Annual Review Debate — Justice

Thank you, Mr Chair, and it’s a pleasure to kick off this debate on the justice annual review. Before I do, as a member of Parliament for Upper Harbour in Auckland’s north-west, I do also want to acknowledge that there are many people going through what is a very difficult evening, and also to acknowledge our emergency responders, who will no doubt be busy this evening as well.

I do want to thank the committee members for their engagement during the annual review, to thank the clerks, and also to thank Mr Kibblewhite and his team for the robust discussion we had with the Ministry of Justice staff. I want to also recognise that this is a complex area of policy that often does require a careful balance.

We heard through the review process that in April 2022, the ministry created a new sector directorate, and the aim of the directorate is to strengthen the ability of the justice sector to collaborate and align strategy, performance, and investment. The directorate is leading work on a cluster approach to Budget bids. It also supports the justice sector leadership board, which is composed of the leaders of six justice sector agencies and is chaired by the Secretary for Justice.

We heard in the review that in March 2022, the Government established Te Puna Aonui, which is the interdepartmental executive board for the elimination of family violence and sexual violence. The Ministry of Justice hosts Te Puna Aonui and a significant part of its work is to empower and support community groups and providers that are already working toward the goal of eliminating family and sexual violence. We look forward to seeing the outcomes framework for the programme, which will track the achievement of outcomes in June 2023.

In terms of access to justice, we heard how, in Budget 2022, the ministry received funding for appointing more interpreters and to support the engagement of specialists to produce medical reports, mental health assessments, and other information to support the courts. The ministry noted that these additional resources improve access to justice by helping parties to present their cases and tell their stories in court. Also, the Secretary for Justice and the Chief Justice have partnered to support the development of the national strategic framework for improving access to civil justice in New Zealand.

While we did note that there have been some delays in accessing the courts, we discussed with Mr Kibblewhite’s team the Criminal Process Improvement Programme (CPIP), which is a cross-agency effort to reduce the backlog in the criminal justice jurisdiction of the District Court by establishing best-practice court procedures. The programme is led by the judiciary, the Chief District Court Judge chairs its steering committee, and it’s managed by the ministry. In October 2022, several CPIP pilots began in a selection of courts, and the ministry told us about the following cross-agency priorities and initiatives to reduce delays.

Firstly, they told us about the designation of liaison police prosecutors who work with duty lawyers to try to ensure that a meaningful court event takes place on the first day that a person appears in court. They also told us about checking for bail addresses more frequently and checking for multiple addresses to reduce adjournments caused by failure to identify a suitable bail address. They also told us about the focus on providing pre-sentencing reports to courts in a timely manner to avoid adjournments during the sentencing process, and they spoke about the establishment of a sentencing-ready team at the Department of Corrections that works with all parties to a proceeding to ensure that the necessary information has been prepared and is available to the court on the day of sentencing. The ministry also spoke about the goal of the judicially led Te Ao Mārama model for the District Court, which is to take the best practices from therapeutic courts, such as the sexual violence and rangatahi courts and, essentially, deploy them more widely throughout the court system.

So, once again, I would like to thank my colleagues at select committee for robust discussion at select committee, and I do look forward to the continuation of this debate here this afternoon.

Just before I call the Hon Paul Goldsmith, just for members’ guidance, if they want to make a longer five-minute presentation with a number of questions, the call is more likely to go to another member. If they want to do it in short blocks of questions, I’m more likely to try and stick with one member to exhaust that member’s questions. So it’s up to members, but that’s how I intend to chair these meetings.

Thank you, Mr Chair. It’s my pleasure to speak on this debate, which is focused on the annual review of the justice ministry and the justice sector more broadly.

The justice ministry spends around $800 million a year on its business and the courts; you’ve got another $2 billion or so on Police and another $2 billion or so on Corrections. Overall, the sector is around $5 billion or $6 billion annually spent to keep us safe.

As we’ve had questions to the Minister of Justice in question time around legislation—and she referred to the fact that she is responsible for, I think, was it, 150 pieces of legislation, roughly; a very large number. So it’s a very broad sector that touches upon the lives of New Zealanders in many ways. Many people, fortunately, don’t have direct dealings with the court and justice process as victims of crime, but there, sadly, are too many, but there are also many people touched, whether it’s police, safety, whether it’s the human rights legislation. Certainly, everybody gets an opportunity to vote for the electoral laws that we’re responsible for. So any Government has to focus on what are the real burning issues that they have to deal with at a particular time. I put it to the Minister and to the Parliament today that there are, I think, four real challenges in the justice sector that I want to talk about today and ask questions of the Minister.

The first is around the very significant increase in violent crime over the past five or six years. Since we’ve had a Labour Government, there’s been a 33 percent increase in violent crime. At the same time, there has been only really one tangible clear target operating under this Government in the justice sector, which is to be a 30 percent reduction in the prison population. I think that all members here, and most New Zealanders, don’t want to see more and more people imprisoned in this country. Prison is not a great place. But most people want to see the prison numbers reflective of what is going on in the community. Are people safer or not? What we’ve seen is violent crime going up, and the number of people in prison going down. The computer says that it doesn’t compute, because what we’re seeing is people being made less safe and an increase in crime.

So the first fundamental question I have to the Minister is: why is the primary focus on reducing the prison population, irrespective of what is going on in the community, even though we are seeing an increase in violent crime? And, indeed, “has the determination to keep people out of prison actually contributed to an increase in violent crime?” is a related question.

The second area that we need to focus on is this whole increase in youth crime that we’ve seen. Everybody is aware of the 550 percent increase in ram raids. They’re aware of the smash and grabs. They’re aware of poor old Michael Hill Jewellers being done on just about every second day, it seems, at a different place around the country. We’ve all been, as members of Parliament—well, certainly those on this side of the House have visited retail operators and seen the fear and frustration and despondency in their eyes, as they’ve had to deal with constant harassment and smash-and-grab activities, and even ram raids, and they don’t feel safe, they don’t feel that their family are safe, and they’re so despondent about how they can actually make a living because they have to pay for all the fixing up and the high insurance bills and all the losses that come with it.

So the broad question in this area that I have for the Minister is: is she actually confident that the money and the legislation that we’re investing and that we’ve employed deal with this rise in youth crime? Is it working? Is it sufficient? My answer to her would be, no. Well, what is she going to do about it? What is she going to do about the fact that most people conclude that there are no consequences? So I’m interested in some initial thoughts from the Minister on that issue, as well, and what she is going to do about that 550 percent rise in ram raids.

I’ll just quickly touch on the other subject. The third big area is the massive delays in the court system, and the long delays to justice that New Zealanders are facing. So one basic stat I’d ask to question is: why has there been a 42 percent increase in prisoners on remand—that is, people in prison before they’re sentenced—because of delays in the system?

Colleagues in the House, first may I first reiterate the sentiment made by my colleague Vanushi Walters and acknowledge the serious event that is occurring in Tāmaki-makau-rau and the outer regions right now. Our thoughts are with them all, as this is the second substantive event in a very short period of time. The collegiality in this House will mean that I know that many people will be concerned for the friends, their families, those businesses, those communities, and those that indeed just suffered immeasurable harm. Ki a mātou nei, ka whiua ōku nei whakaaro, ngā whakaaro o tēnei Whare ki a rātou.

[To us, our thoughts, the thoughts of this House, are thrown to them.]

Turning to some of the substantive questions and queries that have been put down by my colleagues this afternoon, I think—as we do in an ordinary committee of the whole House—what I’ll do is just answer in piecemeal: as you go, I’ll go.

So starting with those three substantive issues that the Hon Paul Goldsmith mentioned just now. The first was with respect to the increase in violent crime and making the clear statement around that 33 percent increase in violent crime. I think there’s probably a range of different things that we’ve been looking at when we are tracking the data for why there is an increase in violent offending, particularly from that period between 2018 and 2023. I am on record as noting the police data has shown a 37 percent increase in the reporting of violent offences. The number of people entering the court for violent offending has also increased by 8 percent since July 2022, although I guess it’s probably useful for this committee to also note that that is still lower than that in 2018.

What we are seeing, and particularly since the introduction of a range of reforms that came in to address family harm in 2018—the commencement in 2019—we introduced a raft of measures in this House to enable those that were victims of violent offending within their domestic situation, their familial situations, to be able to (1) report more easily, (2) we introduced different types of offending, and (3) provided more resource to ensure that family violence and family violent offending is more accounted for.

What we’ve seen is that as the crime rates have lifted, the number of family violence offending has lifted. Clearly—to us, on the evidence that’s been provided to us through the data—one of the very clear drivers is why we are seeing an uplift in that violent offending, offending that hasn’t previously been able to be caught. I am pleased that this House had the foresight to introduce that range of remedies and provide police those powers—of course, alongside other tools—to ensure that we were adequately capturing the harm that is caused in the home.

Turning briefly to youth crime, because there’s an interesting corollary there. Yes, I think it’s very clear that we can see—whether it’s through ram raids or other types of offending—we’ve seen a substantive increase by children and young people when it comes to particular forms of offending. I want to touch on, because the members have touched on that in this House, ram raid incidents began to increase from December 2020 and peaked to date at August 2022.

Something that’s interesting when we start to look at that trajectory, though, of crime is that it’s still lower than when we took office in 2017. What we saw over the past decade is very clear evidence that shows youth offending is tracking downwards over the past 10 years. It continues that downward trajectory until around just after COVID, and then we see that sharp increase. We’re not yet up to those rates where we were in 2017 and prior to then.

One of the questions that the member asked this afternoon was whether or not we could be confident that the investment into some of the programmes and the ways that we are capturing our young people are effective. Well, I guess there’s a couple of ways that we could answer that. One of the less pleasing, in my view, things that I see in the statistical evidence is that we have one of the highest incarceration rates right now for young people and children as a consequence of youth offending.

Secondly, what we see is that where we have trialled programmes such as the Better Pathways Package for young people—which is a significant investment into whole wraparound services for young people based in their communities—we are seeing a peak and then a decline in youth offending in those areas. How do we know that’s the case? Because we’ve got other areas where we haven’t taken those same approaches and we’ve seen an increase.

So I am confident that the measures that we are taking—which provide alternatives away from kiddie kindergrounds for, ultimately, gangs and gang lifestyles and life of harm—or a significant and substantial investment into young people, working with them to realise their potential. We’ve seen a reduction in recidivism rates, we’ve seen a more complete re-entry, we’ve seen a reduction in crime, and we’ve seen much more evidence that highlights that people get back into a different way—a more positive way—of contributing to the community. So I am confident in the ways that we have been trialling and managing ways of dealing with this incredible peak in youth crime post the back of COVID.

On the third issue my colleague raised—it was on court delays—I guess I’ll just make a brief comment there, and then I’ll come back and—let’s just answer as we go through. But a couple of things I’ll note there: that as a justice sector that was funded for multiple appropriations at the last Budget, there were four key priorities for that cluster of those justice agencies: Corrections, Justice, Police, and there’s a few others, including the Serious Fraud Office and Crown Law.

So the four priority areas there were the reduction of delays, a real focus on remand, increasing support to victims, and then one which was more about the internal way that those agencies operated. Most of the remand increase in the last year is due to an inflow of serious cases as opposed to delays—that’s what the evidence is showing us—but I will accept there’s certainly more work to be done there and we’ll engage throughout the course of this.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Minister Allan, just in response to one statement that you’ve made there in answer to Mr Goldsmith’s question. You referred to the highest incarceration rate of juniors, or youth, is held by New Zealand amongst the world, and I just wonder, please, if you could explain that to me, because we don’t incarcerate our youth; we put them into youth justice facilities. My understanding is that the majority of the youth are walking out the back door while police are still trying to sign over the paperwork at the front door. So if you could just explain that for me, please.

My second question, Minister, is around the “strangulation fund”. In the last Budget allocation, 2022/23 financial year, $3.2 million has been allocated to a “strangulation fund” for supporting the victims of strangulation. But as at 5 April this year, only $369,697 of that $3.2 million fund has been spent. Could you please explain why there is such a shortfall? Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Chair. With respect to that first question from the honourable member Nicole McKee, first, let me be clear: look, I don’t mean to make any insinuations about global or world data, so I’m not drawing a corollary or a comparison there. What I am, though, stating is that right now we have children and young people who are remanded in custody. The statistics that we have is that currently in New Zealand there’s 1,101. That’s up 37.8 percent.

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Less than 18 years old?

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: Children and young people, so, yes, that’d be 17 years and younger.

Thank you, Mr Chair. If I may, just in referring to these annual review reports out of the Justice Committee, there are two things that I’d like to discuss in my contributions this afternoon.

The first is around the priorities and targets for the justice sector, as has been raised by the members, particularly the discussion about reducing the prison population by 30 percent, and the second is on the prioritisation of police responses, which obviously there’s been much media commentary on. To that effect, it’ll come as absolutely no surprise to the Minister that I have one area where I think there could be far better policy settings and, therefore, far better outcomes and efficacy to actually have policy in place, which then results in far better investment and far better outcomes for all of it. And that is, of course, in the tweaks that are available to her to the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975.

We have a breakdown from the New Zealand Drug Foundation, which pulls apart the budget, and estimates that we spend approximately four times more money on criminal prohibition of substances than we do on harm- or health-based interventions and approaches. And to give some context to the kinds of outcomes that this results in, we know, for example, based on both police data but also the New Zealand Health Survey data, that we have continued to have increasing seizure of, for example, cannabis crops. Yet cannabis consumption in this country has continued to increase to the effect that we now have 635,000 New Zealanders per year consuming cannabis annually.

Then we also have some of those harm- or health-based interventions, the likes of Te Aro Oranga, which I want to acknowledge the Government—having collaborated on it last term, in particular—expanded, but none the less it’s not available across the whole country. It is, of course, the methamphetamine programme piloted, actually, initially in the final year of the then outgoing National Government, which we have complete and comprehensive data on, showing us that for every dollar invested, we have a $3 to $7 return, which is a 37 percent—if I believe correctly, off the top of my head—reduction in criminal offending.

So, to that effect, I just wanted to reflect on some of the questions that I’ve also asked the Minister through the parliamentary written questions. Here we have, despite those changes to, particularly, section 7 of the Misuse of Drugs Act, which, of course, formalised police discretion—we saw that, sure, there has been a decrease in the number of people who are going through the carceral system and ending up interacting with the police as a result, but none the less those numbers and those figures do remain particularly high, particularly when we’re talking about cannabis.

To that effect, I think it would be useful to put on Hansard this afternoon that the number of people convicted of charges relating to possession or use of cannabis alone just last year was 1,111 New Zealanders. Obviously, I think it’s really important to put that in the context, again, of the 635,000 New Zealanders who do consume cannabis annually. We also see, again related to that point around the Government’s prison population aims—that’s in response to my written question 11595, for those following along at home—that 180 New Zealanders were sentenced to imprisonment for cannabis possession alone just last year. So I guess my question to the Minister, in relation to, particularly, the annual reviews here and, as I’ve reflected on, the policy settings which result in the types of investment that we make and therefore the outcomes that we get, is: when do we stop doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result?

I totally, totally acknowledge the fact that the Government has made some moves. I’ve worked with them very closely on them—the likes of that section 7 police discretion change. I know that the Minister is potentially going to bring up the fact that we had the cannabis referendum. Again, we’ve had this debate many times over, where we had a specific proposed regulatory regime for one substance, and I think what that debate showed us is that the status quo is actually untenable, because even those who were on the opposing side of that referendum were unwilling to say that people should continue to be ushered into the prison system, into the criminal justice system, as a result of that low-level drug consumption in particular.

So my question to the Minister is: when will we see that shift away from this expenditure, which is a waste of money? You know, every single year now, I continue to do these written parliamentary questions which show that we spend the better part of $1 million on sending out cannabis choppers into the skies. We seize more cannabis, yet we continue to have those really high consumption rates. There are far better ways to do this. I know the Minister knows it. So I’m really interested to see and to hear where those priorities may lie, particularly when it comes to the allocation of police resources and time and the opportunity to decrease our prison population.

I thank the member for her questions. Probably a couple things just to note at the outset, which probably colour the way that I’m about to respond. First, as the member’s aware, the Misuse of Drug Act is administered by the Minister of Health, so no doubt she can answer some of those responses there. With respect to responsibilities for the police, you’ll be able to direct your questions to my colleague the Hon Ginny Andersen. Remand reduction: whilst not squarely within my portfolio, I think it’s useful just to touch on that, because it is part of the broader justice sector priorities, but she could probably ask a more pointed question to my colleague the Hon Kelvin Davis.

Those things aside, I think, with respect to the discretion that was introduced—the section 7 discretion for those in possession of cannabis—as the member’s rightly noted in this Chamber, as provided by us to you, we’ve seen a substantive reduction in those who have been incarcerated for cannabis possession charges from 2012 through to 2022. In 2012, there were approximately—well, there were 391 people who had been incarcerated for possession of cannabis. That has reduced now to, this year, being down to 180. I note the member’s comments about the broader charges that relate to—but as she is well aware, the outcome of those determinations, when we collectively introduced those laws, was that we would provide those front-line officers with that discretion. And we can see that being exercised with the reduction in cannabis possession offences.

With respect to this annual Budget, it’s suffice to say that there was not a specific stream funded through the justice portfolio dedicated to drug reform. As the member rightly notes, that was an issue that was substantively canvassed between the years 2017 and 2020, which resulted in a referendum, the outcome of which has bound this Government during this term to the work that we will commit to do on that.

The next point I probably think I’d like to make is, however, with respect to the way that we have seen a shift in the way that those that have found themselves within the justice system as a consequence of addiction due to alcohol and drugs. I want to highlight two things. One is that we’re seeing the culture within those courtrooms, as a consequence of Te Ao Mārama and programmes like the alcohol and other drug treatment courts that we have—

Hon Judith Collins: Thank you for acknowledging my work there, bringing that in. Thank you very much.

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: It’s very good work. I will—I will acknowledge that because, having sat through those hearings with those people that have participated, Judith Collins—

Hon Judith Collins: Yes, I did, indeed.

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: That’s what I’m saying. I’m acknowledging you, so it’s a commendation to you, because I’ve seen the profound impact when I’ve sat through those courts of what it is to deal with those that have needed support and to be dealt with in a way that where the health concerns of the people are at the forefront.

What we’ve seen through those courts, and particularly through the outcomes evaluation and cost-benefit analysis of the Waitākere and Auckland courts in 2019, was relatively large offending reductions within two years of entry when compared with match offenders: 23 percent less likely to re-offend for any offence; 25 percent less likely to be imprisoned as a result of their reoffending. Reoffending and re-incarceration is reduced more for graduates than early exiters, and the cost-benefit ratio average of 1.33 means they’re to break even. But many other potential benefits were not able to be costed. What we are seeing, though, is a really positive outcome in these types of alternative ways of dealing with those that suffer from alcohol, drug, and other addictions and afflictions.

That, I guess, sits at the nexus, or underpins the result that’s been led out by the judiciary with respect to Te Ao Mārama: doing things differently in that court context, bringing community to the table to play a larger role in ensuring reintegration, rehabilitation of those that come through the courts.

Thank you, Mr Chair. We’ve heard from the Green Party, and it reminded me of the fact that it is the Green Party policy that when somebody has a warrant out for their arrest and they’re on the run, we should not stop paying them benefits. I’d be interested to know whether the Minister thinks that that would be helpful from an overall point of public safety. You’re on the run with a warrant out for your arrest for a violent crime—for murder or a sexual crime, or something like that—but we should still get you your benefit: I’d be interested in the Minister’s view on that.

The Minister did refer to the question of prison population. We did have the benefit of the long-term insights from the Ministry of Justice on the prison population, and it did refer to the fact that the New Zealand prison population was mainly, predominantly, in there for serious violent and sexual offences. Actually, the number of people in New Zealand prisons for drug offences was relatively low in international terms, and falling—and, obviously, for property crime, it was relatively low. The vast majority in prison are in for serious violent and sexual offences.

But there has been a dramatic drop in the prison population from the moment of the entrance of this Government in late 2017 - early 2019, where you will see a 37 percent drop in the sentenced population in our prisons—37 percent. A colossal falling away of people in prison for sentenced offences since 2018, and that is being driven, so the officials said, by—it reflects police and judicial practice and the greater use of community-based sentences.

So the question I have for the Minister is: what does she think has driven that dramatic change, with the change of Government and the 37 percent drop in prisoners, given the fact that the majority of people in New Zealand prisons are there for serious sexual and violent offences? And we know that there has been a 33 percent increase in violent crime since the Government took office in the same period. There’s been a 140 percent increase in serious assaults during the same period, and there’s been a 550 percent increase in ram raids. There has also been a 61 percent increase in gang membership and—I’ll give you one more stat—a 51 percent increase in gun crimes by gang members.

So you’ve got these two things going on: a significant increase in violent crime, which is making people feel afraid in their homes and in their communities and is creating many, many more victims of crime, and, at the same time, we’ve seen this dramatic 37 percent drop in the number of people in prisons because of a direct change in police and judicial practice. What I want to know is what’s driven that change, and my hunch is that it is the single goal that this Government has, which has been to reduce the prison population, irrespective of what’s going on in our communities.

I’d like to get a better sense from the Minister as to what she thinks has driven that change and what responsibility she takes for her Government’s action in that, and whether she takes some responsibility for the overall increase in violent crime that she’s seeing. Obviously, it’s the people who are perpetuating the acts of violence who are primarily responsible, but in terms of overall justice policy, is she concerned at all about those two diverging statistics that we’re seeing? Like I say, we have a 33 percent increase in violent crime, big increases in serious assaults, and a host of other gun crimes and a host of other issues but also, at the same time, from the moment this Government took office, there was a dramatic falling away in the number of people in prison for sentences.

Probably the first thing I would like to state just on record is that—and it goes back to my primary answer when we commenced this debate and discussion this afternoon—police data shows that there has been a 37 percent increase in reporting of violent offending. That’s not what we’re seeing flow through the system in terms of additional uplift in terms of prosecutions, but the reporting has increased. So we look to: why has the reporting increased? I mean, people can make mockery of that, but we’ve invested a lot of money and time and energy into enabling people to be able to report violent crime.

The biggest and most substantive investment in this area, as I discussed at the outset, was with respect to violent offending within the family environment, one of those types of crimes that tends to be—and has gone for far too long—under-reported, and that’s what was coming through from the New Zealand Crime and Victims Survey. That was one area that was always substantively under-represented. As we’ve seen the level of reporting go up in violent crime, in violent offending, there is a direct correlation with the increase in reporting of family violent crime. So, I guess, just to go back to that start part, that shows that the focus that we’ve had is working, because we are getting further people engaging in reporting areas that have previously been under-reported.

The number of people entering court for violent offences—again, just for the record so that’s correct—has increased by 8 percent since July 2022. If we come over to the decrease in the prison population—because the member’s proposition is that violent offending is going up, violent offenders in prison are going down; that’s the simple proposition that the member has put to this committee. However, the statistics don’t reflect that. Most of the decrease in the prison population is for non-violent offences. Prison population by type of offending: if we look at it, prison population has decreased by 21 percent over the last five years. There’s been a larger decrease in the number of people in prison for non-violent offences—30 percent—than for violent offences over the past five years.

So, I guess, when we are trying to draw apples and oranges, I mean—and this is the challenge that we have, to look at all of those drivers. What is causing the spikes that we’re seeing? Is it substantively worse or better, or what is the corollary from what we saw when we took office? We can see that substantive uplift in reporting and therefore prosecutions in that family violence environment because that was a commitment we as a Government made. We see less violent offenders in prison. There is simply a lack of evidence that prison is the best place for offenders who are less violent, and therefore are there other ways that we as a society can invest in ensuring that those people and those individuals can make a more fulsome contribution, and, if so, then what is the role of the State to enable that? Those are decisions that we have made where we have seen spikes—and I addressed this in the outset as well—particularly around areas like youth crime coming off the back of COVID. We saw those immeasurable jumps. It still doesn’t get us back to where the crime levels were in 2017, but we certainly saw a jump. So we made interventions, like I said, through Better Pathways and others, and we saw that reduction and restabilisation.

So, I guess, what I can assure this House is that unlike the base sum that the member is putting to this House, that there’s more reporting and less violent offenders in the prison—that’s simply not what the evidence is showing us.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Minister, I will go back to my first question, and wonder whether you could answer that, about the strangulation fund—$370,000 only having been spent out of $3.2 million as at 5 April. And further to that, the better outcomes for victims package—that had an allocation of $3.5 million in the last Budget allocation, and only $322,643 has been spent as at 31 March 2023. So how come it’s taken nearly a year before any of the large policies were announced to go with that Budget? Thank you, Minister.

Thank you, again, to the member. Look, I’ll answer that first question. I slightly missed the second part, so if you could restate that—actually, do you want to do that now, and I’ll respond to the first part?

The second part of the question related to the better outcomes for victims package. Why was only $322,643 spent as at the end of March this year out of a $3.5 million package, and why did it take nearly a year after that announcement of $3.5 million for any large policies to be announced in that area?

Thank you, Mr Chair. Turning to the question now. I apologise to the member that I didn’t answer it when I stood prior on strangulation and non-fatal strangulation. I guess that there’s a couple of ways that I will answer that. Justice had a proportion and allocation of the Budget, and there is, effectively, a very streamlined way of the Ministry of Justice giving effect to the way in which expenditure for that particular appropriation was made, and that was through the legal aid system. That’s a very simple response. The other part of that funding was to the Ministry of Health to provide support and additional training, and to provide ways that could operationalise—or the Ministry of Health could operationalise—being able to provide expert medical and forensic witnesses. So two parts.

To the second part with respect to the Ministry of Health, you’ll have to make your inquiries there, but with respect to the Vote that we’ve received, this funding that came to Justice was made available to support experts attending court as witnesses to ensure judicial processes are leading to high-quality decisions, and that was indeed with the amendments and the package focused around family violence. This is why that additional funding was injected into this area. Of course, the prosecution of those crimes or the provision of health specialists—in simple sum, those need to be directed to the Minister of Health and to the Minister of Police.

With respect to the funding for the better outcomes for victims, it was always envisaged that it would be an outcome—so a re-orientating—of the way that the justice system and, therefore, the various agencies that engage with victims—a completely different operating model, as the member will be aware, in our justice system. It’s an adversarial system where the State prosecutes a defendant. The victims in that system are, effectively, not represented, for example, by the Crown—they don’t have their own legal counsel and their experiences are ad hoc.

And I will acknowledge the previous Government for their leadership in appointing the Chief Victims Adviser—that was a good first step. Off the back of those reports and the subsequent inquiry by the Chief Victims Adviser, which, essentially, tasked her and others to come up with the way in which we need to step through: one, we need to trial things within the justice system. It’s made up of many parts—Corrections, Oranga Tamariki, Police, and many other parts there. And so what we needed to do was, one, look at what legislative changes were imminent and immediate that would lead to direct outcomes; now, secondly, look at particular pilots that people like the Chief Victims Adviser, and others as well who are victims’ advocates, had been saying would make a substantive difference to the way that victims could live their lives.

With the appropriations that were made in 2022, of course, it was a different approach for the justice sector. It was a multi-year appropriation, so the intent wasn’t to spend all of the money right away; it was to sit, to do some work, to look, and to make sure that over the course of those four years to which that appropriation applied, the outcomes would start small in terms of investment, because it was about pulling things together so that we could operationalise. As the member’s aware, we’ve made a significant announcement and subsequent investment into not just legislative and trials but also a substantive uplift in the support that victims can receive both through Victim Support and through the Victims Assistance Scheme that are available to victims directly as well. Those trials come into force on 1 June. They will provide a 12-month leeway. And, of course, whilst those trials are in place, we will also be looking at what the other raft of measures will be. So consider this an ongoing commitment by the Government to invest in doing things quite differently for victims, because I think collectively this House would agree that that’s a really important step that needs to be made.

Thank you, Mr Chair. Just briefly touching on, actually, a point the member Paul Goldsmith made regarding the warrant-to-arrest sanctions—and it is one of those that has interactions between Ministry of Social Development and Ministry of Justice—the Minister for Social Development and Employment has been on the record as not supporting that benefit sanction. The Welfare Expert Advisory Group recommended that it ended. I wanted to get the Minister’s perspective on whether she thinks that it has been beneficial to deprive people of income, for those who are receiving a benefit, because they have a warrant to arrest. What outcomes, from a justice perspective, has she seen as a result of that, and whether she believes the sanction actually criminalises people by depriving them of legal ways to provide kai for themselves and their children?

Thank you, Mr Chair. Just responding to the Minister’s suggestion that there was more people with less serious offences that were being thrown out of prison, as it were, in the big reduction of prison numbers—not serious offences. I just quote from the long-term study by the justice officials, saying, in terms of the big decrease in the prison population since this Government took over, “the decrease was larger for those serving long sentences than those serving short sentences”. So there was those people serving long sentences.

I suppose the question that I’d raise is that—the Minister has been talking about that prison hasn’t worked effectively, it’s not a great place, it doesn’t work. The point that’s raised by the victims of crimes is: of course. And the purposes in the Sentencing Act are not just to rehabilitate the offenders who have had a violent crime or created a violent crime or created terrible victims of crime; another purpose is to denounce the act—to denounce the act itself. So a lot of people are left staggered, for example, that a young man who was convicted of raping four women ended up with nine months home detention and playing home station.

Now, the Minister can’t comment on a specific case, but she is responsible for the overall sentencing framework that allows those kinds of results. People would rightly ask the question: does the home detention sentence effectively denounce the act so that all the other young men out there understand that this is something that society doesn’t tolerate? And so when she’s talking about whether prison works or not, is she conscious of the role that it has in denouncing the act?

Secondly, in also keeping people safe, in repealing the three-strikes legislation that this Government did, there’s one area that they did in the justice space—the one piece of legislation that they passed in the sentencing area was to say that “we think that our sentences are too long for our worst repeat offenders and therefore we need to shorten those sentences somehow”. That was the conclusion that they draw. But the average number of offences by somebody on a third strike was around 70 offences.

The point I would make is that with every one of those offences, a new victim is created—or multiple victims are created, quite often. So that cycle—going out into prison, going out, creating a new victim, going back—is what we’re trying to avoid. So the other purpose of the prison population is to keep the rest of the community safe from that small group of New Zealanders who perpetrate multiple acts of violence. So the question I have for the Minister is, while she points to all manner of statistics that—

Hon Member: Facts.

Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH: —may relate to violent crime—what did she say, “Facts”? The fact is that the survey of crime has shown a 33 percent increase in violent crime.

Now, the Minister says, “Oh, there’s been an overall reduction in crime.” Well, yes. If the police are only doing half the number of roadblocks they had for drunk-driving, there are going to be fewer people convicted of driving drunk. That’s not because there are fewer people driving drunk; it’s because the police are doing fewer tests.

That’s how it works: if you change the rules so that you’re not going to prosecute drug crimes, yes, there’s going to be a fall in prosecution for drug crimes. It doesn’t mean that anything has changed, that the country is safer; it’s just that the police have had a different approach. That’s the point that the justice officials were making: there’s been a change in approach. But every New Zealander who walks down the street and sees the plywood on all the windows from the ram raids—and they’ve seen the 140 percent increase in serious assaults—knows that there is a problem with safety. The question I have for the Minister is: why does she think that that is not something that ordinary New Zealanders should be concerned about?

Now, I’ve only got a little bit of time left, but I did also want to ask the question around why is she still—is it still her policy for this Government to bring in legislation around the Make It 16 campaign, for example, as priority in terms of reducing the voting age, either at general or local government? I’d be keen to get a clear answer on that. Then I’ve got a couple more.

There was a broad-ranging contribution from my friend there so I’ll try to address it in parts. One of the things that struck me with the contribution was that there seems to be a bit of a disassociation as to what the intent of the justice system is. I acknowledge the member’s contribution that said that part of the purpose of a justice system is rehabilitation, other parts are to denounce behaviours, etc. However, the part that probably made me ponder for a second is: for us, the real purpose is ensuring that there are less victims over time. And so you’ve got to approach that task in two parts. So, one, there is the immediacy: we need to immediately respond to harm and reduce that. We also have to, as good governors—stewards of a system—look to evidence that works. What ultimately reduces recidivism, violent criminal offending? We have to look at interventions that are made. Is it prisons? Do they work? Are they the best outcome to reduce harm in the long run for victims and, therefore, New Zealanders?

What the data shows us—and that’s what we have to look at; not our feelings, not our reckons, but we have to look at data—recidivism rates are higher for people sentenced to prison for violent offending over those people who receive a serious community sentence for violent offending. As a good governor, we have to look at these statistics, because what we are looking at is harm in the long run for New Zealanders. We have to make sure that when we invest or we change tack, it’s because we ultimately want to reduce crime in the long run. And that’s what we are ultimately seeing. We want to ensure that New Zealanders can report more crime and we’re making it easier for them to do so and enable that participation. But as good governors, we have an obligation to ensure that we commence with a hard and firm view on facts and evidence, not just scaremongering and fear.

To that next question from the member, about the Make It 16 campaign: we have introduced and we have made commitments that we will follow through with the local government component of the Make It 16 policy amendments.

Part of the annual review included the Human Rights Commission, where we had a 14 percent increase in the Budget, in the revenue, from 2021 to 2022. And so a simple question for the Minister is: did she recuse herself from the discussion of that increase in the Budget for the Human Rights Commission?

Just very briefly putting the questions regarding the intent of the warrant-to-arrest sanction policy and whether the Minister thinks that meets the goals that she may have in terms of the Government directions, seeing as the Ministry of Social Development is opposed to it?

I apologise, Ricardo. We have no imminent policy decisions to make any amendments with respect to that policy around the benefits and what they receive.

To my colleague the Hon Paul Goldsmith, he may or may not have been aware that in June 2022 I had no ministerial responsibilities for the Ministry of Justice or for the Human Rights Commission.

I agree entirely with the Minister, she wasn’t the Minister of Justice, but she was still in the Cabinet and so it’s still a relevant question. She may or may not choose to answer it, but I still ask the question: did she recuse herself from that increase?

Another question I have is, finally, in terms of the hate speech legislation, how much has been spent on it—the development of the hate speech legislation—and what are the Government’s plans for it currently?

Thank you, Madam Chair. To the latter question, that I don’t have right at hand right now but it’s in excess of $800,000 that was spent on the proposals for the hate speech legislation, in pursuit of the advancements of the recommendations from the royal commission. Where that currently sits is that we’ve made a referral to the Law Commission for them to be able to provide advice, based on their expertise in these relative, delicate, and complex legal matters, and therefore that matter now sits with them.

There was one other matter that you asked and it’s just slipped—

Hon Paul Goldsmith: Human Rights Commission.

Hon KIRITAPU ALLAN: Human Rights Commission—oh, yes, the Human Rights Commission. Yes, no, as I stated prior, I had no responsibilities for the Human Rights Commission in June 2022.

Thank you, Madam Chair. In terms of the electoral law side of the equation, is it still the Minister of Justice’s view that the one person, one vote principle that we have is still in place across all general and council elections, given the passage of the Canterbury Regional Council bill, which clearly moves away from that principle? The question’s relevant, as the Minister of Justice, because the Ministry of Justice ultimately gave the advice on the compatibility of that and also the Rotorua bill with the human rights legislation, which is against discrimination based on race.

On the Rotoroa bill, the Ministry of Justice came to the conclusion that it breached the human rights provision because that bill would have given greater voting rights to one ethnic group. And then—rather strangely, in my view; inexplicably, in my view—it came to the opposite conclusion for the Canterbury bill, which, clearly, by giving Ngāi Tahu the right to appoint two councillors as well as vote in the election for all the other councillors, it gives that group far greater weight than other Cantabrians. But the Ministry of Justice came to the opposite view.

So my question to the Minister is: has she asked the ministry what it was thinking and how it reconciles those two opposite conclusions drawn?

I’m sure that the member would be relatively familiar with the nature of these discussions, given I’m sure that they would have been in-depth discussions that that member would have been a part of when making the decision to introduce this particular form of voting, in structuring the initial Canterbury Regional Council bill that provided for local body representation and for those two permanent seats of the Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu. So I’m sure that he’s well adept at these discussions. I’m sure he would have been heavily engaged in reaching the determination that the then Government did.

That said, for our own consideration, what we did do—and, probably, in my mind, the Attorney-General is the person that ultimately has to determine whether or not something is consistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act, with respect to the Canterbury Regional Council, for reasons—as it was said there, while there appeared to be a distinction on the grounds of race or ethnic origin, it was found this distinction did not cause disadvantage to one or more classes of individuals, due to there being no comparable group with similar status in Canterbury. It went on to acknowledge the previous National Government’s prior legislation that this bill was built on.

With respect to the Rotorua District Council representation agreements, as you rightly point out, the Attorney-General considered this local bill to be inconsistent with the right to freedom from discrimination in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. It went on to say that it would create a difference in voting weight between those that were on the Māori roll and those that were on the general roll, which is not the same for the Canterbury Regional Council, as the member would be aware because you would have been heavily engaged in those discussions in your previous time in Government.

Members, our time with the Minister of Justice has ended. Thank you. The Minister of Health is now available for one hour to respond to members’ questions.

Health