to hear oral submissions in the event that matters were complex and worthy of such of an application. 
It turns out that since the removal of depositions those applications for oral evidence to be heard have occurred in 3 percent of matters brought before the courts. So people who said previously that if changes were made to the legal aid system the justice system and the way that we drove the system to ensure timely and quality representation we would undermine the fabric of the pistols at dawn mentality—which effectively is the adversarial system that we have adopted—were not right. This Parliament must have the courage to drive through changes to make sure that we test those notions in a vigorous way and this piece of work is only a small part of a broader reform that I hope will do that.