Andersen GinnyGINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): The three-strikes law is an anomaly in New Zealand law and it's for one main reason. It's because it severely restricts judicial discretion. That's number one. It provides fixed sentences that give no ability for a judge to take into account the seriousness of the offending or even the circumstances of the offender. Sometimes I do wonder whether the National Party would like to just do away with judges altogether and come up with a script and corresponding years to be served because that would work better.The fact is that this kind of blanket mandated sentencing does disproportionately affect Māori. We know that for a fact because we see that 81 percent—and we've even had comments in terms of that. The Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court have found that sentences imposed under this regime contravene the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act with Māori having an 81 percent number for those who receive the three strikes.But I would actually like to speak from inside. When I was working in Government when this legislation came into force—and the reality was that it wasn't a National Party idea and there was no preparation for this in any manifesto or policy because it was an ACT promise that then had to be delivered upon in a hurry for quick political points. That was apparent when there was no computer system able to actually deal with the three-strikes system. And so what happened was in a quick hurry as a way of monitoring that we had to develop a stamp. It had Striker" on it. So what would happen when a file came before a court room in a short term was that the judge at sentencing had to read out a certain statement in order for one strike to be applied. Because there was no one computer system I had the job of reading through three different databases finding out when there was a striker finding the court ringing up the court letting them know they had a striker in the cells and the fact that that had to be applied.The trick was that that didn't work over the whole of New Zealand. So there was a running tally that the Minister at the time Judith Collins was required to hear of how many strikes had been missed in any given week. People had to draw straws—now much like I'm sure the National caucus does in giving other news about polls—on who was going to tell the Minister about how many strikes had been missed that week. And the reality was the system was not ready—it was not ready for being able to cope with this change and it has never been ready. That is in relation to the fact that it does not address the underlying causes of crime. That is still true now. So I'm quite happy at this moment to see this bill repealed because it is bad legislation as the Minister has already said.I won't speak too long because I'd like to finish on what the advice was from the Ministry of Justice at the time this Act the Sentencing and Parole Reform Act came about. What the Ministry of Justice advised the Government of the time was that proposals will add substantial and direct costs to the justice system without creating any significant improved outcomes in terms of reducing the drivers of crime improving social outcomes or reducing reoffending and victimisation. That is exactly what has played out over time and that is exactly why this Government will be repealing this poor legislation. I commend this bill to the House."