Judicature Amendment Bill (No 3)

What a pleasure it is to speak on the first reading of the Judicature Amendment Bill (No 3). This bill is designed to reduce the workload pressures facing the Court of Appeal and to increase access to the Supreme Court. Amongst other things, it will ensure that better use is made of judges’ time. The number of Court of Appeal judges will be increased. Some flexibility will be introduced into the way in which Court of Appeal judgments can be delivered. The relevant provisions in the Judicature Act are currently interpreted by the courts as requiring judgments to be delivered by any two judges of the Court of Appeal in an open court. This requirement takes up the valuable time of judges, especially when a judgment is delivered to an empty courtroom. Currently, both the Supreme Court and the High Court are able to deliver their judgments in an open court or through the registrar. The Court of Appeal does not have that flexibility. So this bill will bring the practice in the Court of Appeal into line with the practice in the Supreme Court and the High Court.

New Zealand First supports this legislation, with particular reference to Parts 1 and 2, although the provisions in Part 2 that relate to the Supreme Court would usually be opposed by New Zealand First, because we intend, when we introduce our direct democracy policy, to see whether there is demand for a referendum on this issue allowing the people of New Zealand to decide for themselves whether appeals should continue to the Privy Council.

When the Justice and Electoral Committee looked at the bill introduced to end the right of appeal to the Privy Council, one of the issues that became very clear to us was that the New Zealand Court of Appeal is grossly overworked. When we considered that legislation, we tried to convince the Government to increase the number of judges in the New Zealand Court of Appeal. That was way back in 2003. It is now 2005 and, finally, we have been able to get the Government to do something about the issue and to increase the number of Court of Appeal judges by two, from six to eight—and I think the President of the Court of Appeal counts as being in addition to those judges.

The New Zealand Court of Appeal should be complimented on the amount of work it does and the quality of its decisions. However, the Attorney-General should consider the large number of criminal appeals that are now flooding the Court of Appeal. It is most unfortunate that, probably on legal aid, many lawyers decide to give it a go in the Court of Appeal to see whether the trial judge overlooked something or made a mistake that might form a basis for the matter to be referred to the High Court. That means yet another trial on legal aid, and a possible return to the Court of Appeal for an appeal on the outcome of the reheard case. We may be cynical about it, but when we look at the increasing trend towards appeals we see there is justification for that cynicism.

Clause 7 in Part 2 relates to appeals against decisions of the High Court going to the Court of Appeal, and refers to a case going directly to the Supreme Court. If this bill had consisted of Part 2 only, New Zealand First would have opposed the legislation. But we do not want to be churlish, and we support the increase in the number of judges in the Court of Appeal. This is the only way in which we can achieve that objective, and, as we want to achieve that objective, we support this bill going to the Government Administration Committee. What we do later as far as Part 2 is concerned remains to be seen.

, on behalf of the Minister for Courts: I move, That the Judicature Amendment Bill (No 3) be considered by the Government Administration Committee.