Moroney Sue: Third Readings —Text is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMoroney Sue: Third Readings —[Sitting date: 09 July 2013. Volume:692;Page:11836. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SUE MORONEY (Labour):I would like to say that it would be a pleasure to stand and speak on the legislation that was the Legal Assistance Amendment Bill but I am afraid in this case it is not because it is legislation that actually restricts the access to justice. The speaker who just resumed her seat Claudette Hauiti—you know I was really looking forward to the sort of difference that she might make to the kaupapa and the rhetoric coming from the National Party but unfortunately all she has done is taken it in hook line and sinker. There she is saying that it is a good thing; that it is actually a good thing in her view that National is curtailing people’s access to actually ensure that they have got the resources to have a fair go.That is what this legislation is about. It is about as Labour believes everyone’s right to have a fair go in our justice system. Is that not what the justice system is supposed to be all about? It is supposed to be about ensuring fair outcomes and that everyone has a fair go. Yet at the outset what this legislation is doing is curtailing particularly for low-income people the ability to actually have that fair go right from the word go. In particular it has implications for women because women are more frequently in that low-income area and they do—[Interruption]I know that Judith Collins and Hekia Parata do not think it is an important issue that we actually analyse these pieces of legislation from the perspective of what the impact is on women. I know that their party now does not even require some independent analysis of the gender impact of any piece of legislation because it has—get this—“mainstreamed” gender analysis in the National Party. What that means is that the same ministry officials who came up with this legislation are the ones who get to analyse what the impact is on a gender basis. So the National Party has done away with the Ministry of Women’s Affairs having a role and having independent scrutiny over all of these pieces of legislation to say how they impact on women.It is no surprise from the National Party that it actually does not care. It actually does not care about what the impact is on women and in this instance with this legislation on children as well. The advice that it got from its own officials was that this bill does have a disproportionate effect—and a badly disproportionate effect—on women and children particularly as they try to actually ensure that they get a fair go through the Family Court services. That is an area where many women come into contact with the justice system and it is probably for them the first time that they are given cause to think about that very important issue of actually getting a fair go.Getting a fair go means having equal access to representation and having equal access to knowledge and information. That is where this legislation does not give them a fair go because it actually limits the number of people who can get access to legal aid to ensure that they have got access to representation access to information and access to advice. That is a cornerstone of our justice system—or at least it once was. It once was a cornerstone of our justice system until the National Party decided that cost-cutting was superior to actually having access to justice as a cornerstone of our justice system.So it is with a heavy heart that I speak in opposition—in strong opposition—to this legislation because in the Labour Party equality of access to justice is a fundamental principle. It is one that will not be supported by this legislation and therefore we cannot and will not support this legislation.