Legal Services (Distribution of Special Fund) Amendment Bill

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take this call on behalf of the National Party in support of the legislation. It does broaden the use of the Lawyers and Conveyancers Special Fund to support community legal services more comprehensively. Currently, the fund can only directly purchase community legal services, and this expands it to also fund functions that facilitate or support those services. Why this matters? Three points: better use of existing resources, it reduces pressure on Crown funding, and it strengthens community legal services. This is about making better use of the existing fund, and, therefore, I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you very much. Labour—as you’re aware, Mr Speaker—supports this bill. It broadens use of the Lawyers and Conveyancers Special Fund to allow for expenses incurred by community law centres. Community law centres do amazing work in our community, and in my experience, working in Lower Hutt, it’s been a really valuable resource to send people who can’t afford to receive legal services—so to allow that and the delivery of community legal services to be paid for using special fund money.

It’s important to note that it is not explicit in the current legislation; delivery of community legal services can be paid using the special fund money. The legislative statement gives an example of overheads, such as things like rent or digital costs that are not in and of themselves examples of community legal services, but they very well may be essential expenses incurred in the delivering of those services. Currently, Crown funding is required to fund functions that facilitate or otherwise support the delivery of those community legal services. It’s important that they are funded properly.

What this bill does is it enables the Secretary for Justice to enter into a contract with more community law services to purchase community legal services. That’s important work. It’s also important to note that under Labour, we significantly increased the level of funding in that space.

In the context of this, it’s important we continue to make available access to legal services. We know that there are barriers to accessing justice. It is vital that we have a justice system that is able to be accessed by everyone. One of the main barriers of going through the justice system is that people simply cannot afford representation and it’s very difficult to even get that in terms of legal aid—more could be done in that space.

So community law centres serve an incredibly important role in our communities. I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. The Legal Services (Distribution of Special Fund) Amendment Bill recognises the valuable service that community law centres provide to the public. They give information, give support to the public, and enable the normal person on the street the opportunity to understand the legal circumstances they may find themselves in. The bill enables and facilitates this support and the work of community law centres. I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s a real pleasure to speak in support of this bill, possibly because I’ve had quite a close relationship with Community Law over my career as a lawyer, first as a lawyer and then a manager of YouthLaw Aotearoa—I was there for almost a decade. Community law centres do play an absolutely vital role in terms of access to justice.

I also think they’re quite an unusual service because, from time to time, people who get the services of Community Law don’t actually present first with what they believe is a legal issue. So I’m reminded of a young 16-year-old who I provided support and legal advice to who was referred to YouthLaw via Youthline. When I spoke to her, she spoke about some uncomfortable physical behaviour that she’d received from her boss. She didn’t call it sexual harassment, but through the conversation she became aware that that was what it was, and we eventually assisted her to raise a sexual harassment claim.

Now, this is important to consider, because I think that we all understand the importance of funding legal services, but in truth, community legal services operate in a network. So the idea of building up networks so you can have referrals when people need it is also an essential part of the access to justice framework. I think that’s what’s unique about community law centres. In 2011, Community Law Centres Aotearoa was set up, in part, to help assist that broader framework of networks and people being able to come in and get the services they need. It was also there to advocate for community law centres when they felt under threat that their funding would be cut by the previous National Government. What we’ve seen Community Law Centres Aotearoa do in terms of access to justice is quite extraordinary. They’ve set up Te Ara Ture, or the bridge to law, which matches pro bono legal capacity with issues in the community where people need lawyers. This isn’t a traditional legal service but it’s certainly something that should be funded.

I’m excited to see that these additional attached services are now being recognised in terms of them being funded by the special fund. But I just did want to speak to two points which may come up in the select committee process. Government members have made the point that making this change will reduce the pressure on the Government Vote—so Vote Justice. I think we need to be a bit cautious about proceeding down that line of argument. In truth, the special fund, at times, in the past, has not been sufficient to meet the needs of Community Law funding. If you look back to 2012, for example, the interest received on the fund was actually just under $5 million, which wasn’t anywhere close to the $10.97 million that was needed to fund Community Law at the time. So the Ministry of Justice had to contribute to the budget as well. We must be clear that if the special fund ever dips below what’s required to fund adequate services, we should be expecting the Ministry of Justice to fill that gap and ensure that we have adequate services.

The second point is just in reference to who provides the support functions. So the bill at present reads that it has to be a contract with Community Law, which I think is correct. However, I do think that this bill opens a door to a conversation about the funding of other entities as well. My view is that Community Law do provide a rather special service that ought to be protected by legislation, and so I agree with the framing of the language of the bill as it is. I would just urge the select committee to be very mindful of protecting the scope of the bill as it’s drafted now as it goes through the select committee processes.

Finally, the special fund is, at present, a fund where the banks still retain 40 percent of the interest from the fund. I do think that that’s a matter that the House should consider in due course as well, in terms of the adequacy of funding to ensure that everyone is able to access legal help when they need it. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’d just like to, in the first instance, acknowledge and thank our community law centres for the services that they provide in our communities and, often, for those who are our most vulnerable. I’ve met with them a number of times in the Wairarapa electorate, and they’re very passionate and compassionate, and I would like to thank them for what they do. Often, we have constituents in our offices that seek advice, not only from us but also from the community law centres. So I would like to commend this bill to the House. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

The question is, That the Legal Services (Distribution of Special Fund) Amendment Bill be considered by the Justice Committee.

Motion agreed to.

Bill referred to the Justice Committee.

Instruction to Justice Committee