Children, Young Persons, and Their Families Amendment Bill (No 4)

This bill is an example of just how absolutely hopeless this Government is, and I will tell members why. This bill will do nothing to alter or improve the service delivered by the Department of Child, Youth and Family Services in this country. Let me tell the House why that is.

I mentioned last night, but I want to reiterate, that this bill will not do anything to help victims. All that it does is make it easier for those who are the perpetrators. Under this bill the victims are shut out. Unless significant changes are made by the select committee—and the National Party, under the leadership of Katherine Rich on this bill, will be making sure there are—I give notice, as has been given earlier, that National will end up opposing the bill because it does nothing.

We have already seen that the problem with this bill is that it does nothing to address the multiplicity of times that a young offender can take part in Family Court conferencing. Do members know that in this nation there is one person who has been to a Family Court conference 16 times? How many chances do people expect to get before they are actually pulled up and made to address their issues? There are two people who have had 15 shots, and there are 100 who have had eight to 14 shots. It is just not good enough and we expect the Government to do something about it. But what is it going to do? Under this bill it is not going to do anything at all.

The thing that also worries us is that we have these offenders who continue to offend, who do not worry about their victims—do not worry about the elderly, do not worry about the people who have to suffer as a consequence of their offending—and under this bill they will get automatic name suppression. Why should they get automatic name suppression under this sort of legislation? The public should know who the young people are who are causing problems. It really, really concerns me that this Government knows there is a problem out there but is not doing anything about it.

That brings me to the issue that I really want to address. I want to bring to the attention of the House some statistics that relate specifically to Northland. It is the matter of unanswered cases. This House will be interested to know that in the northern region there are 862 recorded cases that have not been answered at all. That is a disgrace. The problem with this Government is that it is just not paying attention to resourcing this department so that it can get on with its job. There have been 862 cases of people ringing up and saying: “Hey, we have a problem here with a young person. These are the circumstances. This is what is happening.”, and what happens? Zilch. Their calls are not even answered. People leave a message on an answerphone saying they are worried about a case, but what does this Government do about it? It does absolutely nothing. It is a disgrace. There are 862 such cases just in Northland. Those people need to have their issues addressed. That is the trouble with this Government. It is big on talk, but when it comes to resourcing something that needs to be resourced it does nothing. It can spend $500,000 on sending a braying dunny to Italy, but when it comes to something that is absolutely important, which might mean the difference between a young person having an opportunity, or not, it does absolutely nothing.

Then it turns round and says that it is the fault of the officials and of the people who work in the department. Actually, it is not. The fact is that the department is under-resourced, its staff is underskilled, and it has people who are asked to do a job that is beyond their ability. They can answer phones, but it is beyond their ability to address the issues that are brought to their attention. What does the Government do? It brings in some silly bill that includes a whole lot of stuff that will do nothing. The Children, Young Persons and Their Families Amendment Bill (No 4) will achieve zilch.

I tell Government members, this Parliament, and this country that the National Party will look to make significant changes to this legislation. The National Party knows that if this bill goes through as it is now, it will end up doing absolutely nothing. I know that my colleague Peter Brown would agree with me. He wants legislation to be effective in this House. We all want legislation to be effective. But this sort of legislation will not get the support of the National Party, and I suspect that a number of parties in this House will not support it in its third reading if it is not changed significantly.

I say again that the issue of victims’ rights is not addressed in this bill. I say again that the issue of a young person who repeatedly offends has not been addressed in this legislation, although it should be. That young person should have one or two opportunities then, “slammo”, he or she should be put away, shot out, dealt with, put out of the system, so that he or she will not cause any more problems to anybody, but will this Government do anything about it? Not on your nelly! We have even got to the stage where it is saying: “Don’t worry, young fella. Keep offending. We’ll suppress your name so that no one knows who you are.” The offenders can leave a note when they climb in the back window, so that the victims might know who they are, but this Government does not want the general public to know. It is giving them automatic name suppression.

I ask again what the Government is doing in this legislation to address the matter of unanswered cases. This year in Northland 862 people have rung up and said they have an issue and they are worried about it. They have said that this young person and that young person need to be looked at as they may well be future criminals. What has happened? Absolutely nothing?

💬 Jill Pettis: You’re just repeating yourself.

The member is right; I am repeating myself, for the very reason that it is so important, and it is so difficult to get a message through to this Government at all, that I have to keep saying it again and again. Unless this legislation has significant improvements we will oppose it later on during its process through this House.

We have just been treated to a great audition to be a front-bencher from John Carter, who was telling us all about the National Party and its approach to the Children, Young Persons and Their Families Amendment Bill (No 4). But he made one mistake. He told us that the National Party’s approach would be led by Katherine Rich—who, of course, has been silent on this bill up until now. But the idea of Katherine Rich leading anything is a bit of joke. We want to know what her view on time limits is when it comes to the Children, Young Persons, and Their Families Amendment Bill (No 4), because I understand that the National Party is having a huge debate on issues about limiting time. It will be very interesting to hear what Katherine Rich has to say about that.

This bill builds on the work of the Ministerial Task Force on Youth Offending, which found that, overall, our youth justice legislation was sound, but, of course, improvement is always needed. With the better information-gathering and operational practices that this bill proposes, we will be able to make more of a difference for young people in this sector. I support the bill having its first reading, and am interested to hear from Mrs Rich her view on time limits.

I shall just take a brief call. I was really interested to hear the previous National Party speaker on the bill, particularly when he said the National Party was looking to make significant changes to the bill whenever it was in a position to do so. Well, we know that will not be for a very, very long time.

But I understand that the National Party will also make significant changes to its spokesperson on this area. In fact, the National Party spokesperson on child, youth, and family issues has not even taken a call on this particular bill. Great changes are afoot, and I think Mr Carter’s sentence was quite Freudian in its intent.

This bill will assist young people; it will assist them to stop committing crimes, and it will stop them from reoffending. National’s glib approach to this bill shows that its policies for young offenders will never work. That kind of speech might go down well in some of the Northland bars and speakeasies, but it does not work here in Parliament, where every word is recorded. That would be a good speech from the podium during an election campaign, but certainly does not stand up to scrutiny in this place.

This bill is a good bill, and I am very pleased to support it.

Bill read a first time.

I move, That the Children, Young Persons, and Their Families Amendment Bill (No 4) be referred toconsidered by the Social Services Committee for consideration, that the committee be required to present its final report on the bill by 15 November 2004, and that the committee have the authority to meet at any time during a sitting of the Housewhile the House is sitting, except during questions for oral answerbut not during question time, during anthe evening onf a day on which there has been a sitting of the HouseHouse sitting day, and on a Friday in a week in which there has been a sitting of the Houseof a House sitting week, despite Standing Orders 191 and 194(1)(b) and (c).

I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I have a growing concern with this referral motion—of the Government consistently bypassing Standing Order 194. The Standing Orders are very clear to protect members’ interests. We are getting this experience in many committees. The only opportunity members have is to raise the issue and put forward an amendment during the debate. It is too late at this stage. But sitting past 6 p.m. and sitting on Fridays is actually a breach of the Standing Orders and it is sneaked through by Ministers doing it in the referral motion at this stage. It is a gross intrusion into members’ rights and a breach of the Standing Orders, and I believe it needs to be looked at.

I thank the honourable member for his contribution. I understand the concern that he has, but there is nothing that I can actually do about it—and the Minister did indicate this course at the commencement of the debate.