Andersen GinnyGINNY ANDERSEN (Labour—Hutt South): Thank you very much Madam Speaker. I stand and appreciate the opportunity to speak on this bill as the chair of the Justice Committee and after hearing all of the submitters who came forward to share their views on this particular piece of legislation. I think anybody in this House today who has either done constituent work or has known somebody who's been through the Family Court process will know that it can be a particularly harrowing experience and that the challenge that lies before any person that goes through the Family Court process during no doubt usually a relationship breakdown is to be a big enough person to put the needs of a child or your children before your own. At the time when a relationship has broken down emotions and feelings can be particularly raw and it is sometimes processes that exacerbate those tensions and stop us from focusing on putting the needs of children first.This bill attempts a long journey in attempting to rectify a process that has been overly combative and quite frankly traumatic to many families who have been through it already. It is sad and distressing when a focus is placed upon the breakdown of a relationship rather than on putting the needs of the child first. So what this bill does is to emphasise children's wellbeing and also it values engaging children appropriately in decisions that directly affect them.We've already heard from speakers today about the changes that happened in 2014 under the last National Government and while as Simeon Brown the last speaker mentioned they were designed to de-lawyer or to take things out of a courtroom context the reality is that at the time when someone is coming to this point mediation or a lower level sometimes isn't just appropriate. After a relationship has broken down it is incredibly difficult to facilitate always in those contexts and that was really evidenced in the fact of the huge increase in without notice applications. They completely shot up over that time after the 2014 changes and that resulted in excessive delay. I agree with the member when he states that justice delayed is justice denied because that is exactly what has been happening with the Family Court system over the last decade.So what will this bill do to remedy those factors? I just want to highlight again before we go to the submissions and speak to some of the key points made that this is the beginning. We have a long way to go. This bill will be part of a range of measures that will attempt to make our court system far more user-friendly to the people who have to be at the heart of it.The submissions that we received were very interesting and they spoke to some of those things that we saw in the report that was commissioned by Andrew Little back in 2018. So in 2019 we had the report that looked at those clear problems and they were that the participation of children wasn't good enough that there was very little recognition of cultural diversity or different cultural backgrounds and that wasn't taken into account by the courts and it was also the delay that I've already mentioned. There was a huge delay and sometimes that delay even intensified the trauma and the stigma that some families were going through particularly when that related to family violence. The last point that was found was that there was a real lack of the ability for the court to be able to respond to family violence particularly with children being involved.Look I'll briefly touch on some of the submissions we received because the heart of the submissions that the committee found really useful was focusing on what is that role of involving the child. That's a very difficult balance to strike—at what level should that be happening? Many of the submissions were made on those two key professional roles within the family justice system that facilitate children's participation and that is the lawyer for child and also the family dispute resolution (FDR) provider.We had a really thorough submission from the Office of the Children's Commissioner and it was interesting to note that he submitted that the lawyer for child needed more training on child rights and participation and care and protection issues. That was emphasised also by other submitters such as Save the Children. I thought it was worth noting around family dispute resolution providers that the FDR centre observed that the bill didn't alter the practice because they are already carrying out child-inclusive mediation that involves the appointment of a professional who is specifically trained and experienced in child inclusive process. As a result of some of those submissions I'd like to note that the Ministry of Justice has begun a procurement process for a stocktake of appropriate models for child participation including FDR and is expected to include a wide range of how is it best to engage children and have their participation in that process while not making it overly burdensome on the child. So I think the fact that that process is under way will no doubt provide a greater flexibility and a greater understanding of what will work best.I would like to wrap up today by really touching on what the bill does and showing how we attempt to begin this journey of rebuilding a system that has been really broken for a long period of time. We saw that in the submissions process. Many of those submitters I would like to acknowledge who didn't submit specifically on a part of the bill just spoke about how difficult the process had been for them how awful it was and how some of those issues had not been addressed but they'd just sort of been spat out the other end. So really what the bill will do is to reinforce the expectation that a child should have a reasonable opportunity to participate in those decisions that directly affect them and their future to give them time to process a marriage separation and to be understanding and cognisant of the impacts and to also ensure that lawyers appointed to represent children in proceedings are suitably qualified to represent a child or a young person and that they explain the proceedings to their client in the appropriate way. There's also a requirement for lawyers to facilitate the efficient resolution of disputes in order to minimise harm to children families and whānau and lastly it is to reinforce the need for the court to recognise and respond appropriately to family violence particularly the impact it has on children—and how important it is given the situation that New Zealand now confronts that our court system is able to respond to that adequately. In conclusion I would like to say that we want to strengthen the expectation that children are provided with opportunities to give their input when appropriate. We want to promote better outcomes for children and child wellbeing in our country and we want to do that by having a system that's flexible and giving enough to enable that to happen in the right way. Finally we want to give better effect to children's rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child because that is the right thing to do. I commend this bill to the House.