Collins Judith: Electronic Monitoring of Offenders Legislation Bill — Second ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCollins Judith: Electronic Monitoring of Offenders Legislation Bill — Second Reading[Sitting date: 30 March 2016. Volume:712;Page:10082. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon JUDITH COLLINS (Minister of Corrections): I move That the Electronic Monitoring of Offenders Legislation Bill be now read a second time. Many offenders serving sentences or orders in the community are subject to conditions restricting their whereabouts. Such conditions are of two broad types. The first requires the offender to be in a particular place—for example an approved residential address. The second type of whereabouts condition prohibits entry to certain areas. For example a released child sex offender may have a condition requiring them to avoid places such as schools or parks that are likely to be frequented by children.Electronic monitoring provides an additional tool in the overall management of offenders. It supports the effective supervision of probation officers use of interventions and programmes regular risk assessments and pro-social community support. Electronic monitoring already plays an important part in deterring and detecting breaches of whereabouts conditions. The courts can impose electronic monitoring as a condition of bail to verify compliance with the requirement to be at the bail address. They can also impose electronically monitored sentences that confine the offender to an approved residence at defined times or at other times except for approved absences and the New Zealand Parole Board can impose electronic monitoring as a special condition of release from a prison sentence of over 2 years or of an extended supervision order.However there are legislative barriers to expanding the use of electronic monitoring in the criminal justice system. This bill will improve the safety of victims and the general public by removing such barriers. Specifically the courts will be able to impose electronic monitoring in the following situations: first when sentencing an offender to up to 2 years’ imprisonment the court will be able to impose electronic monitoring as a special condition of release and second when sentencing an offender to intensive supervision which is a community-based rehabilitative sentence of between 6 months and 2 years. The bill includes provisions designed to ensure that these new powers are used in a manner that is appropriate and effective including a requirement for the court to obtain advice from the Department of Corrections before imposing an electronic monitoring condition. Defining the purposes of an electronic monitoring condition—Hon Phil Goff: I raise a point of order Mr Assistant Speaker. We are really interested to hear what the Minister has to say but for some reason her microphone is not working and her voice is very very quiet. I wonder whether she could speak directly into it so we could hear what she is saying.Hon JUDITH COLLINS: Thank you. The bill defines the purposes of an electronic monitoring condition as deterring breaches of conditions that prohibit entry into specified places or areas and monitoring compliance with such conditions. It sets out the permitted uses of information collected by electronic monitoring including among others detecting and providing evidence of the commission of offences. It makes clear that offenders may be required to have electronic monitoring equipment attached to their bodies and to comply with written instructions—for example to regularly charge the equipment.Not only are we progressing this legislation to allow the wider use of electronic monitoring but also we are improving our operational systems for those already being monitored. There have been recent incidents where offenders subject to electronic monitoring have removed their straps and absconded. The Department of Corrections has responded swiftly to these incidents by making changes to the way we deal with electronic monitoring alerts for high-risk offenders. If an offender removes or tampers with their anklet there is an immediate response; police are advised and if the strap is cut offenders are held to account and may face penalties imposed by the court. The Department of Corrections and Police have compiled a list of the highest-risk offenders on electronic monitoring. Following a tamper alert for any of these offenders the contract provider is required to immediately contact the GPS Immediate Response Team at the Department of Corrections which then decides on an approved course of action. This has greatly improved the effectiveness in terms of locating offenders and keeping the public safe.We are also strengthening the bracelets themselves. A new strengthened strap has been developed to be used in the electronic monitoring of the highest-risk offenders. The new strap is stronger and much harder to cut. The Department of Corrections has ordered a thousand of these new straps which are currently being manufactured. The new straps will be fitted to existing and new high-risk offenders from August 2016.I would like to thank the Law and Order Committee for its work on this bill. The bill as reported back includes a number of changes. Most notably it contains amendments to the Corrections Act clarifying that some prisoners may be subject to electronic monitoring when they are outside the secure perimeter of a prison. New Zealand’s prisons are surrounded by razor wire fences and the vast majority of prisoners spend their time within that boundary. However some prisoners are permitted to go outside the wire for various reasons. Examples include prisoners who are removed under escort to a hospital for treatment some prisoners who are close to release and live in external self-care units that are located on prison land but are outside the secure perimeter and prisoners near the end of their time in custody who may also be granted daily release to work returning to the prison at night. Escape risk is considered carefully before any prisoner is temporarily released or removed or allowed to live or work outside the wire and appropriate measures are taken to mitigate the risk.Nevertheless the risk cannot be eliminated entirely. The use of GPS technology can provide additional assurances that prisoners who are allowed to be outside the prison’s secure perimeter will not attempt to escape. In the rare case that escape is attempted GPS monitoring may assist the Department of Corrections and police to respond more quickly. It is neither necessary nor technically feasible to use GPS technology to monitor every prisoner who is outside the wire. However the amendments will clarify that the department can use this technology where appropriate. The amendments relating to prisoners also set out the purposes of electronic monitoring and the permitted uses of the information. These are based on comparable provisions in the bill that are in the Parole Act with necessary modifications.Before concluding I would like to comment briefly on the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act issues. This bill attracted a report from the Attorney-General under section 7 of the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act but the Law and Order Committee subsequently concluded that the bill is consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. In my view the positions of the Attorney-General and the committee are not as far apart as may be suggested. It is clear from the Attorney-General’s report that issues of compliance with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act do not arise from the main policy of the bill but from minor technical amendments to the Parole Act in Part 1 and the only reason these amendments were considered to be a problem is that they will apply to extended supervision orders which have been declared to be inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. To summarise the Attorney-General and the select committee reached different conclusions about the bill’s technical compliance. Nevertheless there seems to be a broad agreement that the key proposal in the bill—namely to expand provision for the electronic monitoring of offenders—is consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act.It would be wrong to think that electronic monitoring of offenders is some sort of panacea. However in concert with a range of other measures it can make a significant contribution to maintaining public safety and indirectly to rehabilitating certain offenders. In addition to the situations where electronic monitoring is already available the bill will enable it to be used as a special condition of release from a short-term sentence of imprisonment and as a special condition of a sentence of intensive supervision. The bill also clarifies that electronic monitoring can be used for prisoners who are outside the secure perimeter of a prison. Overall the bill should mean that the potential benefits from electronic monitoring are more fully realised while providing appropriate safeguards for offenders.