Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill

on behalf of the Minister of Justice: I present a legislative statement on the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on the Parliament website.

Hon MARK MITCHELL: I move, That the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill be now read a third time.

It is a privilege to be leading this bill through its final stage in the House. I particularly want to acknowledge the bravery of victims who have shared the personal experiences that have shaped this bill. Our Government has been clear from day one that when it comes to law and order, victims are our priority. It underpins all the work we do to achieve our two key targets: 20,000 fewer victims of violent crime by 2029—something we’re currently tracking ahead of—and a 15 percent reduction youth offending, which we know we’re closing in on. This bill further builds on our plan, which we know is working.

I’d like to briefly outline the issues under the current law and how this bill addresses them. The purpose of this bill is to improve the experience of sexual violence victims who are participating in criminal justice proceedings. Specifically, it addresses two issues these victims face during proceedings. The first issue is deeply disturbing. Right now, under the Crimes Act, it is possible for victims to be questioned in court about whether they consented to or even enjoyed sexual abuse that happened to them when they were under 12 years old, as part of deciding whether that abuse was a crime. This experience is unacceptable and is especially harmful if the complainant is still a child during proceedings.

The second issue is that the current settings for name suppression are confusing and out of step with what most people would expect. In too many cases, victims do not automatically get interim name suppression, causing victims additional distress. The current settings can also end up silencing victims who would like to talk about their experiences, because the court has the final say on whether to supress the offender’s name. This situation leaves victims unable to speak out or warn others, even though the offender has been convicted. That is not justice. That is a system that protects silence over safety and, once again, takes choice away from the victims.

The bill addresses these problems by making it clear that the age-specific offence of sexual conduct with a child must be used when the person was under 12 at the time of the offending, aligning the maximum penalty for sexual conduct with a child under 12 with the maximum sentence for sexual violation: 20 years imprisonment. Clarifying the process for victims lifting their own name suppression by including the process in the criminal procedure rules; extending victims’ automatic interim name suppression to all crimes of a sexual nature, including offences related to intimate visual recordings; only allowing permanent name suppression for people convicted of sexual violent offences if the victim agrees.

Two additional changes were made by select committee to clause 6A to clarify that victims’ agreement to name suppression orders is only applicable for permanent orders and not interim orders, and require that all reasonable measures are taken to contact the victim to seek their views on the offender’s name suppression. I want to thank the members of the Justice Committee for their work on this bill; and the victims, their support people, and their advocates, who shared their experiences and insights. Your input has been key to the development of this bill.

The Government has heard from victims and their advocates that name suppression settings have disempowered victims, prevented victims from speaking out about their experiences, and prevented victims from warning others. We have also heard that the way children are questioned in court is not acceptable to New Zealanders. This bill responds to those concerns. The changes we are making are about one thing: protecting and empowering victims. This bill makes it crystal clear that children cannot consent to abuse. This bill empowers victims with choice and it makes sure their voice is heard loudly and clearly. Children under 12 years old cannot consent to sexual activity, full stop. It should never be a defence to say they enjoyed it or agreed to it.

These changes will better protect some of our most vulnerable victims who are being brave enough to come forward to talk about their experience in a courtroom. The changes to name suppression are a powerful step forward. They restore dignity, choice, and control to those who have had it taken away from them. Let me be absolutely clear: these changes do not force victims to decide whether their abuser’s name is published. If they don’t want to make that decision, they don’t have to. The bill doesn’t impose it; it empowers.

The bill will come into force four months from the date of Royal assent. The Government’s message is this: it is abhorrent that the law allows questions about whether children enjoyed or agreed to sexual activity. We are fixing that. It is unconscionable that victims feel silenced by our laws, especially when they have braved the scrutiny of the court process to prove their case. We are fixing that too. This Government firmly believes in centring victims, and it is my pleasure to be here today, championing these much-needed changes. I commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Thank you. I was not in the select committee process for this, because I’ve just picked up this portfolio. It’s one of those portfolios that you pick up and your heart is heavy with it immediately. You know the weight of it because it is such a serious issue in our society. Lots of us know people who have been impacted by this kind of violence towards them. It’s a terrible ride; it’s not an easy process through our justice system. We absolutely have to do more to address the way that we treat victims. We also have to, I think, look beyond our justice system, in terms of how we treat those victims, because court is a small part of what we probably need to do.

There’s a lot of work to be done, I think, on first picking up this portfolio, in the area of education. We have some pretty strange views out there in the world about consent and what is acceptable. One of those views is the view that people could enjoy or consent to this behaviour at a very young age, and, unfortunately, it’s not something that has happened occasionally; it has happened habitually—that people have used this kind of defence when they have abused a child. That is something that has come to the attention of many of us in the legislature because people have come and complained about the old law.

I remember talking to a group about this, who were explaining this issue in the law to me and how the way that the matter was prosecuted had different penalties in it, one of which was lighter than the other. If the matter was prosecuted under the lighter law, it wasn’t necessary to prove the consent issue; so it was being chosen. Effectively, the person was getting a lighter prosecution, a lighter sentence, because those prosecuting didn’t want to put a child under this extra scrutiny and have this extra defence raised. That was an unacceptable situation, and I’m very pleased to see this law amend that today. That’s a really important thing that’s happening today, and the Labour Party is supporting that change.

With regard to name suppression, I do see the issue with regard to automatic name suppression tending to feel, often, like a disempowering act to a victim. I think that is an absolutely valid point of view. But the issue is more complicated than that, because the sad reality is there are often more victims than one. There are often more victims than one. If this has happened in a family, it may be that there will be two sisters, and one sister will be the person who has asked about the suppression issue, but the other one will be equally impacted by the result of it. There may well be two different views in that situation. So it is a much more complicated thing, and hence you’ll see, in the report, the Labour Party take a more nuanced view on this issue. It is a difficult matter. It’s hard to reconcile that issue.

One of the things that I think we need to remember is that we also place a lot of weight on someone, particularly someone young, making a choice like that. Because they live in a community, there is real weight attached to such decisions, and there is also going to be family pressure. All of those issues are going to be difficult, and so it may well be that this part of the law doesn’t necessarily have the impact that we hope to see by it; hence the reservations that have been expressed by the Labour Party members who were part of this select committee.

There were real concerns from the Law Society about this aspect of the bill. I always take real notice of those submissions, because I think that you have people giving submissions in those circumstances who’ve worked a long time in an area and they’ve seen a lot of different scenarios. I don’t think that the arguments they’re putting up are academic ones that we should dismiss; I think we should respect anybody who works in these areas long term, because they bring all those layers of experience in. I don’t believe there’s a kind of dichotomy between listening to the victim and listening to the people who have been expert in those fields. It’s very important we do listen to them. I take on board that there will be people out there who’ve got serious reservations about this aspect of the law, but today we’re going to support this law going through, and it is very much part of something that, I hope, will be a much bigger focus on sexual violence in New Zealand and trying to eradicate it and support those who have experienced it.

I just wanted to talk, lastly, about the seriousness of that situation. I went to something today which was on the marae just down the road, and it was about sexual and family violence. It was a group of people who are being disbanded that were advising the Government. One of the people spoke up in the group and said that sexual violence was misunderstood in this country—that people didn’t have a clue how bad it was; how most New Zealanders would be horrified if they knew how prevalent it is. I have to agree. I think we’re moving into a society with new dangers, with regard to this, one of which is the area of digital development, where kids are playing games that involve sexual violence and it’s changing and making them less realistic. It’s changing their norms. I think we will have to think about sexual violence more widely and differently than we have. It is going to matter, not just to do things like this but to think very widely about how committed we are to eradicating this problem in our society and spend some money on educating our kids about what’s wrong with it. We are entering a new world and people don’t know.

What that man made me think today was that it’s not just our kids; it’s a society that has thought, in the past, it was appropriate to argue that there were people liking this who were under 12. It’s that society; it’s throughout our society. It’s our children, but it’s also our adults who need to understand just how bad this problem is and how harmful it is. We really need to spend some money on it. We really do. We hear a lot from this Government about wasted spending. Well, I hope I never hear those words used about this. I just wanted to remind this House that there was no money spent for the Minister who was in charge of family and sexual violence work—no Budget bid, no extra money this term—and I hope that that gets reviewed. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of the Green Party in strong support of the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill, an incredibly important piece of legislation designed to enhance the legal safeguards for victims of sexual violence within our justice system. This bill is a testament to our collective commitment to ensuring that survivors of sexual violence are treated with dignity, with respect, and with autonomy when navigating the complex and often retraumatising legal processes.

The key aspect of the bill—well, there are a few parts of this bill. We’re looking at the impact of sexual violence on children. We’re looking at strengthening those legal protections for all victims of sexual violence, and empowering victims to have control over name suppression, and ensuring a fair and consistent process for those name suppression applications. Then, of course, it’s where to from here? How do we prevent this violence from ever happening? We have some really amazing cross-party, cross-agency work there with Te Aorerekura, which was, of course, stewarded by the Hon Marama Davidson.

A key aspect of this bill is the amendment to the Crimes Act 1961, which introduces a crucial change regarding the offence of sexual violations for victims under 12. Oh, I know that we all feel this really heavily when we hear that “for victims under 12”. It seems so obvious, and I’m glad, today, we are bringing our legislation, our laws, into line with what is right.

The bill’s new definition is “sexual connection with a child”, ensuring that the legal processes better reflect the vulnerability of young victims. This change acknowledges the profound harm caused to children. The reason that we’re doing this is to reduce the risk of subjecting them to those invasive and distressing and retraumatising questions around sexual consent in court, including, in some cases, being asked disgusting questions like, “Did you enjoy it?”—absolutely appalling. I’m so glad that we are protecting those victims who are 12 and under.

It is an important step in protecting our tamariki and aligning the maximum penalty for this offence with that of sexual violation towards adults by removing the possibility of victims under the age of 12 being cross-examined in court around these very invasive questions and this questioning, and we send a clear message that our justice system is committed to prioritising the safety and wellbeing of our most vulnerable in our society, our tamariki.

In addition to these changes, the bill also addresses critical issues around name suppression. This was a key theme that came through in the submissions in select committee. I do just want to take the time to thank everybody who submitted and who went back over their own trauma and the people who are working with these traumatised people and survivors. Thank you for taking the time to write in submissions. Thank you also to the people who came in and gave oral hearings. It was so important for us to really strengthen this bill and make it really workable in our justice system. I do take my hat off to the Justice Committee as well for working together on this bill.

One of those key themes that came through, of course, was around name suppression. Currently, automatic name suppression is only provided for victims of certain sexual offences, leaving victims of other sexual crimes, such as intimate visual recordings. This is inconsistent and creates a situation where some victims may be exposed without their consent or even awareness. For many victims, the fear of being publicly named can be deeply, deeply distressing and contribute to further trauma, and we want to reduce that. That’s why the Greens strongly support the extension of automatic name suppression to all victims of sexual violence. We know that being publicly named can cause further trauma, and we want to do everything we can to make sure that doesn’t happen.

During the select committee stage, we heard very clearly that an equally important provision in this bill is one that gives victims greater control over decisions regarding that name suppression. This bill will promote that the victim’s view will be paramount when considering the suppression of a convicted defendant’s identity. No permanent name suppression could be granted without the victim’s agreement, except in cases where the victim is unreachable or unable to engage. We think that this is a really important change because this empowers victims and acknowledges their agency in determining how they wish to engage with the legal process. This is something we heard, over and over, really strongly from a range of submitters in select committee.

Another one of the themes that we heard at select committee from our submitters was around the fair and consistent processes. That’s what this bill is aiming to do. It is aiming to create more consistent and transparent processes for lifting that automatic name suppression. This aligns to ensure that victims who wish to lift this name suppression can do so more easily and, in a way, that’s consistent with rules that are already in place. This is about good lawmaking; it’s about listening to our communities, listening to the people who have been the most affected, and ensuring that our laws are in line with the realities faced by people who have been victimised and assayed.

I want to acknowledge, again, the extensive and really important work of the Justice Committee, which scrutinised this bill and worked really hard together to enhance the legislation. I’m really proud of the work that we have done together. It’s been a critical contribution to improving the framework within these legal protections.

Of course, in concluding and talking about the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill, it’s an important and necessary step and reform that will improve our justice system. We want to make sure that we are strengthening those legal protections for our vulnerable victims and survivors. We also must recognise that there is still so much more work to be done. That’s where things like Te Aorerekura come in, that prevention of family and sexual violence. Te Aorerekura is about eliminating family and sexual violence. That’s why it is a cross-agency initiative that works together to ensure that prevention work is happening across the board. We want to continue to see the Government put its money where its mouth is and really invest in prevention and in the community services and community providers who are ensuring that there are these programmes and that there is education out there and support wrapped around these whānau. We must continue to work together to create a future where survivors and victims are supported and prevention is at the heart of our efforts.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m delighted to take a call on the third reading of the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill. As has already been said tonight, we’re proud to be part of a Government that actually is victim focused, and we’ve actually put a target on reducing victimisations in New Zealand. What this bill does is—really, it is about improving the experience of victims in the criminal justice system, particularly those victims of sexually based offences, which are particularly heinous and unpleasant. It makes two really important but simple changes. It makes sure that the victims of sexual offending under 12 are appropriately treated in the criminal justice system, and we’ve heard some talk about that tonight. So we’re making sure that those vulnerable children are appropriately protected as a prosecution is happening. It makes these really important changes around name suppression, and, particularly, allowing victims to speak out if they want. That’s the key thing: empowering victims to be able to speak out if they want, by clarifying the process under which they can lift name suppression. So I commend this bill to the House.

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak in support of the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill. The introductory Minister has given an outstanding outline of what this piece of legislation is. It is important we get this into law, and we commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise to speak on the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill. This is something that we do support from the Green Party because of the fact that although they are considered reasonably minor, they make really meaningful changes to people’s lives and to people who should not be subjected to additional trauma or be put through repetitive traumatisation as a result of something like this.

So just two particular elements of this bill that we wanted to address. The first one is, rightfully, when we’re looking at amending the Crimes Act 1961 so that the offence of sexual violation cannot be charged if the victim is under 12 years old, which then would reduce the risk that the child would undergo questioning about certain content when giving evidence in the court. I think this is something that even during the committee stage was something that the House broadly had clear consensus over.

I think the other thing when we are looking at the second part of this bill, again, we wanted around the automatic name suppression for complainants in sexual cases—we want to draw back to the work that could be done and the work that is intended to be done by Te Aorerekura, the National Strategy to Eliminate Family Violence and Sexual Violence. Again, that particular action plan and documentation is something that is going to move towards addressing this really concerning and systemic issue here in Aotearoa New Zealand.

So, specifically, one of the things that we looked at during the committee stage is around some of the details and potentially some of the improvement or consistency that’s been met as a result of this. I think, for Part 2 in particular, when we were looking at the Criminal Procedure Act, which talks about the automatic name suppression for complaints cases, that we have heard from survivors and victims and from complainants that they do not need to have such protection and find that applying to lift the suppression can be a slow and difficult and expensive process, which, again, reinforces the idea that we are looking at people who have suffered a lot—and are potentially retraumatised—as a result of this process.

I think—again, I know I mentioned it in previous speeches as well, but I really want to draw the House’s attention again to Gisèle Pelicot, who bravely lifted her name suppression against her husband in France and is able to bravely talk about her story and experience, so that way it raises a nationwide campaign, highlighting the concerns around sexual violence in France. I think this is a really, really good example of different people wanting to get through and reclaim themselves and feel a sense of empowerment in different ways, and name suppressions may not be able to achieve that.

We did, however, ask the Minister a couple of specifically nuanced questions and we did manage to get some responses from the Minister around what happens when there are two complainants and one decides to lift name suppression while the other doesn’t. Those are kind of the things that potentially may play out in situations and may not be anticipated as a result of the regulatory impact statement or the introduction of this bill. We are quite happy with the way that the Minister conducted themselves and being able to respond to our questions.

So, again, overall, the Green Party is supportive of this bill, as we have been supportive of other bills that strengthen protection against the most vulnerable communities and the most vulnerable parts of our communities. It could be this, it could be litigant abuse, it could be other forms of family violence that we’re looking at, but ultimately these are kind of the things that we really need to be looking more towards when we’re introducing bills to this House—how we can have equitable treatment, being victim-centric, and have better access to justice. So, with that, the Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand will support this bill.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I’m just going to take a short call on the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill. This is a rare occasion when the House comes together on an issue that is really important. I’ve personally, and I know many other members have also, acknowledged the courage of the submitters. I think many of them had a lot of courage in talking about it. Dr XuNan just talked about a case in France, but only just last weekend, 21 June, we had our own case being revealed in the New Zealand Herald about two daughters who’d been abused by their father. They were taking the opportunity to be clear and open about what had happened to them, and I think this is a bill that helps them stand up for their rights. That is why it’s such a great occasion to be standing in this House, talking about this bill, and to see it passing the legislation very shortly. Thank you.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. It’s a pleasure to take a call on the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill. So this bill does two different things. It clarifies law in the area where there are sexual crimes, and there’s two separate offences specified where it makes an offence to have sexual connection with a child or a person defined as under 12. Consent is not relevant under section 132(1), but under section 132(2) it explicitly states that consent is not a defence, which means harmful lines of questioning are less likely to be pursued.

However, despite the age-specific offence being available, rape or unlawful sexual connection with a child is often charged as sexual violation under section 128B, inserted by clause 4, and under this section, lack of consent and lack of reasonable belief and consent are key elements that may be proved. Therefore, children could be cross-examined about whether they wanted, asked for, or even enjoyed sexual activity. So what this legislation does is it makes sure that sexual violation carries a maximum penalty of 20 years of imprisonment, whereas sexual connection with a child had only 14. So it brings them into line and it stops children being asked if they consented to sexual abuse or rape. So this was first looked at by both Camilla Belich and Emily Henderson when we were in Government, and they relentlessly pursued this with the Minister of Justice at the time, to the point where they finally agreed to put it in a bill. So it’s a good example of backbenchers taking up an issue and relentlessly pursuing it to see a legal change.

The second area that this covers is the area of name suppression. Before I go into that, I’d just like to quickly relay a personal story from when I first started working at New Zealand Police. One of the areas I was working in, a senior adviser to me lay out a roll of paper and it was about three A3s altogether. So it stretched right out. They rolled it out and they said, “That is a rape trial, Ginny. That’s a timeline from the point of charging to conviction of a rape trial.” That’s still the case in New Zealand. It takes years to go through a rape trial. Women are still questioned about details of their life and retraumatised through the criminal justice system to the point where it prevents people from reporting sexual violence because the process of holding the offender to account is so traumatising that it actually puts people off from reporting and enabling justice to happen.

So this is a small step with these provisions. These are small steps to try and make that traumatic process slightly less traumatic. But we have a really long way to go to enable a system which enables victims to want to come forward and to give evidence and be treated fairly before the court, but also to have their dignity retained through that process. I would like to acknowledge everyone who’s had to go through that process. It is a very difficult one indeed. I’d like to acknowledge that there had been some good changes made in terms of the way Whangārei and the court they run up there, in terms of how the courtroom is set up, how victims are treated, how evidence is given, and enabling victims to come forward and tell their stories in a way in which they’re not traumatised.

We already made changes; what would happen is someone would be questioned about their sexual history, about their promiscuity around what they were wearing. Those sorts of questionings were able to be made. So there’s already been changes made around that to be more in line with the UK. So some of these changes are just a few of the ones that we made when in Government. This is actually the last couple of bills that I introduced as the Minister of Justice, that are getting their final reading now.

We do have some concerns with the provisions in and around name suppression, and there’s been some excellent examples given of cases where—whether it’s France or I think of the Mama Hooch cases in Christchurch—victims stepped up and were pleased to be able to hold their offender to account publicly. They have every right to be able to do that. But that is their choice and their ability to do that. We, along with other advocates in the sector, have raised some concerns about the pressure being placed on victims to have, effectively, a veto right on whether name suppression will be provided or not to the accused. So those reservations have been highlighted.

The one in particular is that there is more stress or pressure because of the weight of that decision and that there could be victims that are exposed from other family members who have a vested interest in getting a conviction of the person in the dock. There’s no bottom age limit in this bill where victims could be consulted, which could potentially result in children being given the decision power despite potentially not fully understanding the consequences. So there are some concerns there.

There’s also an issue in and around multiple victims. It is unclear what would happen in the situation where there is intergenerational sexual offending. There are cases where this occurs, where there is a small community in New Zealand where there is a known sexual offender who has committed sexual offending against three generations. There’s been instances where that has occurred. So while some of those older victims of that sexual offending may well want that sexual offender’s name to be made public, there may be younger members who are still at school who have the same last name and don’t want that to occur. So that’s a real concern as to how that would be weighed up, because there’d be some strong views that they should be called out, but as long as the interests of all those victims are being weighed up, we really hope that that occurs. We would really dislike for this to prolong the trauma of sexual violence within our justice system, which is already—as I’ve explained—incredibly traumatic for victims of sexual violence.

The policy process of developing the name suppression amendments in this bill was quite concerning, and part of the reason why this bill has come halfway through this Government’s term, when it was introduced by our Government back in 2023—it is because the Minister of Justice took quite a bit of time to take a look at name suppression and to make those changes. It was held up for close to a year while he did that. So we still have some concerns around that policy process. I felt it was important to put it on the record, about what was the process to arrive at this decision. It’s well and good to say that you support victims and you’re doing this for victims, but we should talk to victims and the people who work alongside of those people and take into account those views.

The officials in their advice to the committee stated that the Minister directed us to consider adding the proposal to the bill that, before the court can grant a permanent name suppression to a person convicted of sexual crime, it must have the agreement of the victim of that crime. They state that: “We did not have access to a fully detailed problem definition.”—this is problematic—“We have discussed the proposal with the Minister to better understand his intention, and to more clearly define the problem. However, we were not able to obtain full context or clarity.” This is after they spoke to him—“We have therefore made some assumptions in our assessment of the proposal.” So it’s great that you’ve clearly done something to help victims, but the officials themselves have stated that this was not done with a clear problem definition.

So, yes, we support this bill, but we have some real concerns that it hasn’t been done with a full, thorough analysis of what the problem is you are solving, which, to be honest, is quite typical of this Government.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. This is a very good piece of legislation, and I would also particularly like to acknowledge the courage of the submitters. I would commend it to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Well, it’s disappointing that we’ve got an important bill here about matters that are important and we’ve got a Government that’s putting this to the House and its members have got fundamentally—Mike Butterick had nothing to say. It’s just really disappointing.

Look, this bill raises difficult and challenging issues. The bill as it was presented to the select committee was relatively straightforward in making it clear that, essentially, consent should never be a defence when there is sex with a child. That’s a good amendment. We entirely support it. Then halfway through the process, an Amendment Paper was introduced and put to select committee, which introduced a pretty significant change. That was what can best be called the right of a veto to name suppression by a victim. At first blush, that looked very like a very good idea; that, if you’re a victim of a sexual offence, you get to choose whether or not the perpetrator gets name suppression. In many cases, that will work and that’s all well and good.

But as Ginny Anderson has just said, life can be a little more complex than that, and when we’ve got multiple victims, some of whom are of age and some who are not, it becomes a lot more complicated. When we’ve got offending across family members, where not all family members accept, sadly, that the perpetrator is the wrongdoer, life becomes a lot more complex. The difficulties, the possibilities of pressure being brought to bear of the victim’s life being made more difficult by this reform is real. We think that this is a blunt approach. We support this bill because overall, in sum, it’s a good reform, but we have reservations around that particular aspect of it.

The other challenge is this: it’s a philosophical challenge in some ways, but it makes the victim the judge in terms of the perpetrator, in that they get to decide what the punishment is, because name suppression or a name being published is recognised as part of the punishment. One of the aspects of the rule of law is that judges decide punishments and that between the victim and the perpetrator we have the State to decide those things, because judges can impartially balance the competing interests of parties in such situations. But this very blunt tool—the right of veto of name suppression that was introduced at a very late stage by the Minister—doesn’t recognise that. It says to the victim, “Well, you decide.” That’s actually a dereliction of duty. The State is not doing its job.

I accept that name suppression rules need work, that we haven’t struck the balance perfectly and that better direction could be given by this House to the courts, but a carte blanche to victims to say “You decide.” is putting the victims actually in a very invidious position. So that’s why we don’t support that part of the bill, but we will be voting in favour of it for the wider purposes.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. It’s a great day that we support across the House this piece of legislation. It’s been a long time coming, as previous speakers spoke about. Therefore, I’d just like to commend it to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to take a call and speak to this very important bill that actually has some history in the House. While I’ve been out of Parliament for 18 months, I do remember the introduction of this bill to the House when it was first introduced in its first iteration, which was that first section or the first part of the bill in regard to the consent issue when it didn’t have the name suppression issue attached to it. But I didn’t leave the issue there when I left the House. I went back into legal practice and I was also involved in a project that was led by the wonderful Hon Anne Tolley and Dr Emily Henderson, who the House will be very familiar with. They, with others, were and are working on a project to identify the gaps in our legislation and policy in regards to sexual violation and sexual assault. Part of what they were working on was consent law reform, and as part of those conversations, we certainly had a lot of feedback on this issue.

So what I’d like to touch on today are the parts of this bill which we do agree with and some suggestions that were made by those who submitted to the select committee. I wasn’t there to receive those submissions, but I’ve read those submissions, some of which, I think, contain some excellent suggestions that the House must turn its mind to in due course. I will also talk about parts of the bill that we disagree with, which the Hon Duncan Webb has spoken to as well.

Part 1 of the bill amends the Crimes Act so that a person cannot be charged with the offence of sexual violation if the victim is under 12 years old. Instead, the charge would be sexual connection with a child, and this would, as other speakers have said, reduce the risk that a child must undergo questioning about sexual consent while giving evidence in court. The bill would also increase the maximum penalty for the offence of sexual connection with a child to align with that for sexual violation.

There are many submissions on the bill that reference the need for the bill and HELP Auckland is one of those submissions where they talk about research from the office of the Chief Victims Advisor in the report called That’s a Lie, which demonstrates that some defence lawyers have accused children of having consented in spite of presentations to the contrary, and that kind of questioning and accusation can obviously have quite serious consequences for the young person. So we do support that section of the bill.

However, HELP Auckland and YouthLaw Aotearoa also mention in their submission that there is a gap in terms of this particular issue. The YouthLaw submission says, “As a related issue we have concerns about consent still being argued in relation to young people between the ages of 12 and 15, particularly in cases like R v Christian which involved a teenage girl and a significantly older man. The maximum penalty for sexual connection with a young person is still 10 years, so that’s half of that for sexual violation under section 128(B)(1), which means that those young people in that higher age group can still be questioned about consent.”

I think that some of the submitters acknowledge that there is a policy question here in terms of young people who might be in a relationship with someone who’s just slightly older than them but older than the statutory bar, and that it is something that may involve the need for police discretion in terms of which charge is more appropriate. However, it is important for the House to consider that issue, which hasn’t been addressed in this bill.

The other issue that was raised by YouthLaw in their submission was the proposing of a review of consent more broadly and looking toward adopting a positive definition of “consent”. Now, this isn’t a new issue for us in the House. It was something that was actually raised in 2019 in a Cabinet paper on improving the justice response to victims. It was also a submission that came to the 53rd Parliament though the petition of Layba Zubair, who presented to us along with a number of experts. She was interesting. She didn’t argue for a precise change; she argued that we needed to consider whether the law of consent needed to change or not. I would certainly argue that it’s timely that the House starts to look at that.

There is an academic called Anna Hide, who is working with the Hon Anne Tolley and Dr Emily Henderson on this project, and she argues for consent law reform so that we have proactive consent. She talks in some of her writings about the fact that, in case law, judges are more willing to accept that you need proactive consent for the most part. However, we have the case of R v Christian, which, on appeal, the Supreme Court declined to read an affirmative consent standard and they said that being passive plus an X factor meant that consent could be presumed. At this time, I’m sure the Government members listening are wondering what that X factor could be. Horrifyingly, it can be that you have a history of being in a relationship with the person. So you can imagine in circumstances of domestic violence that if this were to come up in front of the court, we still at least have some case law where silence plus X, plus something like being in a relationship, could be seen as consent. So my sense is that there have been some really valuable submissions, not only on specific issues on the bill but what the bill doesn’t cover in terms of this area of sexual assault, as well.

I just want to turn briefly to the Labour members’ dissenting view, and Dr Duncan Webb has covered this in detail, but I wanted to recognise the submission of the Law Society which raised very valid concerns about the rule of law. They actually very helpfully made some proposals for a residual discretion where the judge could still exercise discretion to grant name suppression. My colleague Helen White proposed during the committee stage quite a narrow residual discretion on the basis of some of what the Law Society said. She proposed that where the identification could result in hardship or danger to the family of the victim, including whether sexual offending has occurred within the family, or where the identification could result in hardship or danger to the family of the offender, there ought still to be some residual discretion.

I was a little bit alarmed that the Government members didn’t really seem to be considering those very valid residual options that had a focus squarely on the victim. They were not the full set of proposals that the Law Society had suggested. They were focused very squarely on the victim and actually also on the offender’s family. But I thought that they were very helpful, very pragmatic suggestions that, unfortunately, were discounted.

Interestingly, some of the submitters who work in the sexual violence space also believe—well, some of them—that there should be some flexibility in this space, and I’d encourage members who have an interest to go back and read HELP’s submissions. They proposed changes such as that for young people under 16 who are complainants in those circumstances there should be automatic name suppression and that they should be able to decide later down the track, because they would face, potentially, a lot of pressure in those circumstances. Of course, as my colleague Ginny Andersen has said, where there are multiple victims that can also be a valid space for there to be residual discretion.

Finally, I just suggest to the House that this is one of those issues where it may be well worth our time to return to some of these issues in due course and just really be sure that they are working, that they are fit for purpose, and that those who are working on the front line truly believe they’re serving the needs of complainants but are also fair in terms of the rule of law.

I’m the last person to speak in the third reading of this bill, the Victims of Sexual Violence (Strengthening Legal Protections) Legislation Bill; a bill that really tugged at many of our heartstrings as we listened to the submissions and we considered what so many of our tamariki have had to go through in the past. This is a child-protection-first - approach bill. This is a victim-protection-first - approach bill, and I commend this bill to the House.

Kia ora, Mr Speaker. I rise as a member of the Labour Party who has worked extensively in this space to ensure that good legislation is brought to this House, to ensure the empowerment and also the voices of victims of sexual violence, as has been traversed from my colleagues on this side of the House, in terms of how this came to being in this Parliament from the previous term, and as our conversations have been had over the evening, through the committee stage, through the select committee stage, around the importance of traversing the complexities of what can be done in terms of supporting victims of sexual violence and strengthening legal protections.

Now, we have an issue in this country when it comes to sexual violence, and we need to continue working on that and we need to continue fighting that. This legislation is something that takes us a step closer and further to a nation that does what is right by victims but also doesn’t allow sexual violence to be something that’s ever condoned or accepted, but also ensuring that it’s not just something that’s hidden away, which often can be done when it comes sometimes in families who protect family members, when it comes to things like name suppression. We can do better, and I’m glad to be part of a mostly robust and engaging Parliament and lawmaking community that can actually make changes for the betterment of victims.

As I was looking through the legislation and thinking about what I could say this evening, it’s interesting to look at the changes that are being made. So we look at Part 1, that would amend the Crimes Act 1961. Think about that just in terms of the dates and what has happened and changed since the 1960s. We live in different times and this place should always be a place that is always moving and stretching and keeping up with what modern society is doing. So the fact that this legislation would amend the Crimes Act 1961 so that the offence of sexual violation cannot be charged if the victim is under 12 years old—instead, the charge would be sexual connection with a child.

Now, this would reduce the risk that a child must undergo questioning about sexual consent while giving evidence in court. We know that there’s been a track record in this country when it’s come to this process with under-12s. So it is good to make some moves and move forward in this space. The bill would also increase the maximum penalty for the offence of sexual connection with a child to align with that for sexual violation, and that is a good thing.

Secondly, as we look at Part 2, that other colleagues have talked about, it’s around amending legislation from 2011. When I was looking at that and thinking back to the culture and the time of 2011, I think of social media and the difference that time was to now, and the fact that social media was something in 2011, but it was something that was far less and far more engaged than it is now. So the fact that we look at legislation like the Criminal Procedure Act 2011, which relates to name suppression, it is a good thing for us to look at working on and changing.

It’s around protecting victims. It’s around protecting their privacy, while supporting also their autonomy to have name suppression lifted if they wish. I think that is important for us to sit with: that a victim has a choice and a victim has a voice. Being someone who’s worked in this space with offenders and victims over the years, I know the fact that to have a voice and to be able to speak up as part of the healing, part of working through trauma, is the fact that you have the power restored in you.

So my colleagues have spoken about some of the challenges that we had through the select committee stage around things that we thought could be done better to improve this. But, on the whole, we think it is a good step forward for this House and for this country, and, therefore, I commend this bill to the House.

Motion agreed to.

Bill read a third time.