Courts and Criminal Matters Bill

If I have not already moved the motion, I move, That the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill be now read a second time. This bill updates and improves a number of aspects of the law relating to the enforcement of fines and civil debts. It will significantly improve the Ministry of Justice’s capability to enforce unpaid fines.

The Law and Order Committee has recommended a number of very worthwhile improvements to the bill, and I would like to thank the members of the select committee for their contribution. In particular, I would like to thank the very hard-working and excellent chair of the select committee, Martin Gallagher, who I know has put a tremendous amount of good work into this bill and has been somewhat frustrated by its process, and I commend him for his tolerance. Further substantial changes to the law relating to fines enforcement result from a comprehensive review of the infringement and fines systems now being undertaken.

This present bill largely relates to technical improvements to existing processes. There is, however, one very important new policy issue implemented by the bill, which is to have enforcement of fines at airports. Currently, most fines defaulters are able to leave New Zealand permanently, or leave and re-enter the country, without this being brought to the attention of the Ministry of Justice collections units. This situation is completely unacceptable and undermines the credibility of the fines sentence. Parts 2, 4, and 6 of the bill therefore create an arrangement allowing the Ministry of Justice to compare its database of serious fines defaulters with the databases of the Customs Service and the Immigration Service of people travelling in or out of the country. This will enable alerts to be triggered when serious fines defaulters enter or leave New Zealand at an international airport. The serious fines defaulters will be intercepted at the airport and given the opportunity to pay their fine, or they will be arrested.

Restriction of airport interception for the most serious defaulters will minimise the potential to inconvenience other travellers. The definition of serious fines default given in clauses 7 and 15 was, however, amended by the select committee to include anyone who owes any amount of reparation, in addition to anyone owing at least $1,000 in unpaid fines. That change does not have a serious impact in terms of the volumes of persons likely to be intercepted, but it means that nobody who is in default in payment of reparation to a victim of his or her offending will be able to leave the country undetected. I think that is a good amendment, and I support it wholeheartedly. The bill also allows for the threshold in relation to fines to be reduced by Order in Council, and the Government will review that threshold in the light of experience in the implementation of the legislation.

Clauses 7 and 15 were amended by the Law and Order Committee to limit the exemption from liability afforded to the Crown in respect of fines enforcements action taken against the traveller. The committee was concerned that the provisions as originally drafted would suggest that an innocent person who was wrongly detained would not be entitled to recover loss and damages. The redrafted provisions exempt the Crown from liability only in relation to third parties, such as airlines and other passengers, and then only when the actions were taken in good faith and did not result from gross negligence.

Other changes made by the select committee include those made to clause 26, which redrafts section 78B of the Summary Proceedings Act to clarify the range of situations in which irregularities and infringement proceedings can be corrected by the courts. This section is quite complex, owing to the range of situations needing to be covered and the requirement to be fair to defendants whilst not affording undue opportunities to obstruct the infringement enforcement process on purely technical grounds. It was substantially expanded and reworded at the select committee stage, and some additional clarifying amendments will be proposed in a Supplementary Order Paper.

Clause 27 was also significantly expanded by the select committee. The original intention of this provision was to ensure that fines defaulters who are paying off fines or reparation by instalments and who experience a substantial financial windfall, or who are found to have given misleading information when entering into a payment arrangement, take responsibility for paying off the fines or reparation as soon as practicable. Currently, a fines defaulter who is meeting agreed instalment payments cannot be required to increase them, even if it comes to the ministry’s attention that his or her circumstances have improved dramatically. Clause 27 therefore enables a registrar to take the initiative to vary the amounts payable under agreement. New subsections (2) and (3), inserted by the select committee in response to submissions, also empower a registrar to take steps to amend a time to pay or attachment order, in order to take account of an additional fine. This will avoid the need for the person to enter into a completely new arrangement for a new fine.

The select committee has also added a new amendment to section 88(3) of the Summary Proceedings Act. This relates to the use of charging orders against the property of fines defaulters. This is a civil enforcement mechanism that is not cost-effective unless the amount owed is relatively large. The committee concluded, however, that the current threshold in the Act for use of such orders is too high at $10,000. The Government agrees that this should be reduced to $5,000. A number of further minor, technical amendments to the Summary Proceedings Act have been incorporated in the bill by the select committee. These include, for example, provisions to sections 88 and 91 of the Act to enable warrants for the arrest of fines defaulters or the seizure of their goods to be in the form of a computer printout. The Supplementary Order Paper will include technical improvements of this nature, aimed at increasing efficiency of the enforcement proceedings.

The National Party in Opposition believes that this bill is a wasted opportunity to deal with the growing mountain of court and reparation debt in this country. That mountain of debt is now over $600 million, and, in fact, the vast majority of that $600 million is overdue. So the mountain of debt, owed by criminals and those who have been fined up and down the country, is escalating on a level that is unbelievable. The Law and Order Committee’s own report states that the total debt in June 2003 was $500 million. In less than 2 years, it has grown to $600 million. So a lot more action is needed to deal with this mountain of debt.

Why should we be worried about the mountain of debt? For a number of reasons. This debt has come because many people have been punished for their offending and have been fined, and they are not paying. They have not faced up to their accountabilities. It gets worse, because in the last year, under Labour’s law, $40 million of those fines have been wiped. The suffering of the victims could not be wiped. We should also be concerned because there is a growing mountain of debt owed to the victims of crime in New Zealand. Those reparations are going uncollected.

What can be done? If the Government were truly serious about dealing with the mountain of debt owed by fines defaulters in this country, it would improve the level of information sharing between the Inland Revenue Department, the Ministry of Social Development, and the Ministry of Justice. But there are constraints on the information that can be provided in order to locate those fines defaulters, and those constraints need to be removed. Those who are being denied justice—the victims and the Crown—deserve to get their money.

The Government promotes this bill as some great new device to collect debts from fines defaulters. [Interruption] The Minister says, “Yes, it is too.” Let me look at the numbers. Wait for this. Do members remember that when the Minister introduced this bill, he said it would be really tough on fines defaulters who left the country from airports? We asked the officials how many people would be stopped at airports by a warrant for arrest for being a fines defaulter. A hundred? Several hundred? Several thousand? The answer was 35.

Lindsay Tisch: How many?

Hon TONY RYALL: It was 35. The Government introduced a bill that it said would crack down on fines defaulters leaving from airports. The number of people to be affected? It was 35, not 3,500 or 35,000. There is a $600 million mountain of debt, and Rick Barker’s bill for fixing it means that 35 people will be stopped at airports. That is tough. It is about as tough as Phil Goff’s sentencing bill. Thirty-five people would be stopped at airports.

So the Government majority on the select committee acquiesced and decided to toughen up the bill. The Opposition party members said that surely we should be serious about this. If people can afford overseas airfares, which start at $189 with conditions, they can afford to pay their fines. So the Government reduced the threshold. The Opposition parties—National, New Zealand First, and United Future—said we should go further and make it work, but the Government said that it would drop down the threshold, in this get-tough bill, to a fine of $5,000 and a warrant for arrest.

Let me go through the numbers. There is $600 million of debt owed. Well over $350 million, I believe, is overdue. The Government says it will stop people going out of the country, through the airports, and will save money for New Zealand victims and the justice system. What did the officials say? They said that the bill as amended will stop 117 people at airports.

That is how many people will be stopped at airports, according to this bill. That is all—117 will be stopped at airports. Do members know how much the officials said would be saved by this bill—how much would be collected? It is $1.5 million.

Lindsay Tisch: How much?

Hon TONY RYALL: It is $1.5 million. We have a growing mountain of debt in this country—$600 million; it could even be higher with the way that this Government has dishonestly hidden the Kyoto Protocol stuff—and this Government has brought in a bill to tackle the debt owed by fines defaulters that will collect $1.5 million. That is 0.25 percent of the debt owed by fines defaulters in this country. What a wasted opportunity.

When the Opposition parties said that we should improve the information regime and get all the addresses, phone numbers, workplace information, and personal details of fines defaulters so that we could go after them, that we should lower the threshold at which we will stop people at international airports so that we can actually get the money, and that we should back the call centres and look at the efficiencies of the Ministry of Justice’s collections systems, what did the Government say? It said it would get tough, with a bill that will stop 117 people from leaving the country and collect less than 0.25 percent of the fines owed in this country.

That does not deal with the problem. We have to get that debt mountain down, because it is money that is owed to victims of crime or is a punishment for offending. It is money that could be used elsewhere in the State sector to improve the quality of public services and to provide benefits for New Zealanders. That is what the money could be used for. The Government is not taking the issue seriously. This bill is a wasted opportunity. The Government could have brought in changes to information sharing. It could have brought in much tougher criteria for people leaving the country, if they owe fines. It could have provided improved resources for the Ministry of Justice’s collections systems. But instead we have some flim-flam that will stop 117 people at the airports and collect less than 0.25 percent of the debt mountain owed by fines defaulters in this country.

It is not a lot. In itself, $1.5 million is a lot of money, but as a proportion, 0.25 percent of the $600 million owed by fines defaulters in New Zealand is hardly worth the effort. But we tell this Government to take the opportunity during the Committee stage to move amendments that will improve information sharing, lower the thresholds at which we can stop people at international airports, and improve the collections systems of the Ministry of Justice. I guarantee the Government that it will get 120 votes in favour of those changes.

Hon Dr Michael Cullen: Can’t guarantee it.

Hon TONY RYALL: Well, I cannot essentially guarantee it, but I would expect to see 120 votes in favour of those changes. That is the point.

Government members should wipe the grin off their face, especially in light of a poll that will be coming out in the next 3 days. For them to stand up in Parliament and say that they will get tough on 117 fines defaulters is hopeless.

As chair of the Law and Order Committee, I will be gracious and thank all the members of the committee for their hard work on the bill. I cannot conceal my disappointment in terms of the previous contribution and its negativity, but I acknowledge that all members of the committee did a lot of hard work on this bill. I thank in particular the deputy chair, Marc Alexander, and I also acknowledge my colleague Ron Mark and the Government members—Georgina Beyer, Ann Hartley, and Mahara Okeroa—for the work they did. I want to pick up and re-emphasise the main points of this bill. I will take only a very short call, because we have a long way to go. The Leader of the House will be most comforted by the fact that I will take a short call, because I anticipate much debate in the Committee stage and at the subsequent third reading.

Basically, in summary, as the Minister has said, this bill updates and improves a number of aspects of the law relating to the enforcement of fines and civil debts. It will significantly improve the Ministry of Justice’s capacity to enforce and collect unpaid fines. As has been detailed, I believe that our committee has recommended a number of very worthwhile improvements to the bill. I note also that the Minister, in his address to the House, noted that further substantial changes to the law relating to fines enforcement will result from a comprehensive review of the infringement fines system that is now being undertaken by the Ministry of Justice in conjunction with the Law Commission. A discussion document was issued last year that outlined the issues being addressed in the review. A number of very useful submissions have been received, and the Minister will make further announcements about the progress of that review in the near future. It will be a comprehensive review, with comprehensive submissions—not the sort of 30-second sound bite - type of contribution that was made by the previous speaker.

We will be talking during this debate about the ability of airports to intercept significant fines defaulters, and about where the reasonable line is. If a person owes 20 or 30 bucks for a parking ticket and is going for a week or so to the Gold Coast, will he or she get zapped and pulled out of the passenger queue for that? Where is the reasonable line? I anticipate debate about where that line should be, and also about the need for flexibility as cost of living indices change over time.

I want to highlight perhaps one area and then I will sit down, because I know we will have a long session on this bill. That issue relates to the visit made by the select committee last year to Australia, as part of a parliamentary exchange. I note that the bill does not provide for a reciprocal information-sharing policy with Australia, in terms of targeting New Zealand fines defaulters who are now resident in Australia. But, as a select committee, we continue to have an ongoing interest in the ministry’s efforts to target New Zealand fines defaulters who live overseas, especially in Australia. That is a difficult and complex area to address, but in our view the bill provides a good starting place. It targets people with fines owing who are leaving New Zealand for Australia, and we strongly encourage the ministry to continue to look at ways to collect outstanding fines that can be linked to New Zealanders who live in Australia. If someone escapes from a custodial sentence, he or she can be extradited back across the Tasman for crimes attracting custodial sentences. But, quite frankly, if someone who has huge fines outstanding here is living in Darwin or Perth, or vice versa—if someone who lives in Taumarunui comes from Perth, or wherever else in Australia—then we need to look at better reciprocal arrangements. The select committee observed, when we visited Australia, that even the interstate arrangements were not as perfect as they could be. There is more work in progress that needs to be done.

I will be taking further calls later in this debate. I take the opportunity now to thank the committee for its hard work, and I look forward to the passage of this bill.

I call the honourable Ron Mark.

You must be clairvoyant, Madam Speaker—or be looking at the election poll results that are coming through now. Thank you for that compliment. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak on this bill.

Lindsay Tisch: Say that again.

RON MARK: I said that Madam Speaker must be clairvoyant or must have just been reading the polls. I appreciate the compliment, although I am not an “honourable” yet.

What can I say? Out of 10 points, being really generous on this Friday, I would give the Government—

Hon Paul Swain: Give us a C pass.

RON MARK: I would give a National Certificate of Educational Achievement pass—whatever that is worth these days—to Minister Swain, but I would say: “Nice try.” As they used to say, “nice try” meant: tried hard, meant well, but failed, and probably the army description of what we have here is: “This soldier tried hard, meant well, but failed.”

Once again, Mr Barker is proving to this House that if he is the best man the Government can find in its caucus for this job, then God help Martin Gallagher’s mum and dad! We over here would say that Martin Gallagher is far more competent and capable than that pathetic Minister Mr Barker. Members should remember that this is the Minister who, when New Zealand First asked how many violent criminals were on home detention, stood in this House and said there were no violent offenders on home detention. But what did New Zealand First table? In answer to a written question we tabled his own department’s statement that rapists, child-beaters, thugs, murderers, andwife-beaters—any piece of scum that could be found on the bottom of a shoe—were on home detention. This is the same man who brought this bill to the Law and Order Committee to “get tough on fines”.

Mr Barker is the man who runs around the country boasting about his “confiscated car club” and “name shame” campaigns. The money recovered through the procedures in this bill will not pay for even the advertising in the “name shame” campaign. It will not pay for the advertising in the “confiscated car club” campaign. He is running up a deficit already, and God forbid what we would find if we tallied up how many hours Parliament—the select committee and the House—has spent on this bill. Opposition MPs have been trying their level best to assist him. He has accepted some advice, but the guts of the advice he has been offered has been rejected.

I remind the House that on 14 May 2003 New Zealand First first started asking questions about outstanding fines. On 14 May 2003 we lodged written questions asking what the level of outstanding fines was and what brackets we were talking about. We got the most amazing answer—something like $450 million was owed in outstanding fines, with some young punks out there owing up to $90,000. This Government has been trying to promote itself in the eyes of the public as being fiscally prudent, frugal, and a good manager of the economy. What Government in its right mind would allow some boy-racer punk to run up $90,000 worth of fines and then—worse still—would allow the court, which has not been able to collect those fines, to write off the lot in return for 400 hours’ community service?

One of those young punks was getting paid $140 an hour for not turning up to community service and for not doing the work he was supposed to do, because he did not pay the fines that had been imposed on him by the courts, which the courts could not recover—so everybody gave up, put him back in the courts again, and gave him community service. That is ridiculous—and they call this the smart Government!

This Government is full of academics, professors, and all sorts of people who like to teach people, and to tell them how to live their lives. It is the original “nancy State” Government. But what does it do with boy racers who flout the law—who undermine the very integrity of the judicial system and the law enforcement process by gaily clocking up heaps of fines, then thumbing their noses at the police and the courts, and walking away from it all? The level of interdiction in this bill would only target 117 people and recover $1.5 million—less than a quarter of 1 per cent of the sum of outstanding fines. That is pathetically inadequate.

What did New Zealand First say? New Zealand First said that the Government must get tough. Anyone with an outstanding fine should not be going on holiday to Queensland or Bondi, or spending Christmas in Fiji, until the fine is cleared. How are victims of bashing, burglary, or car conversion expected to feel when they see their offenders getting on board planes to go to Bondi? It is ridiculous.

Hon Tony Ryall: Well, don’t ring 111.

RON MARK: If they ring 111 they will only get a cab. But they will not get a cab to Bondi—they will be told that.

The ridiculous thing about this bill is that we had a prime window of opportunity to go out and grab defaulters by the throat. But the real rub is that this Government is responsible for boosting the level of unpaid fines, because it runs a quota ticketing system aimed not at boy racers but at nana and granddad. It is aimed at recovering fines clocked up by people like an elderly pensioner, who was driving too fast to get to church on Sunday because she thought she would be late, down High Street in Rangiora where the highway patrol was sitting looking for the big-time speeders. Those police were not in Queen Street at 2 o’clock in the morning when the hoons were burning out their tyres at the intersection, but they were there to catch nana going to church. They gave her a fine but, because nana is on a pension, she cannot afford to pay it. So where is the outstanding fine? It is sitting against nana’s name.

Instead of targeting the hoons—the recidivist offenders who clock up $60,000 or $90,000 worth of fines—by locking them up, by grabbing them at the airport, and by sharing all the information held by the Inland Revenue Department and Work and Income within the Ministry of Social Development so that the courts can find the little beggars, the Government latches on to nana, because it knows her address. She is a law-abiding citizen. Her name is on the electoral roll. They can find her at the snap of a finger. But the people who cause this mountain of debt are those who deliberately go out to undermine the judicial system and the integrity of our law enforcement system by hiding themselves away.

That issue was the one issue that came through very loud and clear from all the submissions. The biggest problem the courts have, the reason they cannot collect these fines, is that they cannot find the offenders. But I tell members that Baycorp can. Baycorp has far better resources and far greater capability to find those people, who now owe some $600 million worth of outstanding fines. With $600 million we could buy another 105 LAV IIIs. We could pay half the Kyoto Protocol carbon tax bill with that. We could do goodness knows how many hip or cataract operations with that.

But no, this Government says we cannot give the courts the information held by the Inland Revenue Department or Work and Income. At the airport we cannot stop people who are going on holiday to Hawaii and collect the $10,000 they owe—or the $5,000 or the $1,000. It is ridiculous, absurd, and nonsensical.

By its very actions in failing to accept New Zealand First’s recommendations, this Government is undermining its own ability to enforce the law. It is undermining the integrity of the police who issue the infringement notices, the integrity of the prosecutors, the integrity of the courts, and the integrity of the collections officers who are trying to get the money. It is wasting everybody’s bloody time.

It is time this Government went if it does not have the gumption, the sense, the brains, or the intelligence to recognise one simple fact: to collect fines, the courts need information. The information resides with the Inland Revenue Department, Work and Income New Zealand, and with the banking industry of this country. If the Government cannot recognise that Baycorp can collect those fines while the Government itself cannot, then I give up—and no doubt so will the rest of the country as soon as the election is called.

I rise on behalf of ACT New Zealand to speak to the second reading of the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill. This bill purports to get tough on the collection of fines and civil debt, yet according to the speeches that we have just heard from the National Party member and the New Zealand First member, that will not happen; this bill just does not do the job. The ACT party did not have a member on the Law and Order Committee that saw this bill, but we feel very strongly about this issue. I want to join the previous speakers in calling on the Government to get tough on the people who commit these crimes, so that they pay their fines.

The basic problem with crime and fines in this country is that we have crimes that people do not really consider to be the result of illegal action.

The size of the fines in this country is arbitrary in many cases. Certainly, many of the fines do not seem to fit the offence that has been committed. The result, of course, is that the wealthy just write out a cheque and forget about what they have done, while those who do not have such substantial means simply do not pay their fines. In fact, in many cases, they have absolutely no chance of paying, so the fine goes unpaid. We have all heard any number of examples of the traffic offences of young boy racers in particular who clock up one fine after another that they never pay.

The difficulty when people commit crimes that do not seem to be the result of illegal activity is that the message is all wrong. The fines are in place to try to dissuade people from repeating what they have just done. But we have seen that there is no dissuasion in a situation where people are just able to write out a cheque that means nothing to them. Alternatively, for those who do not pay, or who have absolutely no means of paying their fines as they mount up, there is also no dissuasion from committing that same offence again. So we get repeat activity after repeat activity. The message that that sends to people is that they can just go out there and break the law, and keep on doing what they are doing. The only people who pay fines in the country are the law-abiding, because we know where they live.

Hon Tony Ryall: And they’re honest.

HEATHER ROY: Yes, they are honest. They admit to the fact that they owe that money.

I am very grateful to the National Party member Mr Tony Ryall for pointing out some of the facts that I did not know because I did not have the benefit of being on the Law and Order Committee. I think that the people of New Zealand should know those facts. Before we set off through the select committee process, the officials’ advice was that 35 people would be affected by the legislation. But after the select committee process, and after a few amendments were made—not very many and none that were tough—I am told that a staggering 117 people will be stopped at the airport at a cost, according to Mr Ryall, of 0.25 percent of the total amount of debt that we have at the moment. There is $1.5 million saved as a result of the bill. What has the bill cost the taxpayer to date? More than $1.5 million, I would contend, when one considers the cost of the officials, the cost of members of Parliament, and the associated administrative costs. I would say that we are already in a net loss situation with the bill. We have to ask ourselves why we are proceeding with it. It is, of course, because there is a message to send to people.

The bill is in two parts: the first relates specifically to the policy proposal to apprehend fines defaulters at airports; and the second focuses on fines enforcement proposals and amendments. In actual fact, there is an argument in respect of stopping people at the borders—which nobody has raised so far—that we might actually be doing the country a favour if we did not stop those 117 people at the borders. We should, perhaps, pay their fare to Australia, or wherever it is that they are going, and let them incur further debts in the country they go to. There is no reciprocal arrangement, and if we look a bit further through the commentary we come to the point that the bill does not provide for a reciprocal information-sharing policy with Australia.

That is an extraordinarily disappointing outcome of the select committee process. The committee said that it would like to have seen this. It has not happened. People, no matter what fine they have incurred, should be liable for it. They should be chased until that fine is paid. Until that sort of action is taken and adhered to rigidly, people will be encouraged to keep on committing offences because there is no requirement, in practical terms, to pay up. The idea of picking up a few people at airports—we are told that 117 is the estimate—is ridiculous in the greater scheme of things.

It was interesting to look at the comments of my colleague Muriel Newman. In her first reading speech, she was quoting 2001 figures. On 1 May 2003 there were $487 million of unpaid fines, $314 million of which were overdue. Fortunately, the select committee must have been given updated information, because we now know that on 30 June 2003 there was a total of $500 million, by 31 May 2004 the figure was $572 million, and now, others tell me, that figure has risen to above $600 million. I suspect it is much greater than that, because that last figure, $572 million, was from over a year ago, and we have heard this week about Kyoto Protocol underestimations—there are probably underestimations in every department that we are looking at. So the total is $600 million, and a large proportion of that is overdue.

It is always distressing to see fines being wiped. Fines are clocked up, with no requirement to pay, and when they are absolutely beyond the means of the individual, they are suddenly wiped. We have heard this morning that $40 million has been wiped from the over $600 million of debt that now exists. When people break the law they should be punished, they should be fined, and they should pay up. We need legislation in this country that allows the enforcement of this. I am afraid to say that this legislation just does not do it. I join with my colleagues on this side of the House to say that this legislation is a wasted opportunity to get on top of the growing mountain of debt that has proliferated under this Government.

The commentary goes on to state that the bill “allows a formal information-sharing regime to be established between the ministry, the Customs, and the Department of Labour,”, and quite rightly so. I do not know quite why we had to go to the select committee to allow this to happen. I see that there are amendments to the Privacy Act, which, I presume, are put in place so that this information sharing can happen. It should not be just an informal thing; it must be formal so that each department has the opportunity to share information that they know about individuals, particularly if people are going to be picked up at airports—even if there are only 117 of them. I suppose we should all be very grateful that it has increased in size from the 35 that we originally thought.

Further on, the commentary states that the monetary threshold for information sharing has increased. The amended definition of “serious default” was previously $1,000 owing. It now seems that any amount owing will be able to be collected. I hope that is the case.

Hon Tony Ryall: Only of reparation.

HEATHER ROY: But only of reparation, I am now told. So those powers need to be much more wide sweeping.

ACT New Zealand would like to see rigorous debate in the Committee stage. It is not, of course, too late to see some tough amendments put in place so that the right message is sent to those people who commit offences, and who then think that there is no point in paying them back because nobody will make them. We want to see provisions made for the improved collection of fines, and, very important, we would like to see reciprocal information-sharing, especially with Australia, so that it is not possible just to hop on a plane. A person may not be one of the 117 who are caught, but gets through and suddenly is scot-free until he or she comes back to the country. That is perfectly unacceptable.

We need to take into account the rights of victims. What about the victims in all of this? I have been having a quick read through the bill and I cannot see anything about victims here. It is very important that they are considered, and it is certainly not fair that they are left with the consequences for a long time, but those who created the offences are not.

I rise on behalf of United Future to address the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill. I guess I am a little more positive about the bill in at least one sense: it is baby steps, it points the nose in the right direction, and it at least does something. Nevertheless, it is a wasted opportunity, as a lot of the previous speakers have said, and it could have been a lot tougher. But, to be perfectly honest, when compared with what we had previously, it is a hell of a way forward. I can see amendments coming down the track very soon, when the anticipated results of this legislation fall far short of what the expectations might have been, but at least the early building blocks are there to push us in the right direction.

Interestingly enough, I do not think the bill is really meant to make any major changes in the fines enforcement processes; rather, it is intended to refine and update the existing system. That is a pity, because the bill could have been much, much more than it is. The fact is—and some people have already commented on this—that most fines defaulters, when they have fines or reparation orders to pay, are able to leave New Zealand permanently, or are able to leave and re-enter the country, without being brought to the attention of anyone. It is a blight on our criminal justice system that people can effectively escape the punishment that was imposed upon them, in such a frivolous manner. Members have raised the idea of people hopping on board a plane and going over for a weekend to Bondi, while owing thousands of dollars in reparation to victims they have ripped off, hurt, or victimised previously. That is an affront but, unfortunately, if we look at the prison system, we see that things are not much better there, either. Where is the accountability? If a person does manage eventually to get into prison, that person will serve only one-third of the sentence before being up for parole, and in a sense what we have seen is a mirroring of exactly that inadequacy when it comes to reparations and fines.

There is a provision to enhance information sharing—to improve the existing information-matching and information-sharing arrangements between the Ministry of Justice, the Inland Revenue Department, and the Ministry of Social Development—and one wonders why that was not addressed earlier and in a wider sense. I admit that it probably would lie outside the scope of this legislation, but there is no reason why other areas of crime ought not to be equally covered and given some legislative teeth. We have a range of criminals in this country who, seemingly at will, can walk away from their punishments. We witnessed just recently the case of a sex offender, the paedophile in Blackball, who went there without his parole conditions allowing him to do so. What happened to him? Nothing! He was told that he was not allowed to go there or to be there under the provisions of his parole conditions, but nothing was done. He just simply walked away, with no punishment. And we see again that same attitude demonstrated right throughout the criminal justice system—a lackadaisical attitude towards the enforcement of punishment.

The problem is that we find that people learn from each other. They learn that if others get fines or punishments and they do not fulfil their obligations, nothing happens—they get away with it.

Brian Connell: It’s not very tough, is it?

MARC ALEXANDER: It is not tough, at all. In fact, just as an aside, I tell members that I did a bit of research on the tough law and order policies of this Government, because the Government claimed that the Sentencing Act of 2002 would keep more people in jail. In fact, the average length of prison terms has increased by only 6 months. How is that tougher? Ninety-two percent of the population said that they wanted there to be tougher sentencing and harsher conditions in prison. Those people wanted punishment to be brought back into the penal system, but what has happened? This Government has turned round and slapped them in the face, by saying that it will up the time offenders spend in prison by an average of 6 pathetic, measly months. And can members guess what? The rate of violence in this country has escalated astronomically, all out of kilter with the extra 6 months in prison that prisoners actually receive.

Hon Tony Ryall: They serve only 2 months of it.

MARC ALEXANDER: That is probably right. But I come back to the bill.

One wonders why, if the information-sharing provision is to expedite the tracking of defaulters, it has not been expanded and enhanced for other areas of crime, such as rent arrears, benefit fraud, and victim reparations. The Inland Revenue Department seems to be the one instrument of this Government that is tenacious. It will go after people whether they are in a hospital bed or even, I dare say, if they are 6 feet under. Even if people are cremated, the Inland Revenue Department will be after them, because that department has the long-fingered hand of the Minister of Finance. The red that Labour wears so proudly is the blood of taxpayers, and the long fingers of Cullen are everywhere. They go into the pockets of ordinary New Zealanders and pick those pockets, with no sense of shame whatsoever. Yet if a person commits a crime, he or she gets a wet bus ticket. People who commit crimes get reparation orders and fines, but they can walk away—nothing happens. That is sad.

The Hon Tony Ryall pointed out that $600 million is owed in fines and reparation orders, and that over half of that is overdue. That is an additional cost, over and above that of the original offending, and it is borne by the victims and the law-abiding alike. Who ends up having to pay for the agencies that have to go after those individuals? Well, it is us, the law-abiding and the victims, while the offenders walk away and very little is done about that. The fines and reparation orders are unenforceable punishments. They represent justice that is denied, because the point of them is that they are actually a punishment. But those people walk away, to the tune of the $600 million that is still owed. If those people get away with that, what does that say about the force of law? There is no point in passing legislation in this House that tries to grasp some idea of what the criminal justice system should be about, and then not enforcing it. It is a paper tiger; it is toothless and a waste of time.

The issue goes to the very nature of punishment and respect for the law—something that is increasingly lacking amongst those who are lawless. When Government members stand up and argue they have had a drop in crime of 4 percent, of 2 percent, of 1 percent, or of whatever it may be, I say that is not really good enough. Violent crime rates are going up. In fact, I was given an email—and I do not know how true this is—stating that the only crime that had gone down by 100 percent was in the electorate of the Hon Paul Swain, and it was in an interesting but dubious form of animal husbandry. That says just about everything regarding the law and order approach of this country.

The effect of this bill, as somebody else has pointed out, is that 117 people will be stopped at airports. That is not a helluva lot. I dare say, though, that if there is a positive side, it will be that a few more people, knowing this law is in effect, may actually front up and pay some of the money that is owing. It will not be many people, but some will—in the same way that the threat of publishing names in newspapers brings people out of the woodwork, and gets their hands into their pockets to pay some of the fines they owe. But those people tend to be the easy ones, the ones who are basically lawful, anyway. It is the other ones we really need to target, and we are not doing very well in that area.

We can see where the emphasis in this legislation lies, however. This legislation is all about trying to be tough, trying to go after some money, and trying to enforce the law. But the point is that it does try—it is a step in the right direction. The legislation takes baby steps, but it is something we have to support, because at least it is in the right direction and sends the right signal. However, much more needs to be done, and the legislation needs to be much tougher than it presently is.

I seek the leave of the House to table a press release dated 28 May 2003, entitled “Kiwis rack up huge traffic fines”, which shows that 556 people owed over $10,000.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is objection.

I seek the leave of the House to table another document dated 2 May 2003, entitled “Quota ticketing is a fishy business”, highlighting the fact that a gentleman owed over $30,000 in outstanding fines, so the Government is wasting its time by chasing ordinary people.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is objection.

I welcome the chance to rise in this Parliament at midday, on Friday, to speak in support of the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill. I must say that any bill that has been sired by the Hon Rick Barker and wrenched from the loins of Martin Gallagher’s committee has a good pedigree, and we can be sure it will perform well on the track of social justice. Those people who are talking about waste of time should reflect upon the hours spent in this Chamber, where to quantify would reflect on much productive effort—unlike the very good work of Martin Gallagher and his committee, who have delivered to us a bill that this country will look upon, finally, as being a good piece of social engineering, to deliver back into the coffers of the Government that which we deserve. I support the bill.

I love the smell of urgency. It builds the collegial spirit, which is just so necessary for a team that will be going into Government very, very soon. It toughens one up. I issue an invitation to anyone from the Opposition parties to come to coffee before we commence again tomorrow morning, because we are digging in on this issue. National members will drag it out, because we like being toughened up. We know what is ahead of us, unlike this Government, which is soft, soft, soft, and I am about to explain why. This bill is a lost opportunity of immense proportions. The Government said it would get tough on fines defaulters, but what it proposes is, as Mr Alexander said, a slap on the wrist with a wet bus-ticket.

I want to thank the members of the Law and Order Committee who worked on this bill. I will even acknowledge that some fair work was done on the part of the Government members. It is not their fault that their leadership is soft on crime and they had to work on conditions that were imposed on them.

A key objective of this bill, and the most substantial part, is to improve the compliance of fines defaulters who travel overseas. Let us have a look at the scope of this problem. In June 2003 there was approximately $500 million in unpaid fines, and of that amount $305 million was overdue. On 31 May 2004 it was a whopping $527 million in unpaid fines, and the overdue component was $326 million. Now we are told, and I accept Mr Ryall’s figures, that it is now over $600 million—

Hon Tony Ryall: That’s at December.

BRIAN CONNELL: Mr Ryall tells me that is the figure as at December last year. Goodness knows what it might be now!

Hon Tony Ryall: It’s probably $650 million now.

BRIAN CONNELL: It could be as high as $650 million, or even $700 million, and the unpaid component, I imagine, will have gone through $350 million already. We have been told that this bill will fix that problem.

Under the bill as it was introduced, as Mr Ryall pointed out, only 35 people would have been stopped at the border, and now, as it has been recommended back to the House, 117 people will be stopped. That is one person every 3 days. That will scare the hell out of those people who thumb their nose at being fined—that will really scare them! That will make them lie awake at night and think: “Should I take the risk of travelling, or not, because this tough, mean Government has introduced this tough, mean bill that will stop me at the border and say: ‘You need to pay your fines!’.” Pigs might fly, as well.

The revenue from fines collected will be about $1.5 million. That is 0.25 percent of $600 million, and we are expected to believe that is tough. I ask my colleagues what the point is of introducing a fines regime if legislation to enforce it is not also put in place. The problem is not with the people out there being fined; it comes right back to this Parliament, right back to this Government, which is soft on crime and sends out all the wrong messages to the criminals of this country. It sends the message: “It doesn’t matter if you get a fine; the chances of it being imposed are slight.” The only people who pay fines in this country are the compliant people, the mums and dads who go about their everyday business and get caught by a traffic officer on one of our main highways for doing 4 or 5 kilometres over the speed limit—and that is meant to be an example of being tough. The only reason they get nailed is because they have a fixed abode, so the authorities know where they live.

Rather than take the opportunity to drive home that message to people who thumb their nose at the fines regime in this country, this Government let that opportunity slip through its fingers. It is not as if we cannot find out where those people live. The excuse we have been given is that most fine defaulters have no fixed abode, keep moving addresses, and cannot be found. But if they are registered with the Inland Revenue Department, or if they register their Lotto number and have a win in the Lotto, they can be found—no problem whatsoever. Michael Cullen and his cronies have no problem whatsoever finding out where those people are if they have an inland revenue issue. That is the great travesty of this PC, soft Government. Rather than insist that Government departments share information, it has allowed the Inland Revenue Department not to share this information. That window could have been closed very, very simply, but it has not been. The ministry tells us that, at present, the system of enforcement is very ad hoc. I will allow that this bill goes somewhat towards improving that situation, but, as I have said, it is a shame that the opportunity has been lost in such huge proportions.

The ministry receives information about a fines defaulter for whom there is a warrant for arrest. It normally gets that information because of an ex-partner or someone the fines defaulter owes money to dobbing him or her in. That is how this system normally operates. The ministry then tells the police, and the police, if they are not too busy on our main highways writing tickets or trapping motorists, will wander down to the airport, intercept someone, and tell him or her to pay the fine or be arrested. That sounds all well and good—very ad hoc. The chances of being stopped are one person in three.

Hon Tony Ryall: How much?

BRIAN CONNELL: One person in three. Those are the odds. They are not bad.

Hon Tony Ryall: No, one person every 3 days.

BRIAN CONNELL: One person every 3 days. They are not bad odds. Fine defaulters will say: “Well, I’ll take the chance. I’ll travel. What’s the issue?”. But if fines defaulters are caught, they are told to pay their fine, and if they say they cannot afford to pay, they are released on bail. They are set free. It is like the woman during the Michael Jackson trial who released a white dove every time someone was released. This is what happens: Michael Cullen sits there with all those white doves, and every time someone is arrested then released on bail, he releases a white dove. That is the teeth of this bill. Rather than close down the system, the Government has reinforced it—and the Government wonders why people have no confidence in it.

We were told by the Government that one of the reasons it could not enforce the situation more vigorously is that it would interrupt overseas travellers. The ministry’s suggestion on this has some merit. It suggested loading a silent alert system into the New Zealand Customs Service database that would alert the authorities, as someone checked in, not to load that person’s baggage if a warrant was out for his or her arrest. That suggestion makes a lot of sense, but it would work only if, at the other end, there was an enforcement regime that threatened people sufficiently enough for them not to take the risk. It will not work unless we have a tougher approach from this Government.

The other lost opportunity was in respect of the liable parents who, all the time, drift out of this country to Australia. Was this net widened to incorporate those people as the National Party members suggested? No, the Government could not do that; it would be politically incorrect. So there is another lost opportunity. On one hand mum and dad, the compliant people in this country, will pay their fines, but on the other hand the boy racers will not get nailed. Those liable parents—

Ron Mark: They’ll get nana!

BRIAN CONNELL: They will get nana, but there will be no repercussion for liable parents whatsoever. Here is a Government that maintains that it is tough on crime, but when the rubber meets the road, it is soft, soft, soft. Unless, when we go into Committee, there are significant amendments brought to support this bill, National will have severe reservations about whether to continue its support.

I rise to make a couple of comments about this, and I have to say that that was an example of another road to Damascus experience from that member. [Interruption] “What about his CV?”, my colleague asked. Well, we will not go into that.

The National Government had 9 years to do something about fines defaulters.

Brian Connell: Come on!

CLAYTON COSGROVE: Oh, he is fired up—he has had his muesli this morning. Somebody put some chilli powder on the muesli this morning.

This bill talks about people being stopped at the border. To put that into plain language, it sets up a trigger mechanism, so that if that member wanted to go to Sydney and he is triggered on the system as having fines, then he can be stopped at the border. [Interruption] I think the member is out of control. The enforcement mechanism, which he bleats on about and says does not, apparently, exist in the bill, means he would be stopped at the border and would not get on the plane. He would not be allowed to go until the fine is paid.

We have defaulters going back 20 or 30 years, and I would have thought that that member, Tony Ryall, who was the Minister of Justice for a period during those 9 long years of the last National Government, might have done something about that. But now, when the rubber has hit the road, we have introduced a bill to tighten up the situation and have put forward some practical measures like data matching with the Customs Service, information sharing with the Inland Revenue Department, and stopping people at the border so that they do not get out unless they pay.

Of course, members opposite say that it is not tough enough, that it is all wrong, and that we should do a whole series of other things. Well, I ask why the lift did not make the top floor with that member in it while his party was in Government. Why did the last National Government not have all the ideas that those members have proposed to the House today, now that they have no responsibility and they know damn well they cannot implement anything? Why did they not propose those solutions then? Why did Tony Ryall, when he was the Minister, not actually propose something while he was in Government?

Hon Tony Ryall: Because the debt was half of what it is now.

CLAYTON COSGROVE: That is his alibi and excuse for doing absolutely nothing apart from parking his ministerial backside into a limousine and taking his pay. Because the debt was half, he did nothing about it, he says. I suppose that means that if, under a National Government, the crime and murder rates were half what they are now, those members would say that they should not do anything about it. People would still be getting killed and burglaries would still be going on, but they would do nothing. Well, I thank Mr Ryall, who will be the next Minister of Justice—or so he says. What a wonderful campaign slogan that will be to take around the country!

Hon Dr Michael Cullen: A few halfwits!

CLAYTON COSGROVE: Yes, there are a few halfwits over there—absolutely! So when things get to be about half as bad as they are now, Mr Ryall will say: “White flag! I’m off. I will do nothing.” That attitude tells members in this House a lot.

I say to Mr Ryall that for 9 years he had an opportunity to tidy up the fines defaulter system, but National members never put forward one piece of legislation that would tighten it up. They never did the sort of simple thing that my colleague Mr Barker has done—the “name and shame” campaign. Now, I like that, because the names of the people who do default are put out there. I am not sure what the statistics are for those who have paid up because they have been shamed, but it is a really simple idea—put an advertisement in the paper.

But Mr Ryall says that because the numbers of fines defaulters were only half what they are now, he chose to do nothing. I really do thank him for that contribution, because it tells the people of New Zealand a heck of a lot about National. If things are half as bad, those members are off down the beach in their Speedos, out with the tanning oil, and getting a tan—they do not care! Well, the Labour Government has now done something to fix that problem. We have introduced practical measures in this bill. What did those members put forward when they were in Government? They put forward nothing. What do they put forward now? They still put forward nothing. They simply say that when it is half as bad, they will go off to the beach and do nothing. That was a pathetic response from that side of the House. Despite the gasbagging coming from the member for Rakaia, this is a good bill.

Hon Harry Duynhoven: They used to stand for something.

CLAYTON COSGROVE: National members used to stand for something, but now they sit for something.

The Courts and Criminal Matters Bill is a good bill, and I support it. Yet again, people will know that we put forward the practical ideas and the solutions that are implemented, while National members do nothing.

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. In listening to those contributions, I feel moved to move that the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill be referred back to the Law and Order Committee so that it may be strengthened and improved in respect of information-sharing legislation, so as to enable the Inland Revenue Department and the Ministry of Social Development to be able to provide all necessary information to the courts.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member knows that that is completely out of order. It is not a point of order and he cannot do that. [Interruption] You did not seek leave; that was the problem. You moved, and you cannot do that.

RON MARK: Thank you for your guidance. I seek the leave of the House to move that the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill be referred back to the Law and Order Committee so that it may be strengthened in order to give greater powers to the courts.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought for that purpose. Is there any objection? There is.

One would have to have very much a sixth sense to see that the previous speaker was talking about the Courts and Criminal Matters Bill. The bill is important legislation. National supports it. We do so with reservations because in many parts it is incredibly weak-kneed. Here was a great opportunity to advance legislation that could have dealt so much more effectively with the problem.

The other point that I would make in my opening comment is that the bill’s legislative history is simply appalling. It was introduced on 14 May 2003, had a first reading 5 days later, on 19 June, then went off to the Law and Order Committee, where it languished for months. Although Labour members of Parliament praise it in this House as being legislation that is urgent and necessary, the legislative history hardly supports that proposition.

The imposition of fines for breach of the criminal law is a core sanction, and in the mass of legislation passing through this Parliament criminal offences are created and refined. A common sentence is the imposition of a monetary penalty. There is a clear direction to the sentencing judge in both the Sentencing Act 2002 and its predecessor, the Criminal Justice Act, to take into account the financial circumstances of the offender before imposing a fine. For example, in section 40(1) of the Sentencing Act, the following words occur: “In determining the amount of a fine, the court must take into account, … the financial capacity of the offender.” Later provisions in this legislation detail how the financial capacity of an offender is to be discerned. For example, section 41(2) provides for offenders to make a declaration as to their financial capacity. That point is relevant because, when fines are imposed, the sentencing officer has to be satisfied that those offenders have the ability to make those payments.

It is an absolute disgrace—and reflects no credit on this Government, at all—that the debt mountain has truly soared. It stands now at a figure that may be in the order of $600 million.

Hon Tony Ryall: $650 million.

Dr RICHARD WORTH: Apparently, the correct figure is $650 million. But monetary penalties are not a sentencing possibility for just breaches of what we could call black-letter criminal law. Fines may be imposed for breach of a raft of statutes; the Resource Management Act and the Commerce Act are two good examples.

National supported this bill being referred to the select committee. We did that on the basis that it was a praiseworthy aim to deal more effectively with fines collections. So it is hugely disappointing to see the legislation come back in the form that it has despite attempts by National members to tighten it up in a meaningful way. So I tell members opposite that when the National Party becomes the next Government in September 2005 it will be looking again at this legislation, to tighten it up and lower the threshold.

One of the things that the Government has done is to commence upon a campaign to publicly name people in the columns of the daily press because of frustration at the amounts owed. I think that strategy has been successful, certainly in some areas. It has been done against the background of big amounts that have been outstanding. In Nelson and Marlborough the Department for Courts, as it was then called—now the Ministry of Justice—was owed some $7 million in court fines. In the South Canterbury district there were defaulters with an amount outstanding of $1.2 million. One can instance the case of the Manukau City Council, which says that faulty paperwork has allowed thousands of motorists to dodge paying their parking fines for years. In the case of that council, there has been a loss in the order of $3.6 million. So we see some attempts, feeble though they may be, by dint of publishing the names of offenders, to ensure recovery by a process akin to shaming.

I was interested to read in the Dominion Post of 5 May a comment from a ministry spokesperson on the whole issue of fines. It was in the context of what I think has not been a successful blitz. She said this: “Fines don’t go away. They are a justice sanction aimed at deterring unacceptable behaviour and are never remitted for reasons of age of the fine or expediency.” Yet we have seen some remarkable and, in my view, wholly wrong decisions of the courts to remit significant amounts of money. In April of 2005 an Upper Hutt resident, Nathan Bentley, had $73,000 in traffic fines wiped. There have been other cases where there have been similar significant write-offs. I instance the case of a Hamilton judge, Anne McAloon, who let another offender, Aaron Pace, off paying a $31,352 debt for traffic offences. Quite clearly, the courts need direction from Parliament, or from the Minister perhaps, to deal much more effectively with the whole issue of fines. As we look around New Zealand we see significant errors of administration and a lack of will to deal with what is a mounting problem.

So hope for this legislation has been, unfortunately, dashed. We see here proposals to amend nine Acts: the Crimes Act, the Customs and Excise Act, the District Courts Act, the Immigration Act, the Misuse of Drugs Amendment Act, the Privacy Act, the Sentencing Act, the Summary Proceedings Act, and the Tax Administration Act.

Hon Tony Ryall: Nine long debates.

Dr RICHARD WORTH: Quite right, because this bill is in multiple parts. So we will be here, I am sure, for many days in a 10-part debate on this legislation.

Sentiments are fine but action is so much better. As Mr Connell said when he was speaking on this bill, there are mechanisms available that could have been utilised to make huge gains. I am speaking, of course, of the Advance Passenger Processing system for outgoing flights. That system enables an early-warning signal to be given to airline staff to stop or delay a passenger from boarding a flight. The airline staff will not know the reason for the warning. The early warning allows the airline to prevent luggage from being loaded on to the plane until it is clear that the person is free to board.

There is a comment by the Law and Order Committee in its report back on this bill that I think is worth underscoring, and it indicates the lack of will of this committee to grapple with the problems that arise. It is under a heading “Targeting New Zealand fine defaulters in Australia”. The commentary states: “The bill does not provide for a reciprocal information-sharing policy with Australia. We continue to have an ongoing interest in the ministry’s efforts to target New Zealand fine defaulters … especially in Australia.” In the context of our closer economic relationship with Australia, this is an issue that should be given priority. It is not the difficult issue that the committee asserts it is. I think it is sad that where there was an opportunity to produce real gains, as I have said, that opportunity was simply not taken.

This is an interesting debate. If one was listening to this debate, one would think that the Opposition parties might have taken their opportunity in the Law and Order Committee to do the work that they get paid for by the taxpayer. They have all stood up and said: Woe is me, this bill doesn’t go far enough. It’s not tough enough. We want to send it back for another go.” Well, I read the commentary on the bill from the select committee. Who is on that select committee? The members are Martin Gallagher, a very good chair, Marc Alexander, the deputy chair and a very conscientious man, Georgina Beyer, Brian Connell of the National Party, Ann Hartley, Mahara Okeroa, Ron Mark, and the Hon Tony Ryall. I read the committee’s membership, and I looked for the minority report that stated the Opposition disagreed with this bill because it did not go hard enough and tough enough, and did not do enough. What did I find? Nothing—absolutely nothing.

Hon Harry Duynhoven: They are lazy.

Hon MARK GOSCHE: Well, either the Opposition members are lazy or they do not know how to do their jobs. They are still learning on the job, and expect to be paid full wages. They still expect to be paid full wages, yet they did nothing—absolutely nothing.

The failure to provide a minority report was not because the Opposition members on the committee had insufficient time. The public came along and gave 1 hour and 9 minutes of evidence. That committee considered the submissions for 9 hours and 2 minutes. I think the 2 minutes was probably what the Opposition members did, and the 9 hours was what the Government members did. Now the Opposition members whinge and moan, and come here to the House and say the bill is not tough enough. Well, who is going to take them seriously? Nobody could take them seriously. That is why they are the Opposition—because they are too lazy, too incompetent, and too hopeless to have actually done the job in the select committee that they said needed to be done. Who stopped them? Did anybody say that no, they could not do that? Did anybody from the Opposition say that if they did not like the bill the way it was, they, as members of Parliament, could put a minority report in, even if they were voting for the bill? Even if a member is voting for a bill, he or she can say that it is not tough enough.

The Opposition members on that select committee need to take lessons from Maurice Williamson. He is on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, which I chair, and he said he thought the Government had done a good job on a bill, but that National would go a little further than the Government, so it would put that in the report. Maybe Maurice Williamson needs to run a seminar for the Opposition members, to show them how to do the job properly, because I think they are hopeless, and so does the public.

This is a competent Government, which is doing an excellent job and saying to people who have broken the law that they will not get away with it. It is telling people they cannot go for their holidays to Australia and come back and get away with it any more, with a big fine owing. If they do not pay up, they will not be going. That is the simple truth.

Hon Tony Ryall: That is not what the bill states.

Hon MARK GOSCHE: That does not suit Tony Ryall—no, no. Tony Ryall says he would not do anything, because when he was the Minister the size of the millions was only half the present amount. He sat back, took his salary, drove around the country, and pretended he was important, but he did nothing. He would do nothing again if the country ever gave him the chance.

Jill Pettis: They won’t.

Hon MARK GOSCHE: People will not do that. This is good legislation from a good Minister, and it states to people that we are fixing the issue. Can we fix it? Yes we can.

I seek the leave of the House to table a report of a Mr Craig James Taylor, who had $42,259 wiped from his slate by Judge Moran.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that report. Is there any objection? There is.

I seek the leave of the House to table a report of one, Dane Anthony Blake, aged 19, who had $22,000 wiped off his fines by Judge Moran.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that report. Is there any objection? There is.

I seek the leave of the House to table a document that shows that Howard Willis Case had $20,000 of his fines wiped off by Judge Moran.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that report. Is there any objection? There is.

I seek the leave of the House to have a report that shows that Dennis Fishburne had $20,000 wiped off his fines by Judge Moran, in replacement for 100 hours’ community work.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that report. Is there any objection? There is.

I seek leave of the House to table a report showing that the fines of one Nathan Bentley of $73,000 were wiped by a District Court judge in the period around May 2005.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that document. Is there any objection? There is.

I seek leave of the House to table a report that states that fines totalling $31,352 were written off by Hamilton judge Anne McAloon in or about May 2005.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that report. Is there any objection? There is.

I seek the leave of the House to table a report that shows that in 1 day in Greymouth Judge Moran wiped $109,000 in fines for four young men.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave is sought to table that report. Is there any objection? There is.

Over there in the Opposition parties is Tony Ryall acting like Captain Mainwaring, and Ron Mark from New Zealand First is like Colonel Klink: “I know nothing.” They are absolutely full of wind, bluff, and bluster. They are what one could refer to as “gonnas”: “I’m ‘gonna’ do this, and I’m ‘gonna’ do that, but when I had the opportunity, what did I do? I did nothing.” The irony of the situation is that when those Tories were in Government for those 9 long years, they attacked Housing New Zealand tenants at the airport and at the border when they were going overseas for the first and only time. One of my constituents only ever left the country because her family paid for her, and she left New Zealand with NZ$20 in her pocket and she was stopped at the border and advised that her rent would go up for the 2 weeks she was away, because she would not be occupying her Housing New Zealand property. Those mean, horrible bullies attacked defenceless Housing New Zealand tenants—the poorest people in New Zealand—but did nothing about fines defaulters. They left them alone. It just shows what bullies they are, and God forbid they should ever get the opportunity to be bullies again! However, the people of New Zealand are far too intelligent to do that.

This is a good bill, and a positive aspect of it is that victims are more likely to get reparation. This is an excellent bill by a hard-working and competent Government.

I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I could not hear very well and I was wondering whether the member who has just resumed her seat said “a $1 billion Kyoto stuff-up” somewhere in there.

Madam DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member knows that that is not a point of order.

Bill read a second time.

Instruction to Committee