Dalziel Lianne: Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Dalziel Lianne: Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:660;Page:9300] 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL (Labour—Christchurch East) 
: 
 I heard the Minister in the chair the Hon Paula Bennett minimise the reality of Part 2 of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Youth Courts Jurisdiction and Orders) Amendment Bill by saying it follows on from a part that we have been debating at some length. I do not think that is a fair and reasonable response from the Minister. In fact it sounded as though she was trying to put off having to respond to the questions that have been put to her and was trying to encourage the Chair perhaps to close the debate on a significant part of the bill. 
Nobody can ignore the fact that this bill has major consequences for our children. I still cannot hear the Minister use the word “children”. The reason that she cannot use that word is that she finds it really difficult to accept the fact that that is what the law she is responsible for administering says. She is responsible for administering the protection of our children. She has obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and she is completely ignoring them. That Minister has not responded to a single question that I asked the last time that we were debating this issue that Jacinda Ardern asked earlier and that Rajen Prasad and now Moana Mackey have asked. All of us have asked a series of questions around the implications of this legislation for New Zealand’s standing in front of the United Nations. 
The Minister of Justice is in the Chamber. He has been in front of the United Nations responding on our human rights standing. This bill was not even mentioned then even though it was before the House when he appeared in front of the UN. 
Hon Steve Chadwick 
: What? 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: No it was not even mentioned yet it was before the House at the time. I want to know what the Minister’s advice has been from her officials about what New Zealand’s standing with the United Nations will be when this bill is passed into law. I think that she has had advice that this legislation breaches the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. It seriously challenges that convention not only in Part 1 but especially in Part 2 where we are dealing with compulsory DNA testing. I think the Minister should respond to that question. 
I have had feedback on this debate. I do not often have people walking up to me at functions— 
Hon Simon Power 
: That’s OK. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: No they come up to me at functions— 
Hon Simon Power 
: Oh generally speaking. 
Hon LIANNE DALZIEL 
: Generally speaking. But they do not often come up to me and say they thought I gave a really good speech in Parliament this week. I was surprised at that. I keep forgetting that we have Parliament TV now and people channel hop and stop when they see something interesting. I asked one guy which speech he was referring to because I had given quite a few speeches last week. He said it was the one about children and who was responsible for them. I had talked about the rights of the child to be protected from a whole lot of adverse effects and had said that responsibility lay with their parents their family and also the wider community. I think that was said in response to some ridiculous comments from the ACT member David Garrett who had been particularly repulsive in his comments about how young offenders were not children any more because of the acts that they have committed. He was not prepared to look at the circumstances of that offending: the deprivation of those children and indeed the damage that had been done to them in the environments in which they had grown up. He did not mind that; he did not seem to care about it. 
The person who approached me fortunately turned out to be a constituent of mine. He was a long way away from the electorate but I was very pleased to find out that my constituent thought that I had given a good speech. He said that while I was talking he started to think about his son who is 11½ years old. He suddenly realised that Parliament was debating the lowering of the age to one where his son a child would in 6 months’ time have criminal responsibility for offences other than murder and manslaughter. Again I think people dwell on murder and manslaughter but the law already allows for criminal responsibility to sit at that level for murder and manslaughter. 
The other question that my constituent raised with me and to which the Minister did not respond was the question of who had murdered Michael Choy. The general public seems to believe that the person who took Michael Choy’s life was an individual called Bailey Junior Kurariki. But he was found guilty of manslaughter along with Phillip Kaukasi Riki Rapira and Joe Kaukasi. Those who actually took his life were Alexander Tokorua Peihopa and Whatarangi Rawiri. Nobody in the House has ever heard of those other people. Why was Bailey Junior Kurariki held up to the public as the face of the youngest killer that this country has ever had? It was because of his age. The Minister wants to open up to that kind of pressure every other 12 and 13-year-old who falls off the track and ends up in that situation in relation to a wider range of offences. 
Nobody is justifying what those children do. No one justifies what Bailey Junior Kurariki did in conjunction with his friends who I have to say were older than him and possibly led him astray. He was 12 years old when that offence happened. He rang the pizza place and that was why the pizza was delivered to that house. He opened the door when the pizza arrived but he has become this country’s entire focus as the individual who killed Michael Choy. It was not Bailey Junior Kurariki who killed Michael Choy but he was involved in that offence. I think what the Minister has completely lost sight of is that in Part 2 we have the situation where DNA testing becomes part of the total package that follows a young person throughout the rest of his or her life. So in the case of Bailey Junior Kurariki he would not only have that following him for the rest of his life; he has the outcome of the media—judge and jury as they are—essentially finding him guilty of the most heinous offence that one could imagine. 
I think that the Minister has not taken responsibility for ensuring that New Zealand is able to maintain its status with regard to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. It is amazing that the Minister of Justice has moved an amendment in a bill that he introduced only a week ago to allow for a change to our adoption laws so that in fact we can actually sign up to one of the convention provisions that we have not been able to sign up to until now. I think that the Minister Paula Bennett does New Zealand a great disservice first by ignoring the fact that we are talking in this debate about children and second by minimising the issue with regard to DNA testing. 
The Minister can play on her BlackBerry as much as she likes but it is not really fair that she is not participating in the debate. She is simply playing on her BlackBerry as she sits at the Table. I would have thought that is probably out of order but there you go. That Minister is not prepared to participate in the debate in a reasonable way and she misses the ultimate point which is that she has an obligation to ensure that New Zealand is always able to provide for its obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Other Ministers stand in front of the United Nations and talk about our commitment to human rights yet on this particular issue this Minister is prepared to stand back and say it is OK to hold children to account in the Youth Court for their actions regardless of all of the reasons that might have brought them there regardless of the damage that has occurred from their upbringing and regardless of the lack of support that they have had from their family and their community. 
These offenders are children. Part 2 is just as important as Part 1. Members on this side of the Chamber will continue to debate the importance of Part 2 until the Minister takes some responsibility and gets up to explain why she thinks it is OK that mandatory DNA testing is applicable to 12 and 13-year-olds—children—under the legislation that she is obliged to oversee.