Loheni Agnes; Rurawhe AdrianAGNES LOHENI (National): It's with pleasure that I rise to take this call in the second reading of the Oranga Tamariki Legislation Bill. This is a good example of cross-party support for issues that often transcend our political colours and this one is one of them. I'm pleased to say that National started the process of social welfare reform alongside the Māori Party in the last term and the result was a shift to focus on the most valuable the most vulnerable members of our society—our children our tamariki. The Children Young Persons and Their Families (Oranga Tamariki) Legislation Act 2017 was a comprehensive piece of legislation that took the focus away from welfare and moved it to a care-based approach focused on the wellbeing of our children because oranga—wellbeing—is what we sought. Our view was to move the power of decision making back to those that were best placed to make good decisions for our at-risk whānau and tamariki and that is of course whānau—the family-focused approach. Too often the subtlety is lost on those seeking to make political gain on the back of our most vulnerable whānau. We sought to move from a dependency model to an empowered model. That approach would include better measurements of outcomes stronger input from whānau and a greater focus on positive outcomes for tamariki. The Act also focused on the less pleasant things with our tamariki—our children—and that is criminal offending. Even in these situations we are dealing with vulnerable young people. This bill tightens up legislation particularly around procedures and processes relating to 17-year-olds within the youth justice jurisdiction. It is a sad fact that our dependency-based approach to family wellbeing has led to dissociation disillusionment and a sense of hopelessness amongst our youth. This is reflected in the sad statistics we have around youth offending and it is necessary that we address youth offending both from a restorative perspective and an accountability perspective. Supplementary Order Paper 247 in the name of the Hon Tracey Martin which is before us today deals with accountability for youth who find themselves in the criminal justice system. It looks specifically at managing criminal charges for 17-year-old youth. Where a youth has committed a Schedule 1A offence punishable by 14 years' imprisonment or more the Oranga Tamariki Act does not easily allow related charges—for example non - Schedule 1A offences—for 17-year-olds to be heard alongside the very serious Schedule 1A offences. These Schedule 1A offences are automatically transferred from the Youth Court to the District Court or the High Court yet less serious related charges may still have to be heard at the Youth Court. This sees the untenable situation arise where a youth may face two separate hearings for a related series of charges. The Social Services and Community Committee does not believe that it is in the best interests of the young person complainants or witnesses to undergo separate court proceedings for the same incident or series of incidents. Hearing charges separately could also substantially affect court time and resources. Proposed amendments will allow the Youth Court to send related charges to the adult courts to be heard alongside any Schedule 1A charges and it will equally allow adult courts to refer charges back to the Youth Court where appropriate. The proposed new section 276AA(6) in new clause 4G assists greatly in defining related charges. The proposed amendments also suspend family group conferences should Schedule 1A charges apply. At first glance this may seem harsh or counter to what we all hope to achieve by having family group conferences for our youth—namely better accountability and buy-in from all affected parties—but the proposal is sensible. The hearing of Schedule 1A charges and related non - schedule charges will be determined by an adult court where family group conferences do not apply. It would not seem sensible to try family group conferences where outcomes from them would be superseded by the adult court's findings in relation to the more serious charges a youth faces. Therefore inserting new clause 4B which inserts new section 247A to specify when family group conferences would have to be suspended or would not be required is a pragmatic enhancement to the Act. There is also greater clarity where a youth is found not guilty of a Schedule 1A charge but pleads guilty to lesser non - schedule charges. The proposed new clause 4H amending new section 276A allows greater ease. Where charges have a guilty plea or verdict they can be transferred back to the Youth Court where it is in the interests of justice for this to occur. Overall this gives full effect to aspects of the Children Young Persons and Their Families (Oranga Tamariki) Legislation Act 2017 by seeking to ensure that the benefits of the policy to include 17-year-olds in the youth justice jurisdiction are fully realised. It does this by amending legislation to ensure that the extended youth justice jurisdiction is applied consistently across the justice system. The inclusion of 17-year-olds in the youth jurisdiction will take effect on 1 July 2019. It addresses drafting errors in the 2017 Act including unintentional provisions relating to interim court orders and it does this by making a consequential amendment to the Children's Commissioner Act 2003 to correct a cross-referencing error. All these matters require enactment before 1 July 2019 to ensure amendments made by the 2017 Act are consistent with the policy intent. On this side of the House given it's a very technical bill we would have preferred more time to scrutinise this through the select committee process and to have allowed more time for members of our community to make submissions and to have had their voices heard on this very technical bill. But ultimately this is the direction that the National Party was moving in to and we would not want to hinder this. I commend this bill to the House. ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Adrian Rurawhe): This is a split call. I call Greg O'Connor—five minutes.