Parole (Extended Supervision) and Sentencing Amendment Bill

A good starting point in talking about Part 2 is to note it in its context, and its context is that there are before the Justice and Electoral Committee 17 amendments at the moment, either proposed or passed, that have been placed before it by the Government—17 amendments. They are contained in Supplementary Order Papers 223, 229, and 230, and I have probably been generous to the Government in counting them in the particular way I have.

The interesting thing about all this is that this bill—the Parole (Extended Supervision) and Sentencing Amendment Bill—has only just been reported back. It was reported back in mid-June. In that short time the Government has found 17 deficiencies in the legislation. It is a wholly unsatisfactory circumstance. While National is supporting the bill, we are doing so on the basis that there is really only one redeeming feature of merit in the bill, which is the introduction of a new, extended supervision regime that will manage high-risk child sex offenders. We have real reservations about how effectively this legislation will be administered by the relevant agencies, and we have good grounds for those reservations, given the comments of Justice Ellis as chairman of the Parole Board the other day, and the comments that the Minister of Justice, Phil Goff, made in reply.

The reality is that the outcome of fiddling around with the Parole Act and the Sentencing Act has been complex and densely-worded legislation. It is full of subtleties. It is beset with qualifications, elaborations, and ambiguities. Members may recall that when the Parole Act and the Sentencing Act were first passed, there was trenchant criticism from the Court of Appeal. In fact, the legislation was described as being akin to the Hampton Court maze. Well, it has been made more complex, more subtle, and more difficult. In Part 2 we see again a raft of changes running right through the Sentencing Act and the Parole Act. Part 2 is in two subparts. Subpart 1 is “Amendments to Sentencing Act 2002” and Subpart 2 is “Amendments to Parole Act 2002”. That in itself is not strictly accurate, because there should be a third subpart in which the miscellaneous amendments to other legislation should be.

It is far reaching—there is no doubt about that—because it touches, in the amendments to the Sentencing Act, on issues relating to reparation reports, and cumulative and concurrent sentences of imprisonment. There is a provision dealing with minimum periods of imprisonment in relation to fixed sentences. The issue of preventive detention has come up again for review. There is material about home detention and deferring its start date, which I would like to develop in later calls. The whole issue of discharge without conviction is being revisited, as is the question of orders to come up for sentence if called upon. The whole aspect of review of non-association orders is thrown into stark relief, and the Government has seen fit to make a number of changes to legislation such as the Misuse of Drugs Act, the Bail Act—the changes to bail on deferment of sentence are quite significant—and the sentencing regulations. As if that is not enough for one part, substantial changes will also be made to the Parole Act.

The Minister has surely reached a position, with the patching that has been done to the Sentencing Act and the Parole Act since their enactments, where he can hardly say, as members heard him say as he stood in the Chamber, that he is proud of this legislation and that it is a triumph of the Government. In reality, it is wholly flawed.

This is the first call I have taken on this bill. I start my speech by simply saying one thing: stop and wake up! I draw to the attention of the people who are voting for this legislation that everything in Part 2 is aimed at achieving a new extended supervision regime that will actively manage high-risk child sex offenders in the community. Members should think about that. Everything I read in Part 1—which I did not get the opportunity to speak on, because I did not get the call when I asked for it—and everything in Part 2 is aimed at putting high-risk child sex offenders into the community under, supposedly, 24-hour supervision. We all know that nothing in this legislation will guarantee that.

How do I know that? I know that because even yesterday there were articles in the paper stating that a home detention individual who was monitored with an anklet went missing for 4 months. Get that! Four months! I have one message for everyone on the Government benches who votes for this legislation. The day a high-risk child sex offender commits another crime on another child as a result of that offender supposedly being supervised 24 hours a day, 7 days a week under this legislation, I will do everything I can to put a billboard in those MPs’ electorates stating that they personally voted for it to happen.

They should know that this legislation is fundamentally flawed. I go back to the third reading of the Parole Bill, when Winston Peters stated that this legislation was fundamentally flawed. There are arguments in this Chamber to the effect that it does not matter what one does with parole. Frankly, parole is past its use-by date. Eighty percent of people who are paroled offend within 5 years. Know that! Members should think about that. This legislation is all—a term I cannot use in this Chamber because it is not parliamentary; “Bravo Sierra” is an army term that springs to mind—Bravo being “b” and Sierra being “s”—and that is what this is. The crime here is that members like Mr Barker, Ms Pettis, Mr Benson-Pope, and Mr Gallagher will all sit here and pass this legislation, and working-class people will bear the results. Boy, am I looking forward to the hustings the day after the first recidivist offender offends, because I will nail them all as responsible. We over here in New Zealand First will vote against Part 2, because it is fundamentally flawed.

There are some things that I can endorse. Why? Because we told the Government they were shortfalls and failures, and it would not listen the first time around. Take the deferred sentencing. Why are we dealing with that issue now? Why is it in this legislation? Because the Government would not listen—and is that not interesting: again, it is not listening. The result we had from deferred sentencing was that people who were sent to jail did not go to jail. Where did they go? They went back out in the community on deferred sentence pending a home detention application. What happened? There is a high-profile case of a man who committed aggravated robbery, was sent to jail, did not go to jail, and was put out in the community. They suddenly find that, hello, DNA evidence shows he was involved in four other aggravated robberies, and when they went to pick him up from the place he was supposedly living on his deferred sentence, he did not live there any more. He had gone—flown the coop. No one could find him.

Hello! If he had been locked up in jail for a start, the police would have known exactly where to go. Well! The Government suddenly realises that it has a problem, so it is moving to block that hole. But is it not also interesting, when looking at the beginning of the bill, to realise this Labour Government, supposedly cloth-cap, working class, and union representative, is now bleating the cry of an employer who wants to get off home, get a deferred sentence, because he is a rich guy.

Firstly, I say to the Committee that this debate reminds me a little of the fabulous old cartoon, with Bill Rowling and Rob Muldoon looking out a window. The cartoonist observed that it was interesting that one could see blue sky, and the other could see only mud. Law and order debates are very interesting, because despite what the Opposition says, the facts are that since the Bail Act was passed, more high-risk defendants are being denied bail than before. Opposition members do not accept that. The second point is that there are projections now for an increase in New Zealand’s prison population of over 20 percent in the next 7 years. Those are not the statistics Ron Mark would have, when he says we are soft on crime. The fact is that since 1996, when crime in New Zealand peaked, there has been a continued drop, and all members should say that is a good thing. But the Opposition members, for their own purposes, have to go and scare and terrify the electorate by saying there is more crime.

I want to come back to Richard Worth, who made an interesting point when he identified that a number of corrections were being made to the legislation. He put that forward as a criticism. I think Richard Worth should say it is a positive thing. If things are not right, we try to constantly and incrementally improve the law. No one gets it absolutely, perfectly right the first time, and anybody who believes that is a fool. The Government has identified areas for improvement. For example, there is concern about the deferral dates for the start of sentences. We are now tightening the rules on that in the light of experience and practice, because we have now found that the words we wrote before, which we thought were adequate, are not. So, we are now to require exceptional circumstances instead of special circumstances—we are going to do that. We are also to make it clear in sentencing that when considering non-parole periods of greater than one-third of a sentence, those should be imposed in cases where the statutory minimum would be insufficient to deter, denounce, and punish a serious crime. I think that is a very positive amendment, and the House should support it. Those are constructive amendments to improve the quality of our legislation, and I think people should applaud them.

Some people will condemn those amendments. Of course they will, because it is the nature of the Opposition—oppose, oppose—to lock themselves into that mentality. But the Opposition cannot deny the statistics. The facts are that the crime rate is on the way down, the prison population is going up, longer sentences are being imposed, and it is now much tougher to get bail. So there are some positive matters, and I think the Committee should have that put on the record.

Part 2 of the Parole (Extended Supervision) and Sentencing Amendment Bill has a whole raft of minor patch-ups to the Sentencing Act. I want to look at one or two of them. The first one is in clause 15, “Proof of facts”. In the Sentencing Act, Mr Goff’s brave new gift to criminal justice in this country, we had a complete code about the evidence that a judge has to take into account on sentencing. It is in section 24 of the Act. Let us look at what Mr Goff is now proposing: that in section 24(2)(c) the words “beyond a reasonable doubt” must be inserted. It now states that a prosecutor, the guy who is trying to get a decent sentence, must prove beyond reasonable doubt the existence of any disputed aggravating fact. That means any fact that would increase the sentence must be proved beyond reasonable doubt. The prosecutor must negate beyond a reasonable doubt any disputed mitigating fact raised by the defence—that is, the guy who is trying to get the offender off a sentence.

Let us then look at what the offender has to do. The offender must prove on the balance of probabilities the existence of any disputed mitigating fact not related to the offence. So let us think what a disputed mitigating fact may be that is not related to the nature of the offence. It is something such as the offender had been nice to his or her mother. How can the prosecutor prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the offender was not? Or the mitigating fact may be that the offender gave lots of money to the SPCA. How is the prosecutor going to disprove that beyond a reasonable doubt? Whose interests is Mr Goff serving when he comes forward with that sort of fatuous amendment?

💬 Ron Mark: “I’ve become a Christian.”

The offender may say he or she has become a Christian, so the prosecutor must disprove that. The offender may say he or she has become a Christian and will never commit the offence again. Mr Mark has raised an excellent example of what seems to be deep at the heart of Mr Goff’s priorities for the reform of our criminal justice system.

💬 Judith Collins: Any chance of Mr Choudhary becoming a Christian?

I am not sure whether it would be of sufficient mitigation. If Mr Choudhary became a Christian, I do not think people would forgive him, either. However, looking back at section 24(2)(c) in clause 15, I cannot even see an explanation of why that is being done. I have no doubt that Mr Goff has a reason to now make the prosecution negate beyond a reasonable doubt the claim by an offender that he or she has become a Christian, but I would really like to see how that would be done.

Clause 17 states that when reparation is ordered against the poor, dear offender, the court must not impose a condition that it be paid as a lump sum unless it is satisfied that the offender has sufficient means to pay it immediately. The poor offender may have to sell his or her house. Reparation, of course, is simply compensation to the poor victim, but now in all the toughening-up that Mr Goff has been telling us about he is making sure that a court does not make the mistake of putting the offender under time pressure. We would not want that!

Then I look at clause 19, which refers to section 86 of the principal Act. Section 86 is the provision that has been put in to do what the Court of Appeal told Mr Goff was needed. Mr Goff told the Court of Appeal that in his judgment it was unnecessary, because he had already assumed that the court could do it. But the Court of Appeal said it needed to know when it could set longer non-parole periods, because the Act stated that it could be done only in extraordinary circumstances, or words to that effect. Section 86 is now to state that a longer non-parole period than the minimum can be set, in order to hold the offender accountable, denounce the conduct, deter the offender, or protect the community from the offender. Those are the purposes of sentencing. Mr Goff has had to state that when the court wants to set a longer non-parole period, it can apply the conditions of sentencing. What can it do? It can then set a non-parole period that extends to two-thirds of the sentence. In other words, the court can now go back to what the law was before Mr Goff changed it. Before it was changed, violent offenders had to serve two-thirds of their sentence. Now, in all his toughness, Mr Goff has gone back and stated that a court can reinstate the conditions that prevailed before he changed the law. What a toughening-up that is! He has gone back to the position that Mr Ryall had imposed when he was the Minister. Mr Goff has stated the court can now get us back to where we were before he started to change the law.

To listen to the Minister in the chair one would think everything was rosy in the garden in New Zealand. One would think that tonight hundreds of New Zealanders have not had their cars broken into, that tonight many New Zealanders’ homes have not been broken into, and that if those people live in Auckland they do not expect to wait 24 hours before a police officer comes. It is a fact that tonight many New Zealanders are at risk of being bashed on the streets of New Zealand. Although crime dropped during the 1990s—from the mid-1990s on—crime is on the way up again, and reported violent crime is up 15 percent in the term of this Labour Government.

If this Government is so confident of its discredited parole system, it should tell this Parliament why 40 percent of people on parole reoffend within 12 months, 55 percent reoffend within 2 years, and 86 percent reoffend within 5 years. For some categories of offenders, over 95 percent reoffend within 5 years.

💬 Ron Mark: So parole works, right?

Yep, parole works for those people! Frankly, members on this side of the Chamber are left gasping. This Government can talk all it likes about what it is doing about the prison service, the Parole Board, etc., but 60 percent of the people who will go to prison this year will have been there before. Of the people released from prison, 86 percent will reoffend within the next 5 years. We know what that means. It means that tens of thousands of New Zealanders will become victims as a result of people being released on parole—under Governments of both colours. Tens upon tens of thousands of people will have their cars broken into or stolen, or their houses broken into and ransacked, or be bashed or robbed in the street. So there is a human cost to the way in which the Government deals with the parole system.

That is the reason why, during this debate, National members have sought to raise a real concern about this bill. We support the extended parole provisions in the bill; they are not our first choice on how to deal with these offenders—our first choice is a law that allows one to convince a judge that these sorts of people should not be released from prison—but we do believe that this bill has some merit. But it does not go far enough. We are most worried about what will happen after the 12 months of home detention supervision. The probation service told the Law and Order Committee that these people would be monitored or contacted weekly, to start with, and that eventually that would reduce to quarterly monitoring. The probation service told us that nobody would be monitored for the full 10 years and that about 8 years might be the maximum.

Frankly, that is not the level of supervision National wants. I give this commitment: a National Party - led Government will ensure that the monitoring of those people is real, and we will make sure that if they are out, the provisions that apply for the first 12 months apply for the full period. If we are going to agree to extended supervision, it should be meaningful, and the National Government after the election will make amendments to these provisions. But the Minister should not tell members that parolees are not reoffending. He should not say that tens of thousands of New Zealanders are not being made victims of the offending of parolees.

Nor should he say that New Zealanders are treating the justice system with credibility. When a young woman in North Auckland was sentenced to 7 years in jail for driving a car into a crowd of schoolchildren and killing a young girl, the whole country said she would not serve 7 years but would be out in 2. That is what has happened: sentencing has become discredited.

I want to look at several issues in Part 2. Stephen Franks raised the issue of reparation and pointed out that the Government is saying we must not be too hard when reparation is being ordered; that if the offenders cannot pay it all at once in one lump sum, because they do not have it or do not look like they might have it, we must be kind to them and let them pay it in instalments. Can members imagine saying to someone who holds them up and demands $10,000: “I don’t have it all right now.”, and that person saying: “OK, I’ll take it in instalments.”? That is what this measure does to offenders.

For 30 years this country has said that if we are nice to criminals they will be nice back. It just does not work like that. We should not even have parole. Parole does not work. It is a joke. It is a lie to the community. Tony Ryall talked about people saying that the girl who had been sentenced to 7 years would serve only 2. A lot of people still do not realise that. A lot of people still think, when they see a sentence of 7 years, that that is good, then are shocked when they read 2 years later that that person has been released. It is an anomaly that parole is given. We should not have parole at all.

By having parole we create all these other huge problems. In fact, I wonder why we even bother with a justice system when members of the Parole Board are appointed by the Minister of Justice, and can be fired by the Minister, yet when they consider a person’s parole they do not have to take into account why the judge set the sentence in an open court, in an open justice system—except when the judge set a non-parole period, which cannot be more than two-thirds of the sentence. If that is not Kafkaesque, what is? Why do judges go through the process of sentencing someone to jail for a heinous crime—of stating in an open court that it was a terrible crime, that the victims have been harmed immeasurably, that the crime has offended the community, that there needs to be a deterrent for this sort of thing, and that there needs to be reparation—lulling the victims and the community into a false sense of safety and security, when that person can go before the Parole Board and none of that has to be taken into account? In essence, that offender goes before another, secret court, a secret set of judges who are appointed by the Minister and do not have to take into account any of those issues.

The other anomaly in this legislation is the issue of cumulative and concurrent sentencing. I do not agree with concurrent sentencing, at all. It is a sort of bargain bin—a two-for-one system.

💬 Ron Mark: Buy one, get one free.

Yes; an offender who murders one person might as well murder three, because he or she will get the other two free. The bill contains a ridiculous clause, clause 18—which I still do not really understand, even though Stephen Franks explained it to me—which provides that a court cannot “impose a sentence of imprisonment cumulatively on another sentence of imprisonment if, at the time of sentencing, the offender is subject to a sentence of imprisonment but, having commenced serving the sentence, is no longer detained under it.” Well, why is the offender no longer detained? If the crime was so bad that there was a sentence of the kind that imposing another sentence would be cumulative, why is the offender no longer detained? Why did we get into this situation in the first place? If that person was on parole, he or she should have been recalled immediately. That is the issue with our having this nonsense of parole.

The issue of preventive detention, which the Minister of Justice has boasted about constantly in this House—about how people will be imprisoned for much longer periods—is also misleading, if members look at the conditions this legislation places on the release of offenders. Not a week goes by when I do not get letters from families who know about convicted offenders—

Any party that takes law and order seriously and that voted against the Sentencing Act and the Parole Act in 2002 must surely vote against this legislation entirely. At that stage New Zealand First said the legislation was fundamentally flawed. In fact, these amendments prove that it is fundamentally flawed. We have a whole raft of extensive amendments from the minority Labour Government that indicate this legislation is flawed. One cannot rectify something that is basically wrong. As I said before, west Auckland had a problem with painted apple moth. We could not do something to make the painted apple moth problem better; we had to get rid of it.

This legislation is flawed. We have to get rid of it and do something along the lines that New Zealand First proposed in 2002 and will continue to propose when it is a part of a Government of this country. We do not support parole in the way it is proposed in this legislation. We want to replace the Parole Board with a rehabilitation board, with a primary objective of minimising recidivism. Offenders are not given parole and they will be in prison for a much longer time. I support the building of all the new prisons. These people should be kept in prison, and for a longer time. That is why we need more prisons.

As far as convictions are concerned, some current statistics show that the longer the stay in prison, the fewer crimes are committed, because the criminals are in prison. If we keep criminals in prison, we will not get crime. The same people commit crime again and again, but if we lock them up, they will not commit crime. It is a cost on the community to lock them up, but maybe it will be a lesson to their families—it will tell their families that this is what happens to criminals. The second thing is that they will not be able to get back home and encourage young children to do the same thing they were led to do when they were young children. That is one of the problems in this particular area.

We want these people to be put in jail and to stay in jail for the term of their sentence, unless towards the end of their sentence there is some indication of rehabilitation on their part. The rehabilitation board would be required to consider the actual duration of imprisonment and to ensure that offenders have demonstrated remorse and have a positive attitude to rehabilitation before it considers parole.

Statistics can prove just about anything. On page 18 of the New Zealand Police Statement of Intent 2004/2005 the recorded crime trend indicator shows an upward trend for the years from 1999 onwards. In fact, since this minority Labour Government came into office, the indicator shows an upward trend for total recorded violence and sexual acts and for total recorded serious violence and sexual acts. That is what this legislation is about. To a large extent it is about the behaviour of sex offenders. And what does this minority Labour Government say? It says that it will give offenders better opportunities to go out into the public.

New Zealand First says that if the Government is serious about dealing with crime, serious about making sure that people get punished, and serious about making sure that victims realise the people who harm them are getting punished, then it has to repeal entirely the Sentencing Act and the Parole Act, and has to pass the legislation recommended by New Zealand First to show that it really is tough about law and order.

I want to make just three brief points. One of the overriding concerns that I guess has been talked about at some length is the attack on the parole provisions. Nothing puts that more sharply in mind than a case of a gentleman by the name of Brian Alan Bolt. He is 48 years of age. The judge said it was clear that he offended regularly, and offended as soon as he was released from custody. While on parole he committed his 636th offence. If there could ever be an indictment of the parole provisions, I guess he must surely be it.

Clause 22 states that the court may defer the start date of a sentence of imprisonment and justify it under exceptional circumstances. One has to ask why on earth we are giving the right to do that for an offender while no right of a similar nature has been given to the victim. Nobody has considered the victim’s interest in this deferral. In fact, there is no provision for the victim to even make an impact statement with regard to the deferral provisions. It seems shocking that we are still going down the track of giving the weight of credence to an offender rather than a victim. It runs counter to the heart of the victims’ rights legislation that was passed not that long ago, which tries to rebalance the justice system in favour of the victim. This legislation does not represent that, at all. It does not mirror those concerns.

Clause 21 deals with the fact that the court must consider granting an offender leave to apply for home detention in certain cases. Subsection (3), in clause 21, states: “The court may grant the offender leave to apply to the New Zealand Parole Board under section 33 of the Parole Act 2002 for home detention only if the court is satisfied that it would be appropriate to grant leave, taking into account—(a) the nature and seriousness of the offence; and (b) the circumstances and background of the offender; and (c) any relevant matters in the victim impact statement in the case.” It seems to me that the nature and seriousness of the offence can actually be decided upon by the victim impact statement, allowing the victim to have his or her say about just what the nature and the seriousness of the offence is. If anybody understands the seriousness of any offence it must surely be the victims. They are the ones who have to suffer for it. They are the ones who have to feel the full brunt of the offence. So, surely, the power ought to lie with victims to be able to ascertain the impact and the seriousness of the offence. I do not believe that clause 21 highlights that as adequately as it perhaps might.

The last point I want to talk about is clause 18, “Cumulative and concurrent sentences of imprisonment”. It seems very difficult to understand exactly what this clause actually says. I am not a lawyer, but I did consult a lawyer not that long ago, and I asked what it means. He himself was not quite sure of it. It seems to suggest that again we are going down the track of offering people discounts for the offences that they commit based on concurrent sentencing rather than cumulative sentencing. If a person is out on parole, despite the fact that he or she comes under the sentencing provisions, and has another offence to answer to, the possible sentence that could apply in that case should not be waived. On what grounds can the offence be diminished simply by reason of a person being on parole and not having to address the offence or the sentencing that might ensue because of another offence given them?

I have in my name a Supplementary Order Paper that I consider to be a technical adjustment of what clause 18 is doing, to at least allow the judges to take into consideration the fact that a cumulative sentence might actually hit the aims of justice a little better than the provisions that seem to be garbled and muddled as they are presently written. I look forward to the support of the Committee.

Is it not about time we stopped playing politics with the victims of child sex abuse? National is supporting this bill for one reason and one reason only. It is a small improvement on the treatment of convicted paedophiles and their behaviour in the community after they are released. It is a small improvement, but at least it is a move in the right direction. Having sat through the speeches tonight, and having heard New Zealand First castigate this bill and the people who vote for it, I would like to ask where they were in the select committee voting. Did they vote for this bill, or did they vote against it? The answer is that they voted for the bill. It is not good enough to come into this House, use the victims of child sex abuse in this way, and talk about this bill and say: “We’re not going to vote for it because it’s not good enough.”

The fact is that we know it is not good enough but it is a step in the right direction, and we have already signalled to this House that after the next election a National-led Government will improve this even more. We will sort this out in a big way. In the meantime, are we to allow convicted paedophiles to sit and think about how they can molest little children and do nothing about it? We know the supervision scheme is bad, but if it saves one child from a paedophile I for one, and the National Party, will say: “Thank goodness for that.” But the trouble is that we will not know which children are saved by this regime. What we will know about are those who fall through the gaps. But if it saves one child—and I believe that the main purpose and intent of this bill is to save those children—it will be worth it, until after next year when we are in power and we can sort it out properly. It is an improvement, and that is why we are voting for this bill. There is no point in coming into this Committee and saying, in a grandstanding way: “This bill’s not good enough so we won’t vote for it.” It is not, in fact, going backwards; it is actually affecting these people. It is to do with people who were not sentenced under the preventive detention regime. That was not available then to them. It is now available, and consequently this is retrospective legislation.

I am appalled to see that people voted against this—as I noted at the select committee—because it is retrospective legislation. The only people I noticed who are against this bill are those who are consistently and constantly concerned with the rights of child sex abusers. Every single civil libertarian did not like this bill. Every single one came along and said: “Oh, it’s bad.” That should be a signal to every right-thinking person in this Chamber that it is in fact an improvement on the current law—

💬 Stephen Franks: And the New Zealand Law Society.

And the New Zealand Law Society—I put them on that particular list.

💬 Hon Member: Pinkos!

They definitely are a bunch of pinkos on these sorts of issues. Of course, they feel that they have to do that because they are there, they say, to look after the rights of everyone, just not necessarily the rights of the victims of child sex abuse. That is why we are voting for the bill. [Interruption] I am shocked to hear the former Minister, Lianne Dalziel, shouting out against us on this bill. I was convinced by her argument in the select committee. [Interruption] I say thank you very much to Ms Pillay for her confirmation that I am right and she is wrong. Well done! I always knew there was hope for that member.

I have to say that the Government at least has made an attempt, not much of an attempt but at least an attempt. It does not help that people are now given parole after serving one-third of their sentence, but at least it is an improvement. We are pleased to be able to do that. I understand why Ms Dalziel would like my speech to come to an end. It is just too embarrassing for her—people will hear that she has been abusing this speaker all the way through. She has been sitting there, chewing gum, and screaming like an old harridan. I say to Ms Dalziel that it is not a good look. In fact, she does not want us to support this bill. I say to Ms Dalziel that I am sorry but I will not oblige.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): Just before I call the next member, I have a correction to a vote. The result of the vote on the question that the amendment in the name of Nandor Tanczos to clause 10 of the Parole (Extended Supervision) and Sentencing Amendment Bill be agreed to was incorrectly announced. The correct result is Ayes 17, Noes 102.

The speech just given by my colleague Judith Collins tells us why National has taken a principled approach. It is an approach that says the bill is an improvement and it will make a difference. She also pointed out that the New Zealand First representative voted for the legislation in the Justice and Electoral Committee. So New Zealand First members are just making cheap political points tonight, by changing their stance on this issue.

Perhaps the most notable interjection today was the one from Lianne Dalziel. She proudly supports the Sentencing Act and the Parole Act. How could anyone stand in this Chamber and say he or she supports legislation that allows parole for the worst offenders at one-third of their sentences? An offender sentenced to 9 years can apply for parole after serving 3 years. The Government claims that that is an improvement. [Interruption] I have to correct Mr Mark. National is utterly and completely opposed to the whole notion of applying for parole at one-third of a sentence.

I took the Government at its word when it said it was going to abolish automatic parole at two-thirds of a sentence. Everyone in this Chamber, and everyone in the entire country, was shocked to find that the Government’s solution, so-called, was to substitute eligibility for parole at one-third of a sentence. That is not just for the non-violent offender or for the first-time offender, but also for the worst offenders.

That is one of the reasons why I have put in an amendment today. I have sat here and listened to the questions—some of the questions were asked by Mr Ron Mark—about the scandals that have occurred with home detention. These are seriously violent offenders who commit the worst and most vile crimes whilst on home detention. Surely experience should tell us that in those circumstances those people are not eligible for home detention. It might be at the back of a sentence, but in practice, the actions of many offenders show it is not right. So that is why I have given Government members the opportunity to vote tonight to stop home detention for violent and sexual offenders. They have the opportunity tonight to say no to that. Will they take that opportunity? Will the Minister say that in principle he and his Government oppose home detention for violent criminals and sexual offenders? He has that opportunity. It is not something unreasonable. The Minister knows full well that he would receive the thanks of New Zealanders if he voted for that amendment. He has that opportunity.

I have listened with huge concern over many, many months as members right across the parties on this side of the Chamber have raised scandalous incidents. I have listened to the answers given by the Minister of Justice. He himself knows that it is wrong. Well, tonight Government members have an opportunity to fix it. If they have the real interests of law-abiding New Zealanders at heart, they will vote for the amendment that will stop home detention. The Minister might well say: “But it was put in there to provide people with an opportunity.” But experience tells us that it was a mistake. Home detention should be limited only to the non-violent offender—the person who does not pose a risk. So the amendment gives a clear instruction that home detention will be banned for violent offenders. We have the opportunity to learn from experience, to say that practice shows it is too big a risk to take, and therefore we should vote against it.

Is it not interesting that finally we are starting to get some indication from National as to where it might be going with its law and order policy, but we will deal with that at a later stage.

Firstly, I hope that when National members give their law and order speeches they will acknowledge that it was New Zealand First that brought home detention—

💬 Judith Collins: Ha, ha!

The member can laugh all she likes. She should go to the written questions, because they do not lie. There is New Zealand First’s track record on exposing home detention for the sham it is. The point is in there.

If this Parliament seriously believes that the provisions in Part 2 with regard to 24/7 monitoring of offenders through extended supervision will work, it is dreaming. Take the example in Christchurch of the young man who was picked up by a taxi-driver outside the casino, having called a taxi to take him home. He got to his home and did a runner on the taxi. Normally the police do not get involved in civil cases such as this, because they do not believe it is their job to make people pay for their taxis. But is it not interesting that when the taxi-driver gave the address of the property he was outside, suddenly police cars arrived. Why did they arrive? Because the person whom the taxi-driver had picked up outside the Christchurch Casino was on home detention, and supposedly was being monitored 24/7 on his anklet. He still managed to go to the casino for an evening’s gambling and do a runner on his taxi fare. So with that in mind, what confidence am I expected to have in this garbage before me? The answer is none.

If that is not enough, consider the man in Christchurch who was on home detention, under supervision, with an anklet on, under 24/7 supervision, and who was committing burglaries. He had accurately worked out that from the time he activated his alarm it took a minimum of 1 hour for the security people to arrive on his doorstep. So he knew that he could race off his property, break into his neighbour’s home, steal his stereo, get home, have it planted and hidden, and when the people from Chubb Security arrived to see whether he was there, he was there. He simply said: “Well, there’s something wrong with your gear, bro’, it doesn’t work, does it? Must be something wrong.”, and so they thought there was.

That 24/7 supervision is so effective that we now have the infamous case of a person who was personally supervised by a Chubb Security guard, who was standing outside the door whilst the offender—the inmate under 24/7 supervision—was inside the room sexually assaulting his cleaner.

💬 Judith Collins: As you do!

As you do! The Government cannot tell me that this piece of garbage that should be sitting on a roll in someone’s lavatory is going to work—it is rubbish!

With all due respect to my National Party colleagues, who have a proven track record of saying: “We’re gonna get rid of the gangs, we’re gonna get tough on crime, we’re going to do this.”, and when they get into Government they spend 9 years doing nothing—

💬 Dr Wayne Mapp: With help!

Oh, the member should not say “with help”, because when New Zealand First came into coalition with National we put steel in the spine of that party, and we brought in 500 extra police. We brought in the non-association laws, and we were the motivation behind that—and I still have the coalition agreement. I still have the black and white coalition agreement, signed by Jim Bolger, that stipulated and laid down the firm improvements we made to law and order under a National - New Zealand First coalition. Now the problem is, to sit here and tell me—

💬 Hon Rick Barker: There was no order in that coalition.

Well, I tell the Minister that in the 12 months that New Zealand First was in Government, there were far better laws passed through this House than the sort of garbage I am seeing right now. Because at the end of the day the proof of the worth of this document lies in the victims, and the Minister can be assured of that.

I move, That the question be now put.

I realise that I should move on to something other than the things that have already been debated, and I will do that.

The schedules, which I believe are part of this debate, are of interest. I see that Form 4, in schedule 2, was approved unanimously by the Justice and Electoral Committee. I did not realise that it obliges a judge who wants to set a non-parole period to sign, in effect, a form of confession or check sheet. If members refer to schedule 2, they will see that a judge who wants to set a non-parole period has to state expressly that he or she considers that the minimum term of imprisonment “is necessary to satisfy all or any of the following purposes: holding the offender accountable …: denouncing the conduct in which the offender was involved: deterring the offender … from committing the same or a similar offence: protecting the community … .” Those are four sensible purposes of sentencing, all drawn from the beginning of the Sentencing Act.

But when I look at the purposes and principles of the Sentencing Act, I find that those purposes are only a few of the ones listed. The form does not, for example, allow the judge to decide that a one-third release would be offensive to the victim or to the community because it would fail to satisfy, for example, the purpose in section 7 of providing for the interests of the victim of the offence. If the victim is terrified and really needs to be reassured that the offender will not be out in 3 or 4 years, or perhaps 5 years if a court ever ordered the maximum sentence, then the court cannot find that that is sufficient reason to impose a non-parole period of 9 years or whatever, because the court cannot order a non-parole period of longer than two-thirds of the sentence.

So why do this form and the section of the Parole Act to which it relates exclude providing for the interests of the victim of the offence? Why does the form also omit the purpose of promoting a sense of responsibility? How can an offender feel that the community is taking the offence seriously, when the offender hears a court order a sentence of, let us say, 12 years for a serious offence, and knows that he or she will be out in 4 years? And it will be 4 years for a number of very serious offenders. Take, for example, an offender who is liable to be deported at the end of the sentence: any offender who is liable to be deported at the end of the sentence must know that he or she will serve one-third—the minimum—because the Parole Board must be absolutely certain that such an offender can be no risk to the safety of the community at the end of his or her sentence! It is absolutely rational that every foreign thug who commits an offence in New Zealand, and is therefore liable to deportation, must know that when the court solemnly pronounces a sentence of 9 years or 12 years, at the most he or she will serve 3 or 4. How can that promote in the offender “a sense of responsibility for, and an acknowledgment of,” the harm of the offence?

Yet the Minister of Justice has come here with his patch-up bill and has provided in Form 4, in schedule 2, that the only way in which a judge can give a longer non-parole period is by finding one of the four permitted purposes, but not any of the others. The judge cannot say that because the offender showed no remorse he or she will set a longer non-parole period, because that is not one of the purposes set out in Form 4, or in this part of the Act. Use of a weapon, particular cruelty, and premeditation are all aggravating factors, and one would have thought it was perfectly proper for a judge to take them into account and to say that therefore it would be offensive to the community to release the offender at one-third of the sentence, but the judge is not permitted to take those factors into account, as far as I can see.

I move, That the question be now put.