Bridges Simon: Legal Services Bill — Third Reading 
Bridges Simon: Legal Services Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:671;Page:17782] 
SIMON BRIDGES (National—Tauranga) 
: 
 Not yet! 
Grant Robertson 
: A bit slow. 
SIMON BRIDGES 
: Well I was getting confused. The Hon David Parker was also trying to get the call. I thought the Assistant Speaker knew something I did not know. 
Legal aid is a fundamental part of a civilised—as we like to think of it—sophisticated and humane society. One way to think of legal aid is that it redresses power imbalances so that people who effectively are powerless who do not have the resources can nevertheless have a fair day week month in court depending on the complexity of the case against them. Indeed they can get legal assistance and advice before that time so maybe it does not come to that. In criminal law it is very simple why that would be the case. It is the State that is bringing a case and a person should have a right to a good defence against the State. Family law is also relatively straightforward some of the time. 
In civil cases—and family law is a breed of civil law—legal aid is perhaps not quite so clear but even then I think we would all agree that where people without money or resources are being sued or have a legal right there should be to some extent public moneys to pay for those people to have their day in court in order to take on the powerful who might be raising a case against them. 
As I say it is important that we have a good legal aid system in New Zealand. That does not mean we should be lazy about our thinking on legal aid. It is expensive: costs have been rising very significantly in recent years. In the Justice and Electoral Committee we were led to believe that those costs would continue to rise—if not exponentially then certainly dramatically—over years to come. So we cannot be lazy about our thinking. Dame Margaret Bazley issued a report and that has been picked up on. This bill soon to become law is part of the Government’s response to Margaret Bazley’s reasonably rigorous report into legal aid in New Zealand. I accept we cannot tar all lawyers with the same brush but she found some concerning cases; it does not matter in a sense whether they were anecdotal or more widespread. This bill makes for and begins the process of a more efficient legal aid system and that has to be good. 
I agreed with what the Hon David Parker who is next to speak said yesterday in the Committee of the whole House. I think he may have put it slightly differently but he talked about a continuum with justice versus efficiency. Efficiency is still very important. One can have a million-dollar drink-driving case that takes weeks but the cost of that would be prohibitive and not worth it. So some regard has to be had for efficiency. 
But the other thing that this bill does is allow for competence and competence testing—a quality assurance framework where practitioners who get legal aid will need to demonstrate competency. That I think is very important. It has been said to me before and it is true that people could get an LLB from any of the numerous universities in New Zealand—there are probably too many in this country that offer law degrees—and they can set up shop anywhere in New Zealand. Of course they have to meet the professional requirements but once they have done that they never ever again in New Zealand need to do anything more to upskill or train or to better themselves as lawyers. I am sure David Parker Chester Borrows and I probably were diligent when we were practitioners going along to New Zealand Law Society courses that updated us on the new law. I remember going to one on the Evidence Act that the past Government— 
Hon Member 
: Too expensive. 
SIMON BRIDGES 
: They were expensive those courses; they were $700 to $800 a pop sometimes. They did do a good muffin and scone though but that is another point. The point is that some would be diligent and go to these courses and would upskill but there is no requirement to do that now. Where lawyers get public money to defend or to pursue a case there are competency requirements. I think that is fair enough. It is a quid pro quo— 
Dr Cam Calder 
: To change the status quo. 
SIMON BRIDGES 
: To change the status quo says my poetic friend and colleague Cam Calder. So that is that. 
I also make some final concluding remarks again about some things that David Parker and Simon Power the Minister of Justice said yesterday about our having embarked on criminal law reform family law reform is to come and perhaps even civil broader law reform. Of course how we fund civil cases— 
Jacinda Ardern 
: I wait for that moment of glory when you quote me. 
SIMON BRIDGES 
: I do not recall “Jacinda Ardern LLB” but that is OK. That is not a problem. Jacinda Ardern can go to night school I think through Waikato University and then maybe I will quote her on legal reform bills. 
Anyway I am getting off course. Finally civil reform is to come and there are a number of things we can consider there. Conditional fee agreements are something they do in the UK and they are now revisiting. We may look at those sorts of things in the future in this country but they are not without their pitfalls. This bill is a very good plank of progress in legal aid reform in this country and Simon Power and the Justice and Electoral Committee that I am on are to be commended for their work.