BRIEFING TO

THE INCOMING MINISTERS

DECEMBER 2020
MESSAGE FROM
THE DIRECTOR
JustSpeak is a movement of people advocating for transformational
change in criminal justice, informed by evidence, lived experience,
and Te Tiriti O Waitangi.

We welcome the new and returning Ministers to the important task ahead of leading a
programme of transformational change across the justice sector. You have the potential to
right many wrongs of the past and present, and contribute to an Aotearoa in which every
whānau and community are able to flourish. But time is of the essence - we cannot afford
another generation of hurt.¹

Over the past three years some important progress has been made by the Labour
government on the policies that drive mass incarceration. We acknowledge the admirable
intentions of Hāpaitia Te Oranga Tangata, Hōkai Rangi and Te Huringa O Te Tai.

But the infrastructure of mass incarceration in this country remains largely in place. As the
Ministry of Justice’s own data shows, the short term decrease from 2018 in the numbers of
people held in prison cannot be sustained without systemic change. Moreover, the number
of people being held on remand - 3,458 as of June 2020 - is set to outstrip the number of
people sentenced to prison by 2029.²

Women, particularly wahine Māori, are even more likely to be imprisoned without having
been convicted or sentenced, and are the most likely group to be subjected to inhumane
seclusion and restraint practices.³ ⁴ Overall, the government continues to arrest, charge and
incarcerate Māori and Pacific peoples at vastly higher rate than Pākēha, continuing a long
legacy of a system grounded in systemic racism and colonisation.⁵

¹ Turuki! Turuki!’ (2019) Te Uepu Hāpai i Te Ora, Safe and Effective Justice Advisory Group.
² Justice Sector Prison Population Projections 2019 - 2029 (2019) Ministry of Justice
³ ‘The number of Māori women imprisoned without conviction has nearly doubled after law change; (2020). NZ Herald.
⁴ ‘Thinking outside the box: A review of seclusion and restraint practices in New Zealand’ (2020). Dr Sharon Shalev
⁵ ‘A Justice System for Everyone’ (2020). JustSpeak. 2
It is no accident that this system fails to prevent future harm or facilitate healing for people
who experience harm. It was never designed for this purpose. Instead, successive govern-
ments have made laws and policies focused on punishment, at the expense of outcomes that
support community well-being.

JustSpeak’s vision is for a justice system that prevents harm, addresses its causes, and pro-
motes healing and restoration among individuals and communities. This cannot be achieved
with small scale change. To achieve this vision, and to honour the commitments made in the
Labour party’s Manifesto, the Government must lift its gaze to focus on changing the sys-
tems and structures to create the outcomes we want to achieve.

Tania Sawicki Mead

Director // JustSpeak

3
CONTEXT, CHALLENGES
AND OPPORTUNITIES IN 2020
Over the past three decades, people in successive governments have made policy decisions
that have fuelled a retributive justice system, focused on punishment rather than prevention
and healing. As a result more people than ever before are locked up in prison, trapped in a
maze without exits which fails to address the systemic causes of harm. Instead of working
together to fix this, justice policy has been used as a political football and the consequences
have been harmful for everyone touched by the system.

The reports produced by the government’s Justice Advisory Group, Te Uepū Hāpai i te Ora
outline the justice system’s failings, including the focus on punishment at the expense of
prevention, overrepresentation of Māori, re-victimisation of those who have experienced
harm, and the interconnectedness of offending with issues such as poverty, housing and
mental health. These findings echo the calls for transformational change that started with
Moana Jackson and Sir Clinton Roper over thirty years ago, which have largely been unheed-
ed by decision makers. In 2021, the most pressing question is whether your government will
change the course of the future and act on these recommendations.

One of the many barriers to change has been decision makers’ reluctance to challenge a
prevailing public and media discourse dominated by punitive values and shallow understand-
ings of justice policy and practice. But the good news is that public attitudes are beginning
to shift away from punitive models, according to a 2019 survey conducted by Hāpaitia te
Oranga Tangata.⁶ The overwhelming majority of respondents believed that our criminal jus-
tice system should focus on preventing crime from happening in the first place, that victims’
interests should be at the heart of our response and less serious offences should be dealt
with in communities.

Given the long history of the politicisation of criminal justice in Aotearoa, this shift in public
beliefs is profound. It is a testament to the courageous advocacy of those who have shared
their experiences of the system and their dreams of a different way of achieving justice.

⁶ ‘2019 public survey of attitudes toward the justice system’ (2019) Hāpaitia te Oranga Tangata. 4
To ensure we make more progress towards an informed and compassionate public discourse
on justice, we launched new research this year in conjunction with public narrative research-
ers The Workshop. Our report, How to Talk about Crime and Justice, points to promising
strategies to shift mental models and generate deeper understanding of the complex issues
around justice for the public.⁷

As your government’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic aptly demonstrated, an evidence

led communications strategy is crucial to gaining public support for complex social issues
and to generate collective action. We encourage you to read this research and consider how
you might apply it in your work to successfully lead the justice sector change your govern-
ment has committed to.

But lessons from and impacts of Covid-19 on the justice agenda go beyond public narratives
and communications; the pandemic and its ripple effects across our communities and the
economy will also be a focus of your government’s policy agenda in the coming years. There
is enormous potential for a programme of justice transformation to achieve ‘double duty’ by
reinforcing your efforts to support communities, improve health and well-being - particularly
of our least served communities - and provide more people and their whānau with secure
housing. Achieving this, however, requires the government to work in meaningful partner-
ship with NGOs, communities, and iwi, hapū and whānau to create the conditions for change.

⁷ ‘How to Talk About Crime and Justice:A Guide’ (2020). The Workshop. 5
TAKING ACTION
TO ACHIEVE OUR VISION
We are calling on your government to build a pathway to a transformational justice system
that no longer relies on prison. Action is needed now to create meaningful alternatives to
incarceration and provide pragmatic solutions to the social issues that push people into the
maze of the justice system.

We have been encouraged by your government’s acknowledgement of the need for mean-
ingful change on these issues. We note in particular the Prime Minister’s request to be held
to account for the difference in Māori and Pākēha incarceration rates at Waitangi in 2018.⁸
In her speech to the justice summit, she also voiced her support for building more mental
health units, and rejected ‘American style prisons’.⁹ This year, former Justice Minister
Andrew Little attended the Black Lives Matter rally at Parliament and acknowledged that our
current justice system has ‘got to change’.¹⁰ “When well over half of the men in our prisons
are Māori, when nearly two-thirds of women in our prisons are Māori, that tells you there is
something wrong with the system.”

But we also heard the former Minister’s comments at the launch of Turuki!Turuki! and Te
Tangi o Te Manawai that those reports, while reflecting the perspectives of thousands of
conversations with people across Aotearoa, were “not a blueprint” for change.¹¹

In our view, these reports - and the work that precedes them - offer significant pathways
forward for justice transformation. But we acknowledge that the task is daunting. To that
end, JustSpeak launched a Blueprint for a Just Aotearoa earlier this year, which sets out
our three visions for the justice system and the actions that are necessary to achieve these
visions, informed by expert advisory group reports and the work of Ināia Tonu Nei.

Our recommendations below, derived from this blueprint, set out what we believe are the
minimum requirements of this Government to begin the process of transformational change
during the coming Parliamentary term.

⁸ PM to Māori at Waitangi: hold govt to account (2018). RNZ.

⁹ ‘No to American-style mega-prisons’ - Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern (2018). Newshub.
¹⁰ Justice Minister Andrew Little tells Black Lives Matter movement at Parliament ‘we’ve got to change’ (2020). NZ Herald.
¹¹ Speech to new direction for criminal justice reform announcement (12 November 2019). Hon Andrew Little 6
BUILD COMMUNITIES NOT PRISONS
In order to build pathways out of the punitive justice system,
the government must;

• Build on your election pledge to repeal Three Strikes Law, and commit to a wider
review of the Sentencing Act in order decriminalise low level offences and priori-
tise alternatives to incarceration in sentencing.

• Repeal the Bail Amendment Act and review the Parole Act to stem the remand
crisis and enable more people to leave prison sooner through supported release.
Significant increases to the length of time spent in prison have over the past dec-
ade contributed to the growing number of people in prison on any given day, as
has the number of people held for longer periods of time on remand.¹²

• Immediately increase funding of pretrial and post-release housing to reduce the

number of people who are currently held on bail or denied parole because of
insecure housing.

• Establish Iwi Community Panels Te Pae Oranga across all regions, allow more
cases to be heard, and require Police to refer all people arrested for low level
offences to Te Pae Oranga instead of court.

DECOLONISE THE JUSTICE SYSTEM

In order to honour Crown obligations under Te Tiriti O Waitangi and
support Māori leadership, the government must;

• Establish and fund the Mana Ōrite partnership model, placing Māori at all levels
of decision-making in government. This will allow a comprehensive process of
constitutional transformation to begin, following the recommendations of and
process set out in Matike Mai Aotearoa.

¹² Justice Sector Prison Population Projections 2019 - 2029 (2019) Ministry of Justice 7
 • Immediately amend the Sentencing Act to allow judges to order Section 27
cultural reports, while also increasing the funding and training for cultural report
writers across all regions of Aotearoa.

• Reform Oranga Tamariki to transfer responsibility and resources for care and
protection of tamariki to whānau, hapū and iwi.

ENSURE COMMUNITIES HAVE

RESOURCES TO THRIVE
To improve community wellbeing in decisions made by the justice system,
the government must;

• Demonstrate its commitment to community wellbeing by funding specialist

de-escalation specialists to respond to callouts for people experiencing mental
distress, and phase out Police responses to these situations.

• Appoint Whānau Ora navigators to be based in every District Court, with support
from all Government social service agencies. This initiative reflects the sentiment
of the Prime Minister’s Labour Congress Speech this year, who said the support-
ing role of Whānau Ora agencies was ‘absolutely critical’.¹³

• Commit to a health-based approach to drug use by overhauling the Misuse of

Drugs Act 1975 to decriminalise use and possession of all drugs.

¹³ Jacinda Ardern. (2020). Labour Congress Speech. 8

CONCLUSION
This term, your government has a unique opportunity to pursue a transformational
programme of change on criminal justice which supports the health and wellbeing of all
communities. There is no longer any justification for continuing to prop up a justice system
which fails to support victims, fails to stop harm and future offending, and fails to honour
the Crown’s obligations under Te Tiriti O Waitangi.

To chart a different course for the future of our justice system, your leadership must be
courageous and bold. Inaction or minor reforms to a system that entrenches terrible out-
comes will mean, as noted by the Chair of your government’s expert advisory group, that
we are “complicit in allowing some of the most vulnerable people in our society to bear
sustained harm”.¹⁴ Instead, it is vital that your decisions this term, amid all the uncertainty of
Covid-19, build the foundationvs for a transformed justice system that is equitable and just.

To create the conditions for this change, everyone has a part to play. We look forward to
working with your government to help build the collective future we all want to see.

¹⁴ Turuki! Turuki!’ (2019) Te Uepu Hāpai i Te Ora, Safe and Effective Justice Advisory Group.

www.justspeak.org.nz