Williams ArenaARENA WILLIAMS (Labour—Manurewa): Thank you Madam Speaker. All victims of violent crime should be treated with respect and compassion. The rights of victims of insane offenders have not been adequately protected in law. I want to make three points tonight. The first is about the new verdict of insanity. This bill was originally brought to rename the verdict of not guilty on account of insanity" with "the acts or omissions are proven but the defendant is not criminally responsible on account of insanity"— and I'll return to that later. The second point I want to talk about is how the bill clarifies the way that victims of insane offenders should be treated under this proposed legislation but also in previous legislation. And the third point I wish to talk about is the place of victim impact statements and particularly in relation to the comments of the member for Auckland Central.But if I can before I turn to my points make some thanks because this has been an unusual piece of legislation that the Justice Committee has considered. It's had the full remit of health officials. It's had a huge number of questions and of iterations as my colleagues on the committee have spoken about and so I want to acknowledge some of the people who have engaged so collegially in that debate. The first person to acknowledge is Louise Upston for bringing this bill to the committee. It has taken a huge amount of effort and a willingness to engage and to find common ground between the members of the Justice Committee and I really commend her for that and her approach there. She's someone who has proven herself to be worthy of respect of all of the committee members and I thank her for that contribution.I'd also like to thank the Minister of Health and the chair of the Justice Committee Ginny Andersen for their work in continuing to develop this member's bill in a way which upholds the values of people like me and the Labour Party. It's our view that the bill in its current state upholds justice and transparency and improves an area of legislation where victims were poorly served. It strikes that balance well and that's why we support it tonight.I also want to give what might be an unusual thanks but I hope you'll indulge me to the officials from both health and justice who had to sit together and find a way to work and give their advice together at the table where they were coming from very different policy perspectives—particularly to the director-general of mental health who faced a barrage of questions from the select committee members. Sometimes we're more used to argy-bargy in this place than our officials are but he managed to approach our questions with an open-mindedness and a spirit of helpfulness that was much appreciated.I also want to take the opportunity to thank both the Office of the Clerk and parliamentary counsel for their work on this. I think when you're trying to amend four pieces of legislation which work completely differently as a parliamentary counsel drafter that that task is momentous and without the full remit from justice it was complicated. But they came up with a very significant change to very old tenets of common law that in its drafting is simplistic and it's elegant and their work on that will aid significant reform in this space. The Office of the Clerk also had to deal with very difficult subject matter that often required finely balanced decisions about what evidence was heard in private and secret and the rights of victims to be heard in a way that was respectful and did not retraumatise them particularly women who were providing us with evidence about matters which were extremely difficult for them to discuss some of which concerned parts of court decisions which were hard for the clerks to determine how to hear. And so I really thank them for their work particularly the principal clerk of the committee.After that shopping list of thanks let me turn to my first point about the new verdict for insanity. Now you've heard from my colleagues about how this is a departure from our common law. I just want to touch on what accompanies this new verdict. The bill as it was introduced also recommended adding a two-step trial process to the Act which would have ascertained whether the offences were proven first and whether the person was insane. The committee agreed that renaming the verdict was an important thing to do but we felt that it could be better achieved and not require a new trial process by renaming the verdict to "proven but insane". That decision was difficult to make and it was something that was negotiated heavily but I think it strikes the right balance between centring the victim in the process around giving the victim the kind of recognition that is appropriate when they have suffered at the hands of an offender in this way but still promotes justice and transparency in those processes. The committee also made this change for the process of avoiding trial which is used in some cases of insanity found in section 20 of the Criminal Procedure (Mentally Impaired Persons) Act and that was I think the right decision to come to.The second point I want to touch on is how this bill clarifies the way that victims of insane offenders should be treated going forward. We've heard about the evidence of Sarah Preece in this and I cannot stress enough how important her submission was in influencing the way that the committee members thought about this piece of legislation not only the issue as a whole but how the actual mechanics of this bill should work. Sarah told us in committee how she was failed by her contents insurer which paid her so little money that she was unable to afford to replace her bloodstained carpet or her dining table that was cracked when her attacker slammed her head against it. That wasn't right in law when it happened and the insurer misinterpreted their role in providing her with cover. What this bill does is it makes it crystal clear that where offending and violent offending has happened to someone that they should be covered and that just because their offender lacked the mental capacity to be found guilty in the traditional sense that compensation that should be owed to the offender through private insurance should not be negated. It doesn't seem like a big change but it is a very very significant change for the individuals who have to go through something like this and I'm very happy that the committee arrived at a situation where we would be addressing that.The third point I want to make is the place of victim impact statements. On this we've heard that the committee recommended amending the Victims' Rights Act to allow victims of insane offenders the opportunity to make victim impact statements. I want to touch particularly on the issue of victim impact statements not being used to inform clinical and judicial decision making about the fitness of a person to stand trial. I have benefited from several conversations with my colleagues not just those in the Justice Committee about this issue which I see is very finely balanced.I agree with the member for Auckland Central's comments that to create some sort of chilling effect which risked arbitrary detention is a very unintended consequence of this bill and is certainly not the outcome that we want to see. I do think that Ministers who hold the health portfolio and responsibility for this have a duty to consider these issues of release of this particular class of offender very carefully so as to not confuse the issue with any political sentiments of the day which is hard to do in these situations where often there is public outcry about a case that has garnered media attention—like the case of Sarah Preece for example. I think though that this bill strikes the right balance. It creates a system where victim impact statements are about centring the victim in the court. They're about giving a victim standing in the court as their own person not just sort of an incendiary of a process which has happened between the Crown and the offender and by not introducing those victim statements at a point at which clinical decisions are being made and at a point at which judicial decisions are being made we avoid that harm we reduce it to something that is absolutely manageable for the Minister who already exercises these sorts of powers in other decision-making capacities. I'll finally conclude with a reflection that this law did need to change but our ultimate goal still remains: to keep all New Zealanders safe including those who are mentally ill and protecting people from violent offending in this way still remains the priority."