Robertson Grant: Electoral (Disqualification of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Robertson Grant: Electoral (Disqualification of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:669;Page:15972] 
GRANT ROBERTSON (Labour—Wellington Central) 
: 
 It is with great sadness that I rise in this third reading of the Electoral (Disqualification of Sentenced Prisoners) Amendment Bill. I want to pick up a point made by other speakers particularly by Rahui Katene in what I thought was an excellent speech about the fact that we are debating in this House a fundamental change to electoral law and it is being done very glibly by this Government on the very day that a constitutional review is announced that has as its cornerstone the proposition that changes to the electoral law should be made by consensus. In fact today the announced review is being criticised because it is too slow and too deliberative and because it is making too much of an attempt to draw a consensus. Seeking consensus is in fact a very good thing to do when we change electoral law because the right to vote is a fundamental part of our democracy. I tell Mr Quinn to look around the walls at the names of the places and the battles where New Zealanders died while defending the right to vote and defending our democracy. 
Hon Dr Wayne Mapp 
: For prisoners? 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: That is the very point. We defend the right to vote of the people who challenge us the most. It is easy to defend the right to vote of all our friends sitting around here but defending the right to vote of the people who challenge us in our communities is the gravest challenge of democracy. 
Today we have had a constitutional review announced that puts at the centre the need to reach consensus about changing fundamental electoral law yet we have a bill in front of us today that gives no good reason to change this law. No good reason has been provided by the National Government to change the law. If we are to change electoral law we should do so deliberately and with thought about the consequences of the change for our democracy. Yet in this process by the National Government we have seen almost no argument in favour of the bill. Where has Simon Power the Minister of Justice been in this debate? He has been absent from it. Where has Chris Finlayson been in this debate? The contribution we have had from Chris Finlayson is to tell us through his New Zealand Bill of Rights Act assessment that this bill is wrong. He has said the change cannot be justified under section 5 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. 
The New Zealand Bill of Rights Act is the very Act that provides that every New Zealand citizen who is over the age of 18 years has the right to vote. That is in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. Therefore when Mr Finlayson puts his assessment in front of us and says this bill cannot be justified it is because the rights and freedoms contained in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act must “… be subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.” That test has not been met. In fact the Attorney-General said the bill is completely inconsistent with that Act. It does not rationally link to the disenfranchisement that is the aim of the bill. The Attorney-General has been completely clear in his denunciation of this bill. 
We now know from listening to the ACT Party contribution that even the ACT Party does not support this bill. Hilary Calvert gave us what was frankly a bizarre intervention earlier in this debate but it meant that the ACT Party is being forced to support this bill as part of its coalition deal. It does not really support this bill. The Maori Party has clearly said it does not support this bill. But the National Government without any representation from a senior Minister and without anyone actually justifying this bill leaves us with Chris Finlayson’s statement that fundamentally the right to vote contained in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act is being changed here via a member’s bill on the very day that a constitutional review is announced that says we should change the Electoral Act only when there is a good reason to do so and when there is a process that provides for consensus. 
But that issue has been part of the debate on this bill all the way through. The fact is that the Law and Order Committee did not allow the Ministry of Justice to be involved in the process. The fact is that this bill about electoral reform was sent to the Law and Order Committee. The fact is that consistently that committee has failed to go through due process under its chair Sandra Goudie and that is precisely what happened with regard to this bill. 
A hoax on the victims of crime is being perpetrated tonight. Nothing in this bill will make our communities safer. Community safety should be the aim of all criminal justice legislation that comes before this House; we should try to make our communities safer. Not one piece of evidence has been provided by the National Government that this measure will make our communities safer. The tragedy tonight was to listen to Paul Quinn stand and run through a series of crimes one of which I happen to know quite a bit about. For him to somehow give the impression that this bill will stop those sorts of crimes from occurring or that this bill will give any comfort to the families and the victims of those crimes is appalling because he knows that this bill will do nothing in that regard. This bill will not stop people from offending and it will not give comfort to the victims of crime. Mr Quinn has perpetrated a hoax on them. By standing here tonight and running through the details of those crimes he did a disservice to the families and friends of the people affected by those crimes. It is a shameful thing to come to this House and pretend that this legislation will do anything for the victims of those crimes or anything to make communities safer. 
Mr Quinn and National know that they need to do far better in this House when it comes to criminal justice. If we are serious about solving the crimes that Mr Quinn brought up and if he was actually serious about trying to stop those crimes then the bill would be about investing in stopping crime before it starts and making sure that we do not send people to prison. People like Howard Broad have come out and said we have far too many people in our prisons. On this side of the House we acknowledge that is the case. We acknowledge that this House needs to do better in terms of addressing the causes of crime. We all need to do better in making sure that we focus more on rehabilitation and on reintegration. But this kind of petty mean-spirited bill will do nothing to reduce crime. It will not make our communities safer and it perpetrates a hoax on the victims of crime. 
We have heard a lot tonight about the view that when prisoners go to prison we are sending them there for punishment rather than as a punishment. The punishment is the taking away of liberty. 
Hon Dr Wayne Mapp 
: No—as a punishment. 
GRANT ROBERTSON 
: No Dr Mapp. We have heard consistently from members of the National Government that people are being sent to prison for punishment. The fact of the matter is that they are sent there as a punishment. Their liberty is taken away. In terms of those people who are sentenced for periods of 3 years or less in prison we know that every single one of them will be back in our society so what should our aim be when they go to prison? It should be to rehabilitate them and ensure that they can reintegrate into society because they will be back with us. They will be our neighbours. We want them to continue to be part of society and we want to make sure that when they come back into society they are part of our communities. 
Mr Quinn’s bill tonight does nothing to improve the safety of our communities. It does nothing to uphold our democracy. In fact it is a shame on our democracy. It is simply a hoax. Mr Quinn is putting up a slogan in front of this House and it is a shame that it will be passing through the House tonight.