Mapp Wayne: Judicature Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Reading 
Mapp Wayne: Judicature Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Reading 
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Dr WAYNE MAPP (National—North Shore) 
: 
 I am a little bit disappointed that some of the smaller parties who are always complaining in the House about the unfair treatment they receive are not taking a call in the debate on the third reading. 
Darren Hughes 
: When was the last time they complained about that? 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: The whip on the Government side makes a fair point. However the reason I make the point is that the administration of justice is one of the key roles this Parliament performs. We pass the laws in this Parliament that set up the structure of the courts. The Attorney-General appoints the judges. So therefore Parliament and the executive have a hugely important role in the administration of justice in the courts of our country. Frankly to have 20 percent of Parliament effectively absenting itself from the process serves the country poorly. If those parties wonder why they attracted only 20 percent of the vote at the last election perhaps it is because the public actually made a judgment on them saying: “They are not worth any more in truth.” Although they once had 35 percent of this Parliament today they have 20 percent and it is because they have refused to participate in developing the law on the administration of justice. They stand condemned by their inaction. 
Darren Hughes 
: They spoke on the last motion. Get on with it. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: Would the junior whip stop making irrelevant and petty interjections as he is notoriously prone to do. I had thought the man had some potential. He came dangerously close to losing his seat. It was another case of the voters in his district saying: “Well maybe the member for Otaki needs a break.” Indeed I suspect that in the 2008 election the voters will say: “We need to confirm our judgment. That man needs a retirement package. Goodbye and welcome to Nathan Guy.” 
I want to talk about the bill as indeed one should. One of the important things the Government did in the last term—and I acknowledge the role of the Speaker in this—was establish the Supreme Court of New Zealand. I realise that it had a controversial birth but I also acknowledge and I want to say so publicly at this point—it would be only fair to do so—that it was something that had been spoken about a great deal by the Rt Hon Jim Bolger and the Rt Hon Sir Douglas Graham. They were committed to that development. 
When a Government is developing new judicial structures—and I recognise the Supreme Court as a very substantial development in our constitution— 
Taito Phillip Field 
: That’s not very generous. 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: We actually said at the time that it was significant. We said it was so significant that the New Zealand public ought to have the right to vote on it. I can imagine that Labour members will say: “Well you weren’t saying that back in 2004.” but the truth is that over time people learn about constitutions—perhaps not the Government but the wider public—and the public expect to be able to vote on major changes to the constitution. I think the Supreme Court fairly met that proposal. I suspect that the public would have voted for a Supreme Court as part and parcel of New Zealand’s development. 
Darren Hughes 
: Which is why you have never voted against it! 
Dr WAYNE MAPP 
: As I have said in this House in a proper reply to the interjector the failed member for Otaki one of the reasons we voted against it was that the public did not have a proper say. 
In developing that important initiative of the Supreme Court it really is incumbent upon the Government to consider more carefully the structure of the balance of the courts. After all there was a substantial direction by the New Zealand Law Commission report No. 85  
Delivering Justice For All: A Vision for New Zealand Courts and Tribunals 
 in which it set out a series of important proposals such as the court sitting in panels and so forth. There is no real recognition by this Government of the importance of putting in place a proper plan in a statutory way that would do that. At least half of the appeals both criminal and civil originate in New Zealand’s largest city Auckland. On an ad hoc basis the Court of Appeal sits there in panels of three. It is only on an ad hoc basis. No permanent panel is established there. The other panel tends to sit in the Wellington Court of Appeal. There are also no developments—and I think it is necessary now that we have a Supreme Court—that would mean the Court of Appeal would sit only in panels of three. Because now under the new system why would we ever have a full hearing of the Court of Appeal? In short what would be the point? Any substantial issue should be heard by the Supreme Court. 
One of the values of the Supreme Court is the “access to justice” question. For instance approximately only eight appeals were heard per year in the Privy Council. I put on record in  
Hansard 
 that Mr Christopher Finlayson appeared in the last Privy Council appeal heard in London which I suggest is an important milestone in New Zealand’s legal history. The truth is that the opportunity has been lost to properly develop the Court of Appeal. For instance—and I have noted this previously—in the Ngati Apa case the Court of Appeal sat as a full court. Indeed it should have because for all practical purposes it was sitting as a final court. Of course it was not the final court. 
That case could have been appealed to the Privy Council but it was not. The Government took the unprincipled route of simply passing legislation without testing its arguments further in the Privy Council. I am sure the Maori Party—and certainly many other Maori people in New Zealand; my wife being one of them—would say that the most important thing that had to be done was to test the legal right one way or the other. Maori have a proud record of using the courts and accepting the decisions of the courts. 
That era of New Zealand’s history has now passed. This bill which deals only with numbers of judges does not deal with all of those other questions I have spoken about such as a permanent panel of three established in Auckland a permanent panel of three established in Wellington a rule that the Court of Appeal will sit only as three and no proper statutory rules around High Court judges sitting on the Court of Appeal—again there are ad hoc processes around that. We have ended up with a detailed and comprehensive statute on the Supreme Court but it is essentially a mishmash of statutory provisions and rules of court procedure that establish the Court of Appeal. That is fundamentally unsatisfactory. Although we will support the bill to third reading because it does something useful it really is a missed opportunity. 
I suggest to the Government given the amount of legislative time it has these days that it take the opportunity to do the job thoroughly repair the legal tool kit put our legal system in a proper structure take advice from the Law Commission and then act on it. After all the Government appointed Sir Geoffrey Palmer who is a former Prime Minister which was a good appointment I have to say. The Government should let him do his job properly. Otherwise we will have a mishmash of ad hoc measures like this legislation which really do not provide the concrete foundation that I think the country is entitled to expect from the legislators and from the executive of this country. It is why taxpayers pay literally hundreds of millions of dollars to them to run the country. I say to the Government which holds the executive power that it should do its job properly.