Bay courts waive $7 million in fines

Ministry of Justice general manager of collections Jacquelyn Shannon said the ministry was committed to ensuring fines and reparation remained a credible sanction in New Zealand. Photo / File

Hawke's Bay district courts waived more than $7 million in fines in the past three years.

Ministry of Justice records show Napier and Hastings district courts remitted more than $3 million in fines from 2012 to 2014 each, while Wairoa District Court wiped more than $400,000.

The number of fines remitted decreased each year at all three courts. In Hastings, the dollar amount of fines also decreased each year but in Napier and Wairoa, the sum of fines dropped in 2013 before slightly increasing in 2014. In some cases, an alternative sentence was ordered when a fine was remitted.

Over the three-year period, the courts substituted 113 fines with community detention, 1932 with community work, 25 with home detention and 107 with imprisonment.

Sensible Sentencing Trust founder Garth McVicar, of Hawke's Bay, said the ministry should be taking a tougher line on offenders.

"There needs to be more serious consequences for offending.

"Fines being continuously remitted sends the message to offenders that they're able to get away with not paying them.

"In Australia, 90 per cent of fines are collected - collection rates in New Zealand are dismal by comparison."

Mr McVicar believed focused collection agencies similar to Australia would make the country's judicial system more robust.

"Offenders need to face the consequences of their offending or it won't be long until they reoffend. 'Mamby pamby' tactics don't work. "

Ministry of Justice general manager of collections Jacquelyn Shannon said the ministry was committed to ensuring fines and reparation remained a credible sanction in New Zealand. Legislation passed in 2010 gave the ministry enhanced collection powers, she said.

"Changes include judges having the ability to re-sentence a person to prison or home detention if reparation they have been ordered to pay is unenforceable or unaffordable, provided these sentences were available at the time of the original sentencing ...

"Our efforts are paying off. The amount of outstanding fines and reparation has fallen from $658.8 million in July 2011 to $567.1 million owing as at 31 August 2014.

"Meanwhile, the proportion of overdue fines has reduced from 48.2 per cent in July 2011, to 42.1 per cent as at 31 August 2014."

If required, enforcement of overdue amounts could include clamping vehicles, seizing and selling property, making compulsory deductions from a person's income or bank account, issuing warrants to arrest, suspending drivers' licences and preventing a person's international travel, she said.

However, in some circumstances, the remittal of the fine was considered the most appropriate action, she said.

"Examples of when this may occur include if a person dies, a company is in liquidation, or when a deputy registrar makes a decision to remit small outstanding balances, such as those less than five dollars," she said.

Nationally, the number of fines wiped rose from 78,443 in 2012 to 87,175 in 2013 and then dropped to 65,033 in 2014.

The value of fines wiped trended downwards, however. In 2012, $33,418,612 in fines were remitted, in 2013, $54,048,015 were remitted and last year, $40,847,021 were remitted.

Community work was by far the most common alternative sentence ordered - more than 14,000 fines were turned into community work in the past three years.