O'Rourke Denis: Public Safety (Public Protection Orders) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeO'Rourke Denis: Public Safety (Public Protection Orders) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 02 December 2014. Volume:702;Page:1005. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DENIS O’ROURKE (NZ First):I want to take a short call on this bill at this stage to make some comments about what the Greens have said in relation to this bill because New Zealand First does have a different approach from theirs although I do respect the fact that the Greens are very much of a mind to preserve and improve human rights. Indeed New Zealand First—and particularly me—is interested in doing so as well. However it has to be admitted that as in this case there are often tensions between personal rights and the public interest. The plain truth is that there are some people who are imprisoned and who are then eligible for release but who remain a danger to the community. We have actually seen in recent years some fairly spectacular examples of that therefore this is not an issue that can be ignored. Consequently New Zealand First embraces this bill and welcomes the initiative taken to deal with that situation however uncomfortable it may be.The real crux of the bill is simply this: is an order really necessary? If it is then it is not a question of punishment; it is a question of protecting the public interest. So I am glad to see that the court must not find that it should issue an order unless it finds that there is a very high risk of further offending. The presumption is that there will not be grounds for an order. These grounds have to be proved so the court must be satisfied that the respondent exhibits a severe disturbance in behavioural functioning established by evidence of specified characteristics to a high level. That is a high bar and so it should be.It is true that there are people who fall into that category and who are not necessarily mentally disordered. If they were then we have a regime for the committal of those people to mental facilities. However there is a gap between that and those who are entitled to freedom and that gap is where there is a person who is not mentally disordered and would ordinarily be entitled to their freedom but who is considered to be so dangerous that they cannot be allowed to go free. It is a very very small number of people but history has demonstrated that they do exist and this legislation is necessary to deal with them in the view of New Zealand First.I note concerning the review provisions that the Justice and Electoral Committee has added clause 17(2) and (2A) to require a court reviewing a public protection order to consider whether the subject still poses a very high risk of imminent serious sexual or violent offending taking into account the reports provided to the court. There will be plenty of evidence for them because the reports of two psychologists or psychiatrists are needed and the person themselves can obtain a similar report. So the matter will be properly investigated and I feel sure that we will not see New Zealand courts with the benefit of that sort of information lightly making an order for the detaining of these people.So I cannot agree with the approach taken by the Greens which I feel is too extreme. It goes to the point of saying: “Maybe there is a problem but human rights are so important that we just have to ignore this problem.” Well New Zealand First does not feel like that. We acknowledge that there is a problem. We acknowledge that there are people in this category while at the same time acknowledging the importance of human rights. We say that this bill is sufficiently well drafted to protect people from arbitrary imprisonment even those who have been in prison for serious sexual or violent offences and who therefore should be subject to one of these orders. We feel that the tension between personal rights and the need for public protection is still adequately covered with this legislation.We do not feel that the way that this legislation is drafted would result in people losing their freedom without that high bar of evidence having been achieved and I would expect that only a handful—literally a handful—of people would ever be subject to those orders. But of course we are going to have reports to Parliament and there is going to be good supervision so if we find that there are a lot more people who are detained in this way then Parliament will know and will have an opportunity to review the legislation.So I think that the situation is so serious that this bill is warranted and that it is well drafted and it is well balanced. The protection of the individual is still maintained but this very serious problem is dealt with. The public has a right to expect that Parliament will act in this way to protect them because there have been problems—serious problems—in the recent past and we simply cannot afford to not do anything about them. So I am afraid that I think that the Greens have gone too far in terms of the protection of human rights without taking into account extreme circumstances and these would be extraordinary and extreme circumstances where a person would be subject to this sort of order. So New Zealand First will continue to support the bill for those reasons.