Mark Ron: Corrections Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Mark Ron: Corrections Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Volume:617;Page:13147] 
RON MARK (NZ First) 
: 
 I have heard some ridiculous things come from the mouth of the former “Minister for Sex in Prisons” Mr Matt Robson. I have heard him say some stupid things but the notion that private prisons— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: The member needs to refer to members by their correct portfolios. 
RON MARK 
: He is the former Minister of Corrections who advocated that prisoners should have sex in prisons. 
Jill Pettis 
: Oh don’t be ridiculous! 
RON MARK 
: Well that is what he did. That Government member instead of parroting on needs to go and read a few newspapers. That man was widely quoted all over New Zealand as advocating conjugal rights for inmates. Now either that member is here on false pretences because she does not do any work or she is simply ignorant and does not read the papers. It is one or the other and members can take their choice. The facts are the facts. Matt Robson is the man who as the former Minister— 
The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley) 
: Would the member come to the bill please. 
RON MARK 
: I am just responding to interjections. I thought I was entitled to do that. 
Jill Pettis 
: The member is absolutely incorrect and he knows it. 
RON MARK 
: Members can see what I mean. To try to lead this Committee to believe that private companies that run prisons use inmates to manufacture nuclear weapons is absolutely ridiculous—absolutely absurd! I have never heard of such a nonsensical unsubstantiated baseless comment in all the time I have been here—and I have heard some comments. 
In this part of the Corrections Bill members are here to reflect on the bill’s purpose and intent. If I go back through the explanatory note of the bill I see it states that this bill is designed “to reflect modern policies and practices”. Modern policies and practices are the very things that are witnessed at the Auckland Central Remand Prison. They are the very things that have led to the high performance that this Government in this very bill wants to get rid of. The most modern practice that this Government could undertake in order to enhance its sordid and sorry performance in the corrections area is to take Dom Karauria the former manager of the Auckland Central Remand Prison and put him in charge as a State employee of the Department of Corrections. I tell the Minister that one would then see a more modern and enlightened approach than we see today from some of the dinosaurs in the department whom the Government has to stoically defend whilst it knows in the core of its very being that it has problems in that department with regard to modernity. 
 Let us go to the second bullet point in the explanatory note. This bill is supposedly designed to insert powers to drug test inmates. Well yes it does except that it does not deal with the people within our Department of Corrections who are studiously manipulating the drug-testing regime so that their prisons come out looking good. What they are doing is deliberately drug testing inmates whom they know do not use drugs. When prison officers say they should go and drug test Mr Inmate Bloggs managers tell those officers not to dare to test that inmate because he would come up with a positive result. But does this bill deal with that issue? No. We simply allow the prisons the Department of Corrections and their current managers to avoid the issue. But not all prison managers do that. If we look at the returns that have come out today we see that some prisons are reporting a 30 percent usage or positive return rate. I suggest that the managers in those prisons are doing the job correctly. Those prison managers are honest and the figures they represent are accurate. But I would look with grave suspicion upon some of the prisons that are mysteriously plucking brand-spanking-new good figures out of the air because I would question their regimes. 
Let us turn to the third bullet point of the explanatory note which states: “the law governing the administration of the corrections system needs to be compatible in its philosophy as well as in its specific provisions with the Sentencing Act 2002 and the Parole Act 2002.” Well hello some of us voted against both those Acts. Some of us said they would be an abysmal failure and some of us opposed them all the way through the House. Any legislation that is designed to be in keeping with those Acts will clearly meet opposition from New Zealand First because we do not believe that some of the things that are happening under parole today—excuse me if I mention Mr Isherwood as one example—are right. If the Parole Board is doing such a fantastic job how is it that a man who drugged raped and forced into prostitution a young woman was allowed by our Parole Board back out on the street to within 12 days—not 12 months; not 12 years—do the very same thing again? And Government members sit there on the other side of the Chamber and tell me the Parole Board is doing a wonderful job of taking into account the safety of the community. What rubbish that is!