Wilkinson Kate: Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Wilkinson Kate: Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
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KATE WILKINSON (National) 
: 
 I rise to speak in the Committee stage of the Corrections (Mothers with Babies) Amendment Bill. Clause 4 is the purpose clause which is to provide for the best interests of the child by enabling young children of female prisoners to be placed with their mothers in prison until they turn 24 months’ old for the purposes of bonding feeding and maintaining continuity of care provided that certain criteria and conditions are met. I think it is fair to say that nobody believes that prison is the best place to bring up children but there are situations where this is a fair and reasonable thing to do. 
I would like to relate a situation a true story that happened in Central Otago that I think really endorses the purpose and good intentions of this bill. One of the local lawyers there told me that every court date the judge struggles with what to do with defendants who are really in the gaps. However the most recent court date was a very good example. The judge stated in his judgment that the defendant should have been given a sentence of community detention but because it is not offered in that area he could not give her that sentence. The defendant has a 3-month-old baby and a partner. She has no family outside Central Otago and because she has grown up there she has no support outside that area either. She was sentenced to 4 months’ imprisonment. The law has changed and she now has to do the entire 4 months. Her baby has been left with the grandmother. She has a 3-month-old baby who has been left with the grandmother and the mother was still breastfeeding. The lawyer stated quite rightly that this situation is outrageous. 
This bill will go somewhere to ameliorating this exact situation. We could criticise that fact that community detention is not available in that area of Central Otago and that in some cases a lack of cellphone coverage means that those who should be serving community detention cannot have electronic bail monitoring. But this real-life situation demonstrates how this amendment bill could do great things for that mum who has a 3-month-old baby and a partner. The mother had offended admittedly but had offended to the extent that the sentence was 4 months’ imprisonment and her baby had to be left with the grandmother even though the mother was still breastfeeding. In this sense it is justice by geography. The judge had no choice. The judge admitted that it was a “deplorable situation” but he had no option. 
This example is from the area of Central Otago; there are other areas where a smaller sentence is warranted but because of those areas’ geography imprisonment is the only option. For mothers who have young babies it is as the judge said deplorable. We have situations where those community detention sentences are not available in rural Westland Buller or in the central North Island including places like Taihape Waiouru Ohakune Raetihi and the Coromandel Peninsula. So if the mums in those areas happen to offend even at that minor level and get a sentence of 4 months they cannot do community detention. They are in the same “deplorable situation” that that poor mother in Central Otago was in. 
I congratulate the member and author of this bill Sue Bradford. It is one of those bills that has been if you like non-partisan. The Law and Order Committee of which I was a member worked hard to get some of the wording right. There was not much debate or dispute about the bill’s intention or wording and it is a good example of the way in which this Parliament can work very cooperatively and collaboratively across parties to produce legislation that really is in the best interests of our society.