Judicial Matters Bill

The Judicial Matters Bill is the Attorney-General the Hon Margaret Wilson’s rambling through of the recommendations from her friend Sir Geoffrey Palmer for disciplining judges. When I spoke before, I ran through the actual provisions, which attempt to do nothing except allow a crony to be appointed as a judicial administrator or a judicial supervisor, and then leave with the Attorney-General, as it is now, a discretion whether to take a judge through a process that could end up in dismissal. This is a smokescreen for a far greater constitutional barbarity. That is the sacking of our entire top court, appointed completely away from the politics of New Zealand, and replacing it with a completely new top court, all to be appointed by the Hon Margaret Wilson, with the assistance of her independent assistant, the Crown Solicitor, and the advice of that paragon of constitutional virtue, Sir Paul Reeves, who left Fiji in a completely ungovernable state.

The judicial matter that is not covered here is an appointment process that would have involved creating an apolitical and obviously impartial, cross-party approved court. This bill might have provided for endorsement of nominees; for example, by the leaders of parties representing, say, 66 percent or 75 percent of the members of the House; and might have provided for some other kind of process, which would have an equivalent effect and achieve the kind of buy-in or support that we get for the Auditor-General’s appointment or the Ombudsman’s appointment, but it does not. The Minister wants to ram this through. I say now that I will move an amendment to the referral motion to omit all words after the word “consideration”, so that the ordinary Standing Orders will apply and the bill is not rammed through.

💬 Mr SPEAKER: The member has given notice of that amendment and I will allow it to be put at the end of the debate.

I am pleased to rise in support of this bill and recommend its speedy passage through the House.

Following on from the very good comments of my colleague Mr Richard Worth on the Judicial Matters Bill when the House last debated it, I would like to make a few comments. The National Party will support the bill going to a select committee. However, we have many reservations about the provisions of the bill, and we give no guarantee that we will support it after that process unless there are significant changes. In particular, we note that this bill is yet another attempt to rein in judges and to put controls over them in their work, yet no control has been put over the Attorney-General’s exercise of the appointment of judges.

That is a real concern, because the judges of the High Court and the District Courts, many of whom I, along with my colleague Richard Worth, know very well, are people who give tremendously in terms of the public service and who contribute hugely to the functioning of New Zealand’s judicial process. Yet they are human. They do occasionally make mistakes. Sometimes they will lose their tempers or make a comment that will be interpreted by the media or by a litigant as being disrespectful, and I would hate to see a time when judges, who are human and sometimes have idiosyncrasies, are pulled up in front of a complaints body because they have been politically incorrect or they have told someone that he or she is talking a load of nonsense. I can understand why judges occasionally want to say that, and they should be able to do so in a democracy.

One of the concerns we have is that that complaints body will try to stop judges from doing their jobs in the best way that they can. Quite often, the work of judges can be mind-numbing and boring, because it involves a tremendous amount of administration, particularly in a District Court. It is a role that often takes them outside the normal sphere of society, because they have to be very careful what they do and are seen to do. They are people whose every action will be scrutinised by the media and the public.

Having been involved in the New Zealand Law Society and the Auckland District Law Society for many years—in particular, in relation to the complaints process in the Auckland society—I know what happens when a body is set up whose sole purpose is to look at complaints. If a body is set up for complaints, the chances are that complaints will be invited. We will have the very same people complaining constantly about judges, who today complain constantly about police officers trying to do their jobs. Unfortunately, decisions will be made by those who will be desperate to be seen to be being tough on judges and to be upholding the rights of litigants. The work of judges will become more difficult, and it will become more difficult for the Attorney-General, and future Attorney-Generals, to get the top people into the judiciary. For many lawyers, going into the judiciary means taking a huge pay-drop and a massive loss of freedom, and means imposing on themselves all sorts of restrictions that senior barristers and solicitors would not normally have to endure in their own practices.

One of the things that High Court judges have mentioned to me in my time with the Law Society, and as a member of Parliament, is that they dislike the fact that sometimes, when they are in the middle of a major commercial case, which might go on for weeks and weeks, they are taken away from the High Court in Auckland and sent off on circuit to go and deal with criminal matters for a couple of weeks. The civil case is delayed and delayed and delayed, and by the time they get another chance to deal with it, months have gone by. That is what is happening.

We would like to see something in this bill that addresses the issues around the operation of the judiciary, rather than constantly pinging judges for every little thing that they say or do, or do not say or do, and that looks at how we can help judges to work more effectively and make their work much more rewarding to them as highly trained, professional, highly committed and intelligent people, who go into the judiciary because they want to give more to the public of New Zealand, rather than take. We would be very interested in looking at that.

We also note with concern that we are still not dealing with the fact that we have judges in New Zealand who are being appointed for particular skills, such as top commercial lawyers, who spend almost all their time dealing with rape case, after rape case, after methamphetamines case, after murder case, after brutal robbery case. We have very, very highly skilled and experienced people who are being wasted on cases in which they have no more particular skill or knowledge than any other judge. Ex - Crown prosecutors and former top defence lawyers are having to sit through weeks and weeks, and months sometimes, of very complicated commercial law matters, which again are not their speciality.

I would very much like to make a plea for the judges—because clearly the Attorney-General does not care—that these people, who are very successful people in their own right and have so much to contribute, feel hugely frustrated that they are not able to practise their profession as a judicial officer in the area where they best can. That is such a waste when we have people like that who are simply not being listened to by the Minister, and who are simply not being used in the most effective way.

I am pleased to see that there is a move to increase the numbers of judges. I know that—particularly in Auckland—there is a huge deficit in their numbers. One of the reasons is the massive increase in the use of methamphetamines. The fact that Parliament has now seen fit to increase the penalties for taking methamphetamines and labelled it a class A drug has meant that there is now even more of a delay in High Court trials. That is a huge concern, because justice delayed is clearly justice denied. The fact that the P and methamphetamine epidemic has generally not been dealt with, and has not been addressed by a significant increase in the number of police—other than those who give out parking tickets and speeding tickets—is a disgrace. I would like to see the provision for more judges to be made, so that they are there when needed, not 5 years after the event.

In summary, the National Party will support this bill through to the select committee, with grave reservations, and we will do our very best to improve the bill in the best way possible for New Zealand.

I support the passage of this bill.

Bill read a first time.

, on behalf of the Associate Minister of Justice: I move, That the Judicial Matters Bill be referred to the Justice and Electoral Committee for consideration, and that the committee have the authority to meet at any time while the House is sitting, except during oral questions, during any evening on a day on which there has been a sitting of the House, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the House, despite Standing Orders 193 and 196(1)(b) and (c).

Stephen Franks has given notice of an amendment to omit all the words after the word “consideration”. The question is that Mr Franks’ amendment be agreed to.