Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill

The House is resumed. Members, we’re on the second reading of the Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It gives me great pleasure to be able to support the second reading of our good colleague Rima Nakhle’s member’s bill here, the Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill.

Tom Rutherford: Call her Tina Turner!

CAMERON BREWER: In short, just to recap—Tom Rutherford, because it has been a week or two—this bill would amend the Corrections Act by creating an obligation on the chief executive and prison managers to protect victims from unwanted contact.

Frankly, this is the right sponsor for the right bill; it’s one of those scenarios, because there’s no stronger advocate for victims than Rima Nakhle. The Nakhle family have got a great reputation in South Auckland for the support that your in-laws have given, the likes of Sir Barry Curtis, in basically building Manukau City, in Takanini. Rima and Roger live in the heart of Takanini. They’ve also got considerable experience with transitional and emergency housing. We salute you, Rima. Not only are you a Western Sydney University lawyer, a Sydneysider that’s over here, but you’ve got that on-the-ground experience as well. It’s great that you’ve been able to pick up this bill and develop it further.

As we’ve said, and I think it’s a favourite term of James Meager’s—is he here? James Meager—can’t comment, but it codifies what the Corrections management CEO and others are expected to do in the protection of victims. As you’re seeing here, we looked at it, as to how effective it would be and whether it was doable across those 26,000 people doing services in the community—community service; 9,500 serving custodial sentences, 26,000 in the community on community-based sentences, orders, or parole. Corrections said that will be difficult—that will be difficult to maintain, to protect those victims all the time from the correspondence and phone calls, unwanted correspondence and phone calls, from prisoners.

Ms Nakhle, as is reported in the report-back, requested, and she made it explicit—she made it explicit—that the relevant agencies continue to monitor the safeguards available to serve the protection of victims where offenders are serving community-based sentences, orders, and parole. She’s codified—through you, Mr Speaker; the sponsor, Rima Nakhle, MP for Takanini, has codified—that requirement not just for custodial sentences, for chief executives and prison managers to manage the correspondence and the likes of phone calls between prisoners and their victims, but also for those that are serving beyond the walls of the prison in community-based sentences, orders, and parole.

This is a big part of our Government agenda, I’d like to think, where we are refocusing the justice system to being victim-centric, if you like, and as I said, there’s no one that fights harder for victims’ rights and ensuring victims’ rights are upheld than our colleague Rima Nakhle. In fact, I would argue that it sits in with the Government’s Public Service target 4—and I know Tom Rutherford recites, most nights, the nine Public Service targets. I might even give my colleague from Northcote here the opportunity to recite Public Service target 4, but he might miss out a word or two, so I’ll give it to you. The Public Service target, the Government target number four, is that we are working already—with the help of this, too—to ensure 20,000 fewer victims of serious assault, robbery, and sexual assault. That is the overall Public Service target when it comes to reducing the number of victims, and it’s, again, part of the Government’s agenda on cracking down on law and order, whether that’s serious assaults, youth offending, retail crime, cracking down on burglaries and robberies.

This bill has come a long way, and the member, through the Justice Committee, has been very compliant, if you like, with new ideas, with ideas from officials and from the Opposition and from the chair and from her colleagues, as to how we can make this workable. Actually, like a lot of legislation, and members’ bills in particular, it is about sometimes codifying what might arguably be in practice in part, but we legislate for the ability to ensure that it can be achieved and that there is a responsibility on the Chief Executive of Corrections and those prison managers to protect those victims and for a process to be in place. The “proposed new section 77(5A) would require Corrections to take into account the interests of victims—in particular, being free from unwanted contact—when deciding what conditions to impose on prisoners regarding [the likes of] outgoing telephone calls.”, says the report-back from the Justice Committee.

The committee has also recommended amending clause 4 with a new section to place a different obligation on the chief executive. The chief executive would be required to “establish and maintain processes to inform visitors of prisoners and recipients of prisoner communications about measures they can take if they do not want to be contacted by a prisoner. We think [that] this”—in the end, the Justice Committee concluded in its report-back, page 2—“approach would support victims to control what contact they receive from prisoners, and make clear”—the other side; control for victims but also make clear—“the department’s obligations to victims.” Look, this is not to diminish all the good work that the Corrections staff do up and down the country, the thousands of them. They are doing their best to protect the victims of crime all the time. This is just to put in practice as a member’s bill to codify the responsibilities on the chief executive and prison managers and the expectations that victims can have, too—so they can go back to the statute, they can seek advice, and say, “What are my actual rights here? Where do I stand with this unwanted communication?” and it will all be explicitly written down in statute and passed through the third reading in a matter of days, if not weeks.

We’re very happy to support the second reading. I commend the sponsor of the bill, Rima Nakhle, for the work that she has done across the committee, across the political aisle, to knock this into shape so it’s actually workable. Initially, Corrections kind of said, “Oh, geez, this is going to be hard.” but through your persistence and doggedness and just commitment to getting it through and protecting victims, we’re now getting to a piece of legislation that’s going to pass its second reading tonight and head towards third reading and, as I said, codifies the responsibilities on prison managers and the Corrections chief of staff when it comes to protecting victims from unwanted correspondence and the likes of phone calls by prisoners.

At the same time, it also identifies that massive section of those people that have offended and are serving sentences in the community: 26,000 people. Twenty-six thousand people, the size of a small New Zealand city, are serving community-based sentences, orders, or on parole. This gives some protection to those victims and expectations around extra protection around where the Corrections management and chief executive can step in for the interests of victims. I commend the bill and I look forward to the third reading. Thank you, sir.

A five-minute split call—Reuben Davidson.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to rise and take a call on the Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill. The previous speaker, Cameron Brewer, referred to there being 26,000 sentences in our community. It felt like his speech went for 26,000 sentences on that matter as well. But I would like to acknowledge, as did the previous speaker, the work of Rima Nakhle on bringing this bill to the House.

I had the pleasure of a tour through Australia with Rima Nakhle. I can say that name because that’s the name we said every morning when we were about to get in the van and we would go, “Where’s Rima? Where’s Rima Nakhle?” My experience is that she is not the most punctual on the trip, but if you want poetry, Rima is the person to go to. On a more serious note—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): What happens on the trip, Mr Davidson!

REUBEN DAVIDSON: Ha, ha! Victims of crime deserve to feel safe and supported—I think we all believe that. I think we can be very, very proud—I am very, very proud—of Labour’s history in this area of ensuring that victims of crime feel safe and feel supported; also proud of Labour’s work to create a justice system that serves all New Zealanders.

We do play the blame game in this House. It’s a lame game, but it’s a game that gets played, where we in Opposition get blamed for all manner of things by this current Government. I thought I’d just give you three things you can add to that list. You can add to that list that you can blame us for the largest ever financial commitment for victims—we’ll happily take the blame for that. To 93,000 more people being able to access legal aid—we’ll happily take the blame for that. And for banning the ability to charge interest on legal aid debt—we will also happily take the blame for that. Please feel free to blame us for that any time you like in this House.

Coming back to the central point—which is that victims of crime deserve to feel safe and supported—victims of crime often have ongoing fears, valid ongoing fears, for their safety and for their security. To this bill’s credit, it will go some way to protect victims from further contact and from future contact, and from the unwanted contact or communication from prisoners or from people who have perpetrated those crimes against them. If we believe that victims of crime deserve to feel safe and supported—and we do, I believe, all believe that—then we would support the actions of this bill. But that’s not without some reservations and without some other points that I think we need to stop and take note of. Whilst we support this bill, I think it’s important to also put on the record the cuts that will negatively impact victims of crime.

Section 27 reports, which were a pathway for victims to get their views into the courtroom, have been cut—you chose to cut that. A 6.5 percent cut to the Crown Law Office—a choice that was made which erodes the resource available to the victims of crime. It doesn’t stop there. There were further cuts made to the Department of Corrections, to the Ministry of Justice, and to Police. If we truly all believe that victims of crime deserve to feel safe and supported—if we truly all believe that—none of us would be doing that. None of us would be making those cuts; would be carving those resources, those people, those support networks out of our justice system, but that is what’s happened. Whilst I can stand and speak in support of this bill and give you some insight to what life on the road with Rima Nakhle is like, what I can’t do is say that we should lose sight of the cuts that have been made and of the very real impacts that will have across New Zealand.

I stand in support of the Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill at its second reading. I am privileged to be a part of the Justice Committee—

Hon Member: Hard-working.

PAULO GARCIA: —under a super - hard-working chair, and, of course, our colleagues Cameron Brewer and Rima Nakhle, who has been determined and persistent in her position of concern for victims of crime. That is such an amazing determination and focus.

The amendment bill aims to protect victims of crime and to protect people under protection orders from unwanted contact by prisoners. It amends the Corrections Act 2004 in establishing an obligation on the Chief Executive of Corrections to implement processes to protect victims from unwanted contacts. It’s section 8 that is amended, ensuring that processes are established and maintained to inform visitors and victims of prisoners, and recipients of prisoner contact, that they have the opportunity to request measures that they can use to ensure that they do not receive unwanted contact by a prisoner. In deciding what these conditions are to be imposed and ensuring that no unwanted contact is placed upon victims, the chief executive and also the Commissioner of Police places the victim and the interests of victims, their wellbeing, at the forefront of these imposed conditions.

The amendment bill is actually a very simple and pragmatic way to ensure that victims are not re-victimised by persistent intimidation through contact that they receive from prisoners. The corrections system is well aware of the many instances where prisoners have continued to intimidate and instil fear in their victims and in the victims’ families through repeated contact. While one would assume that this is not happening, or shouldn’t be happening, it does happen quite a lot. I’d like to mention the many instances where prisoners have contacted victims over 93 times, over 100 times, over 102 times, and these are prisoners who have committed grievous injury on their victims—many times, physical injury, like rape; they have intentionally beaten victims with extreme brutality. It is these prisoners themselves who have sought ways around the non-contact system and through other prisoners who they may know, or who through their own ways have continued to contact the victims, intimidating them and making them want to change whatever positions they may have, if there is a persecution still ongoing.

The amendment bill also provides for a new offence for people to continue to try and breach the contact prohibition. I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. It’s good to stand in support of this bill, the Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill. What this bill does is create an obligation on the chief executive and on prison managers in order to protect the rights of victims and also those who are subject to a protection order and victims of crime so that they can’t be contacted by prisoners.

I think it is important to note that, while we support this bill, when a piece of legislation is creating an obligation on the chief executive, as a policy analyst in a former life, you always want to ask the question whether legislation is necessary in order to do that. There is a little bit of a question for me as to whether we need a bill in order to create an obligation on a chief executive. That would be something potentially a Minister of the Crown would be able to do without a bill. Nevertheless, it’s got a good intent in it. Initially it wanted to do it quite a lot; it was going to be operationally difficult to implement because it would have also included monitoring the communications of people on community-based sentences—which is 26,000, potentially—and on parole. That would have been a huge effort.

The Justice Committee worked quite constructively together in order to make it workable. Corrections staff were great: they worked quite closely with the committee in ways that we could practically make this work in the way of the intent of the member who has carried it forward. The select committee requested that the relevant agencies continue to monitor the safeguards that are practically available and proposed a range of amendments which have been specified. We’ve introduced a new offence of making unwanted contact by amending section 128 to make an offence against prison discipline for a prisoner to contact someone who the prisoner knows or reasonably ought to know does not want to be contacted, and the Act provides a range of punishments for prisoners who are found guilty of their offence against prison discipline.

It’s got good intent, it continues to make sure that victims’ rights are looked after, and I commend it to the House.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. It gives me great pleasure to speak as the final speaker on the second reading of the Corrections (Victim Protection) Amendment Bill in the name of my great friend Rima Nakhle. As well canvassed previously by—

Hon Scott Simpson: Which electorate does she represent?

TOM RUTHERFORD: She represents Takanini. As regarded to by my colleague Cameron Brewer from Upper Harbour—he sort of heaped the praise on Rima for her advocacy for those who are victims of crime, those who have experienced crime, whether firsthand or in support of family members or friends. For me, it’s disappointing to know that we’ve allowed for this to happen for so long, that there’s been a loophole and it’s taken this piece of legislation to amend it. I commend my colleague for picking up the baton from Minister Louise Upston but I’m disappointed also that we’ve had to come to this place to do it. I’m pleased that we’re doing it, but—that we have allowed for something like this to happen in New Zealand.

I had a read through around some examples. One stood out to me. In 2016, a man severely beat his victim for 15 minutes, breaking five ribs, fracturing their spine, and causing severe internal injuries. Sadly, the story didn’t end there. While they were in custody awaiting trial, that offender made 102 phone calls to the victim—102 phone calls pressuring that person to simply not testify in court against them. Now, imagine how that makes you feel as the victim of that crime. Experiencing the crime itself is bad enough, let alone being re-traumatised again and again and again by the exact person who committed that crime against you. For many victims, going through the court process is intimidating enough as it is, let alone to have that contact from the person who committed those crimes against you is just disgusting—it’s absolutely disgusting.

Just reading on: when the person didn’t quite get through that the 102 phone calls weren’t working, what did they do? Manipulated the system. They got another inmate to add the victim’s number to their approved phone call list to continue the harassment. It wasn’t just bad enough for the offender to do it themselves, but they now got old mate from the cell next door to be the one to then start ringing that victim as well and harassing them.

That’s not an isolated incident—it’s not an isolated incident. We’ve seen cases of paedophiles writing to their victims from behind bars. We’ve seen prisoners orchestrate stalking through third parties. Each of these cases simply represents a fundamental failure of our justice system to protect those who have already suffered enough. Number one: in this country, we put the victims first; they have experienced enough. Yet, we’ve created a loophole that allows them to be contacted and harassed by those that have committed the crime against them. I’m pleased that we are fixing this loophole, because it’s simply going to mean a massive amount of change for those who most need all the support they possibly can.

Ruth Money, a prominent victim advocate, said it perfectly when she stated—and I quote—“That everybody was always shocked to learn that this was possible.” She called it “beyond belief” that this detail hasn’t been addressed before now. I read through the report the Justice Committee prepared after considering it through the select committee process. I wasn’t fortunate enough to listen to the submissions. My colleague Rima Nakhle told me there were 12 submissions on it, probably all genuinely heartfelt, probably some people who were firsthand victims themselves and sharing their experiences and sharing why changing this legislation is so important.

The committee carefully considered how to make the bill both effective and practical. The initial draft—and my colleague Rima and I were just talking about it before—would have initially covered about the 26,000 people under Corrections’ supervision and including those beyond the Corrections facilities themselves out in the community. Based on the operational advice that the select committee received, they agreed to redefine the legislation. They brought it back from the initial 26,000 to about 9,500 who are held in Corrections facilities as prisoners, and that ensures that the bill can effectively be implemented with current resources.

Then I had a look through and I saw some of the recommendations and amendments that were made by the Justice Committee and I thought, “Hey, they’re making some really reasoned arguments and points here.” Clause 4 of the bill as introduced would introduce a new section 8(1) into the Act: “This would place an obligation on the chief executive to establish and maintain processes that would protect victims and [protected] persons from unwanted contact from any person under the control or supervision [of Corrections]”. I thought: that makes sense, it’s an amended aspect to the responsibility of the chief executive.

I listened to Reuben Davidson’s contribution previously where he spoke in support of the legislation, but he talked about “cuts here” and “cuts there”. I thought back to Budget 2024 and I thought about the funding we as a Government have put into the corrections space. Don’t forget the $1.9 billion in new funding to deliver 810 extra beds, deliver new front-line staff—

Hon David Parker: You’d be better to spend it on a hospital in Dunedin.

TOM RUTHERFORD: —increase pay for Corrections employees, and extend rehabilitation programmes for prisoners. It’s really disappointing to be heckled from across the House from the Hon David Parker. This is actually a really serious moment and he goes, “Let’s talk about Dunedin Hospital”—let’s talk about Dunedin Hospital. Well, do you know what, Mr Parker? I actually want to talk about the victims who are affected by this legislation. I want to talk about those victims who have had firsthand experience of violent crime in New Zealand, and now we’re fixing the loophole, and you want to talk about Dunedin Hospital.

Hon David Parker: Yeah, I do.

TOM RUTHERFORD: Well, why don’t you actually remember about those victims in New Zealand who have experienced firsthand violent crime and are now being harassed by those prisoners in jail who committed the crime and are now harassing the victims every single day?

One victim received 102 phone calls—102 phone calls and he continues to heckle. That victim received 102 phone calls and yet he’s heckling and saying, “Let’s talk about Dunedin Hospital, let’s talk about Dunedin Hospital.” Do you know what, Mr Parker? I’m talking about 102 phone calls that that victim received and were harassed by the offender who committed those crimes against them. It’s really disappointing. It’s really disappointing that that has to happen. But, do you know what? My colleague Cameron Brewer spoke earlier and he talked about the nine Public Service targets and there’s one in particular that I’m really focused on and it’s about our commitment to reduce 20,000 victims of violent crime—20,000 fewer victims of violent crime by 2029 and reducing serious young offending by 15 percent.

I see my colleague Karen Chhour in the House, a Minister leading that work around giving those children and young people another opportunity at life. Not saying that we’re just going to give up on you. We’re giving you a second shot at life and we’re going to put some investment into you so we know you can turn your life around and you can make better decisions moving forward rather than putting them in the too-hard basket. I just think that’s fantastic.

As I come to the conclusion, I think I really want to reiterate that all these measures around what we’re doing in the law and order space—banning gang patches, young military-style academies, everything else under the front line of bringing in more front-line police officers—means little if we can’t protect victims from offenders behind bars. It means nothing, it doesn’t stand for anything if we can’t protect those who have been the victims of crime. Prison should mean safety and peace of mind for our victims in New Zealand. It should mean safety and peace of mind, not continued harassment and intimidation. This bill represents a return to common sense in our justice system. It puts victims first; it closes a loophole that should have never existed; and, most importantly, it sends a really clear message: we will no longer tolerate a justice system that allows offenders to continue victimising people from behind bars. I commend this bill to the House.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a second time.