Wilkinson Kate: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
Wilkinson Kate: Financial Review Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:637;Page:7936] 
KATE WILKINSON (National) 
: 
 It is a pleasure to follow my learned colleague Dr Worth. This is a ministry under the watch of a couple of Ministers that has not exactly covered itself in glory in terms of performance. There have admittedly been some improvements but there have also been some glowing deficiencies. I have to admit to being somewhat perplexed when the Minister recently stated that he did not agree that justice delayed was justice denied. We have constantly for months and months questioned the Minister on court delays and what has happened? Absolutely nothing! In fact in today’s Christchurch  
Press  
there is the headline: “Delays clear defendants”. A drug importer has gone free because this case was part of a Blenheim court’s backlog. Blenheim for some time has dominated the numbers of criminal prosecutions that have been halted because of excessive delays. In fact of the seven cases of justice delayed and justice denied in the 7 months since July last year five have been from Blenheim. 
The article in the  
Press 
 states that the court was told that the defendant had gone through a depositions hearing at which it was found there was sufficient evidence to put him on trial but at five subsequent court hearings to set a date for his 3-day trial no space was available. At the fifth hearing a trial was scheduled for 3 months’ time but a week before it was due to begin the trial date was vacated. 
We asked in August last year how the Minister could justify his statement then of what he called “a steady improvement” in the court system over the last 6 years when median waiting lists for a hearing date in the last 2 years in District Courts have ballooned from 161 days to 372 days in Blenheim—which is the worst in the country. It is no wonder that Blenheim courts are again hitting the headlines for delayed justice and denied justice. Justice delayed in the Blenheim court for a drug dealer was undoubtedly justice denied. A 22-month wait between being arrested and having a trial date was deemed excessive and a breach of the defendant’s right to be tried without undue delay. This case was simple and quite simply should have been tried within a year the High Court ruled. 
Then we are asked to believe that this Government is delivering speedy and effective efficient justice for all New Zealanders. So what does this Government do to deliver such justice? It increases by 435000 the number of New Zealanders eligible for legal aid. Yet women in Blenheim—again in Blenheim—seeking a protection order have to represent themselves; they cannot get a lawyer to represent them. They often withdraw from the process because it is simply just too hard. Increasing eligibility does not help these women get access to justice and the headlines have said it all—justice for all except battered women. This Minister has sought to increase the demand for justice but he blindly ignores the fact that justice cannot be supplied because there are no lawyers there to supply it. He denies that the number of family legal aid lawyers has dwindled from about 2000 to 1000 in a mere 12 months. The Minister has steadily received correspondence about lawyers withdrawing from legal aid work. He has constantly received letters from battered women who are representing themselves because they are unable to get legal representation and giving up yet he still insists that we have speedy inexpensive access to justice for New Zealanders. 
We have issues regarding court delays and waiting times that have been totally ignored by this Minister and we have pointed them out to him on many many occasions. We have issues regarding battered women who are unable to obtain legal representation and access to justice and we have pointed that out to the Minister on many occasions. I ask the Minister what he is going to do about justice delayed under our system.