What’s causing the scandalous backlog in courts - Richard Prebble

Real reform would give the 15,420 people remanded to prison each year a speedy trial - Richard Prebble

OPINION

The coalition has in Parliament tabled an amendment to the Corrections Bill to extend rehabilitation programmes to all prisoners. Not the action of an “anti-Māori”, “bully boy”, “death cult”.

It is correcting a scandal.

Forty-two per cent of all inmates in jail are on remand. These prisoners have not been convicted of a crime but have been denied access to the 19 rehabilitation programmes available to convicted prisoners.

Programmes range from alcohol and drug addiction courses to anger management, vocational and cultural.

Labour’s excuse was New Zealand has signed a United Nations treaty promising to keep remand prisoners separate and said it was too hard to run separate programmes.

Remand prisoners have the same challenges reintegrating on release as the convicted. It is sensible to provide rehab courses. But the policy is an acceptance that is OK for the state to be imprisoning citizens who have not been convicted of any crime.

The cornerstone of our legal system is the principle of “innocent until proven guilty”. It is one of the rights of a British citizen. Many remanded prisoners are Māori. Article three of the treaty promised the rights of British citizenship.

For the approximately 3890 citizens in jail today on remand the principle has been turned on its head. They are doing their sentence first and having a trial later.

Around 20 per cent of remand prisoners will spend longer in jail awaiting trial than the sentence they receive for the offence.

Today in courts around the country there will be show trials.

Everyone involved, except the jury, knows that regardless of the verdict the defendant will walk free. The defendant, who may have been held in jail for years, will have spent longer in prison than any possible sentence.

Around one in ten of those remanded are not convicted. There is no compensation for having been locked up by the state for an alleged offence and then not being found guilty.

Being sent to prison usually has devastating consequences. Few employers keep jobs open. Many relationships do not survive. The effects on the estimated 20,000 children of prisoners can be judged from the fact that two-thirds of all Māori prisoners and a third of all Pākehā prisoners come from households where an adult was imprisoned.

The average time in remand is between two to three months. There is a huge churn. In 2023, 13,695 men and 1725 women were remanded to prison. The longest time anyone has spent on remand is five years. There are many prisoners on remand in jail for over a year.

It was not just rehabilitation that has been denied remand prisoners. I recently witnessed the joy of a little boy being able to see via Zoom his dad, who is in prison. On remand for three months the dad was not allowed to make a Zoom call. Now the dad is convicted.

Had the dad pleaded not guilty he would be in jail longer than the sentence for the offence.

We condemn as police states countries that lock up their citizens, let them rot in jail and then hold a trial sometimes years later. Yet that is what New Zealand is doing.

New Zealand was not always like this. In 1960 just 3 per cent of all prisoners were on remand. When I was practising law, court cases were speedy. It was rare for an offender to be refused bail.

Nearly every measure Parliament has taken to improve the justice system has had the opposite effect.

White collar crims winners in twisted system

Home detention often means white collar criminals, who have stolen widows’ savings, escape prison. The homeless are often remanded in prison because they cannot give an address for bail. Electronic restraints have enabled the courts to restrict the liberty of more citizens but have not reduced the increasing numbers on remand in jail.

It was a mistake replacing Magistrates Courts with District Courts. Trials have become more complex and much longer.

The no-nonsense common sense magistrates that I appeared before dealt with more cases in a day than many District Court judges handle in a week.

I had some fiery exchanges with magistrates who were pleased when I became an MP. Having observed the alternative, the magistrates’ rapid justice was better.

The Magistrates Court would have dealt with that dad’s case the day after his arrest.

The dad would have pleaded guilty, been convicted and sentenced. No legal aid lawyers. No probation, cultural or victim impact reports. Most remanded prisoners would swap all that taxpayer assistance for an immediate day in court.

A real reform would give the 15,420 people remanded to prison each year a speedy trial so they are not on remand long enough to do a rehabilitation course.

Richard Prebble is a former leader of the Act Party and a former member of the Labour Party.