Pillay Lynne: Third Readings — 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Pillay Lynne: Third Readings — 
[Sitting date: 07 July 2011. Volume:673;Page:19908. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
LYNNE PILLAY (Labour) 
: 
 I am very pleased to stand at the third reading and speak in support of this legislation. Indeed I spoke several times in the Committee stage because I believe that it is very important legislation. 
In starting as I have previously done I acknowledge all the work that was done under Labour with Rick Barker. But also without wanting to be too negative I say that it is a pity that it is only now that this legislation has come before the House. It was ready and could have been introduced in the 90 days of action when the Government first came into office. That would have been— 
Hon Members 
: 100 days. 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: Oh a hundred—yes OK. I got muddled with the “Sacking Bill” did I not? 
Hon Maryan Street 
: Right; you got it mixed up. 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: I got it mixed up with the “90 Day Shaft People in Their Work Act”. 
I come back to this legislation because I know that it is very important that we speak on it. We in Labour are very pleased to see the legislation before the House and we are very pleased to see all the work that Labour put in. We acknowledge the work that Simon Power on behalf of the Government has put in as well. 
Let us get the negative out of the way first: one disappointment is that we have not seen an overarching agency with responsibility for fines. There is no provision for this in the legislation but I know that it was one of the things that Labour really wanted to be part of the legislation. 
However let us focus on the positive things. The legislation will certainly alleviate a lot of problems in terms of unpaid fines in this country. If we look at the statistics we see that between July 2008 and June 2009 the courts wiped $95 million in fines. But that was out of a total of $806 million in unpaid fines so although that amount was wiped there was still a substantial amount owing. I will talk about the people who have those fines which are black marks against their names. It means that they are not abiding by the law and we do not support that in our democracy. But wiping fines also means a loss obviously of huge amounts of money that could be well spent in other areas such as education housing and health—a spend that sadly we see lacking under this Government. It would be a win-win for people with those fines if there were an ability to get them off the track of having debt incurred to them and on to a track of repaying that debt. That would be not only a win financially for the country but a win for those people. 
I do not have the statistics in front of me now so I will work only from memory but I recall that about 69 percent of people with unpaid fines are young people between the ages of 20 and 39 years. I stand to be corrected if anyone is able to correct me. As I have said before I put it out there that I am very very confident that an overwhelming majority of those people are young men. So these provisions are very much a progressive move in accountability and perhaps in setting people on the right track in their lives. I acknowledge Rick Barker. I heard him tell the story of a very good example as he is inclined to do. He is quite the raconteur actually. He gave a good example of a young man and his experience with debt. Indeed that is one of the examples that we hope will be remedied by the new situation. 
I think that other parts of the legislation are important. The waiving of minor infringements—for example of warrants of fitness and registrations—is a really good move. This legislation is about compliance but an infringement might be just a one-off oversight for someone. Who amongst us has not looked at the windscreen and thought “Whoops I have missed the warrant of fitness renewal date.”? People may have no desire at all to break the law—no desire—so they appreciate being able to have those minor infringements waived. It is important to ensure that people comply with the law but we should have the police and the authorities putting their efforts into more important issues like chasing bigger debts and dealing with more serious infringements. The waiving of minor infringements we see is a very very good part of this legislation. 
I have spoken about attachment orders and I will not go through that again. I along with other speakers spoke quite extensively about attachments orders. To allow deductions to be paid from wages in order to repay debt is very very good. At the moment the orders can be imposed only after an examination hearing so a more streamlined ability to get access through deductions is very very sensible. 
In terms of that issue also I will go through the arrangements for longer-term payments of fines or payments by instalments. This I believe is a very very progressive move. The court rather than make an order will have the ability to direct a registrar to determine whether to enter into an arrangement with the defendant thus allowing a greater time for that fine to be paid completely or to be paid by instalments. It could be a bit of both. Payment could be made by a partial payment of some of the fine and then by instalments. That is a very sensible arrangement. 
There is no point in saying to people that they must pay a fine now. In fact we could look at the dreadful situation where people might get into dreadful arrangements with loan sharks in order to pay their court payments. In that situation there is no benefit at all. It is far more sensible to have a situation whereby people can enter into an arrangement and be given payments that are manageable and achievable. They can therefore get into a position of being debt-free from that. I personally find that a very very good part of this legislation. 
I see I have 2 minutes to go. 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: It’s not compulsory. 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: The member says it is not compulsory but I have plenty more to say on this legislation and I take issue with him saying that. He knows that it is the role of good Opposition members to use all their time for speeches and to try to make them as entertaining and— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: I’m trying to help! 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: Trevor Mallard is here and he is trying to help. That is something we always say in our caucus—“Good old helpful Trevor.” So I thank Trevor— 
Hon Trevor Mallard 
: Especially the women’s caucus. 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: Especially in the women’s caucus—he is very popular with the women’s caucus. 
But I come back to this legislation. I take the opportunity to congratulate the Law and Order Committee which did a very good job on this legislation. I think it might have been under the chairpersonship of Sandra Goudie so that in itself is quite an achievement is it not. 
Raymond Huo 
: Oxymoron. 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: I will not comment on that. I also take this opportunity to congratulate the staff and the officials of that committee. Although I was not a member of it I know that— 
Shane Ardern 
: Why weren’t you a member? 
LYNNE PILLAY 
: I was not a member of that committee because one cannot be everywhere. But I know we had good representation on that committee and I know that its members were very well supported and served both by the officials and by staff. I take this opportunity to thank them and I know that other members will probably take the same opportunity to do so. 
So as Trevor Mallard has reminded me and as Mr Assistant Speaker Robertson is saying it is time to wind up. I say “Well done and congratulations.” I commend this legislation to the House. Thank you.