O'Rourke Denis: Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (Continuation and Reform) Amendment Bill — Second Reading In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Rourke Denis: Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (Continuation and Reform) Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee[Sitting date: 08 May 2013. Volume:689;Page:9740. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First): The Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims (Continuation and Reform) Amendment Bill re-enacts the Prisoners’ and Victims’ Claims Act 2005 so that it will continue in force beyond the extended sunset date of 1 July 2013. The restrictions upon the award of compensation to prisoners by the court and the process by which a prisoner’s victims can claim from an award are now to be made permanent.I am pleased to be able to say that the Justice and Electoral Committee has conducted a rigorous examination of the bill as introduced and New Zealand First is pleased to see that a number of needed changes have been made.The principles that New Zealand First considered in relation to this legislation—and many submitters have covered these too—included firstly that being a prisoner means being penalised only by the temporary removal of personal liberty and by incarceration. It does not mean anything more than that. Prisoners must have the opportunity for rehabilitation education and reorientation in the direction of their life if that is at all achievable. Secondly it does not result in the loss of other rights. That means that it does not result in the loss of the right to compensation for genuine injury or disability from genuine accidents because they can happen in prison just as easily as they can happen anywhere else. It does not mean the loss of the right to compensation for significant mistreatment should that occur. I agree with my friend Mr Clendon who pointed out some of those sorts of circumstances.I also took Kim Workman’s submission very seriously because he did make a very important submission to the committee. He said that we should take into account the need for a good prison culture and that good process encourages good behaviour inside and outside prison and will lead to fewer assaults within the prison fewer suicides and so on—generally better behaviour by prisoners. He also said that vexatious claims were few in number—and I agree—and that other prisoners dislike troublemakers and have their own effect in suppressing vexatious claims. So those things also need to be taken into account.On the other hand the rights protected in this way must be balanced against the fact that there is concern in the community that some prisoners abuse some of those rights especially the right to compensation for mistreatment and especially in regard to accident compensation. Those are genuinely held concerns as we heard in the submission process. We must give proper attention to them even if cases of abuse of rights by prisoners are rare. We certainly should not mollycoddle prisoners and we should make sure that there are no rorts like those we have seen in recent times by a few prisoners.New Zealand First accepts that there is a need also for an accessible process for the victims of a prisoner to be provided for claims against any award made to a prisoner. That is the fundamental purpose of this legislation. We think that victims’ rights have been seen almost as second-class rights for far too long. This bill pays proper attention to that and creates a clear right and an easily accessible process for a victim to claim against an award made to a prisoner. That achieves an appropriate balance that protects the rights of prisoners on the one hand and also meets community expectations that prisoners’ compensation be accessible to their victims to meet the properly awarded claims made by those victims.The Government I understand originally wanted a fund to hold the proceeds of all compensation awarded for victims who would then have the right to claim against it. But that was clearly impracticable and has been replaced by the better provisions now in the bill for a victim to claim against an award made to the prisoner who committed a crime against that victim.Some submitters have also said that the courts had pre-empted this bill in theTaunoa v Attorney-General case and that therefore the bill is not needed at all. They thought that codification of restrictions on claims made by prisoners may mean that the law would not be developed or refined further. However against that codification provides certainty and consistency in the law. Parliament does need to set out what the scope for claims made by prisoners should be and it does not mean that the courts may not develop the law within the scope of the Act. Again the Kim Workman submission was very relevant. He pointed out that codification helps both prisoners and victims to understand their rights. So on balance I believe that it is right that this process and these rights should now be codified.Section 13(1) of the principal Act sets out the essence of these issues. It says: “No court or tribunal may … award any compensation … unless satisfied that—(a) the plaintiff has made reasonable use of all of the specified internal and external complaints mechanisms reasonably available to him or her to complain about the act or omission on which the claim is based but has not obtained in relation to that act or omission redress that the court or Tribunal considers effective; and (b) another remedy … cannot provide … redress that the court or Tribunal considers effective.”I think that is the essence of the issue but of course there needs to be some guidance as to how that is assessed and section 14 provides for that. Amongst other things it says that the considerations are “the extent … to which the plaintiff … took within a reasonable time all reasonably practicable steps to mitigate loss or damage” and also “whether the defendant’s breach of or interference with the right concerned was deliberate or in bad faith; … the relevant conduct of the plaintiff;”—the prisoner in other words—“… the consequences for the plaintiff of the breach … the freedoms interests liberties principles or values recognised and protected by the right concerned; and”—importantly I think—“… any need to emphasise the importance of or deter other breaches of or other interferences with the right concerned;”. That is where I thought the Kim Workman submission was very appropriate. It goes on to give other considerations which include “the extent … to which effective redress in relation to that act or omission has been or could be provided otherwise than by compensation;”—again an important issue.So taking all that into account New Zealand First considers that the bill now achieves the correct balance that I have spoken of and that prisoners’ rights will be preserved but will be appropriately restricted in the claims that they bring. More important and finally the victims of crime will have a clear right and process to make claims against any award that the committer of the crime against them has received and that is as it should be. The victim should have the first claim against that money. The prisoner who committed a crime can only expect that he or she must first compensate the victim before benefiting from any compensation themselves. So for all those reasons New Zealand First will vote for the bill.