Criminal Procedure (Reform And Modernisation) Bill

Hone Harawira, MP for Te Tai Tokerau

Wed 24 November 2010; 5pm

The Māori Party will be supporting this bill, the Criminal Procedure (Reform and Modernisation) Bill, at the first reading, but at this stage that support is conditional on the sort of information we are likely to hear when it goes to a select committee.

We support the notion of reforming the justice system. We support it not because I am saying it, but because it is true; the statistics say so. In terms of justice as it applies to Māori on the street, lawyers in the House will know that when a Māori and a Pākehā are stopped on the street for essentially the same issue, the Māori, to nobody’s great surprise, is more likely to be arrested. When the Māori and the Pākehā end up going to court on the same kind of issue, to nobody’s great surprise, the Māori is more likely to be convicted.

When the issue of sentencing comes up for a Māori and a Pākehā who are up on essentially the same charge, to nobody’s great surprise it is the Māori who gets sent to jail, more often. In terms of the length of the sentence when a Māori and a Pākehā are being sentenced on essentially the same charge, to nobody’s great surprise the Māori gets sentenced to a longer term in jail.

The Māori Party supports absolutely the need for reform of the justice system at every level, and although that is a big fat report we do not see anything in it that will affect the statistics that I just mentioned earlier.

In the Minister’s opening address he used the well-known phrase “Justice delayed is justice denied.” I note that many of the clauses in the bill speed up the process. I also add therefore that from knowledge of the system that “justice hastened is not necessarily justice confirmed”.

There is an aim to speed up trials; to have trials without the presence of the accused. I spoke in the debate on the Courts (Remote Participation) Bill, and I remember that the strength of opposition from Labour, in particular, and the Greens and the Māori Party convinced the Minister of the need not to be so hasty in going to trial without the accused being in the courtroom.

I see that issue raises its head again in this Criminal Procedure (Reform and Modernisation) Bill. The Māori Party is hugely concerned about that as well. I know that from just understanding how the system works in a jury trial it is far easier to convict people we do not need to look in the eye. It is far easier to convict people just on what we hear from others.

It is far easier to convict people when they are not present to give their side of the story. If trials are allowed of people who are not in the courtroom—and I note from a comment from Mr Chauvel that the judge will not even have the right to determine whether that goes ahead; it will be the way it happens, simply because the legislation says so—then neither the judge nor defendants will even get a say as to whether defendants will participate in their own defence.

Like Mr Chauvel, I also worry that when we talk about changing the nature of a judicial system that for all of its flaws has been in existence for such a long time—Maori more than most know of its flaws—that there should be far more accountability for those changes than just the fact that the Government and one of its coalition partners can pass legislation that will have such sweeping changes and impact on so many people in terms of the law as it will continue in the future.

I also note that in the speeding up of the process to get people into court, the speeding up of the process to get people convicted, I have yet to hear whether the Minister of Corrections is about to launch into another prison-building programme. I note that when the previous Labour Government began its prison-building programme—due to have been completed next year—the jails were already full by 2009 because of a rotten judicial system. They had already filled them for 2012 before the prison-building programme had been completed. If the process by which people are being sent to prison will be sped up even more, then we need to spend more and more of this Government’s money and more and more of taxpayers’ money building more and more jails for people who we absolutely know will be sent to jail.

Unfortunately, most of them will be Māori. We support the bill to the select committee so we can hear what those concerns will be but I am very clear in stipulating that our support is only to the select committee to ensure that more and more people can have their say on this legislation. We will reserve the right to change our vote, based on what we hear during those committee hearings.

Nā reira, tēnā koutou, kia ora tātou katoa.

ENDS

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