Latest news with #NZParliament
RNZ News
25-06-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
New law to give victims final say over sex offenders' name suppressions
Police Minister Mark Mitchell spoke on behalf of the Justice Minister during the third reading last night. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver Parliament has unanimously passed legislation that will ensure the courts cannot issue a permanent name suppression order for an adult convicted of a sexual offence, unless the victim agrees to it . The Victims of Sexual Violence Bill had its third reading late on Wednesday night. It also amends the law so that children under the age of 12 will not be able to be questioned about whether they consented to sex. The Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith said this made it crystal clear children could not consent to abuse. The law further closes what Goldsmith said was a legislative gap , by ensuring the victims of all sexual crimes, including intimate visual recordings offences, were automatically given name suppression. "These changes will help ensure victims of sexual violence and their needs are returned to the heart of the justice system. We've been clear from day one that victims are our priority as we work to restore law and order," Goldsmith said in a media release. He said at present victims' views on suppression only had to be taken into account by the courts. Paul Goldsmith Photo: RNZ / Marika Khabazi Long battles over name suppression retraumatised victims, as did the inability to discuss what happened to them and to warn others. Police Minister Mark Mitchell spoke on behalf of the Justice Minister during the third reading. "It is abhorrent that the law allows questions about whether children enjoyed or agreed to sexual activity. We're fixing that. "It is unconscionable that victims feel silenced by our laws especially when they've braved the scrutiny of the court process to prove their case. We're fixing that too." Mitchell said victims had been clear that name suppression settings had disempowered victims, prevented them from speaking out about their experiences and warning others. New Zealanders also believed the way children were questioned in court was unacceptable, Mitchell said. MP Kahurangi Carter spoke in favour of the bill on behalf of the Green Party. "I know that we all feel this really heavily for victims under 12. It seems so obvious. "I'm glad today we're bringing our legislation, our laws into line with what is right." Goldsmith recognised some victims would not want to make the decision about name suppression themselves. In those cases, the decision would rest with the courts. He believed the changes would assist in ensuring 20,000 fewer victims of violent crime by 2029. While the bill was passed unanimously, there were no Te Pāti Māori MPs in the House at the time. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
25-06-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
New law ensures sex offenders no longer entitled to permanent name suppression
Police Minister Mark Mitchell spoke on behalf of the Justice Minister during the third reading last night. Photo: RNZ / Angus Dreaver Parliament has unanimously passed legislation that will ensure the courts cannot issue a permanent name suppression order for an adult convicted of a sexual offence, unless the victim agrees to it . The Victims of Sexual Violence Bill had its third reading late on Wednesday night. It also amends the law so that children under the age of 12 will not be able to be questioned about whether they consented to sex. The Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith said this made it crystal clear children could not consent to abuse. The law further closes what Goldsmith said was a legislative gap , by ensuring the victims of all sexual crimes, including intimate visual recordings offences, were automatically given name suppression. "These changes will help ensure victims of sexual violence and their needs are returned to the heart of the justice system. We've been clear from day one that victims are our priority as we work to restore law and order," Goldsmith said in a media release. He said at present victims' views on suppression only had to be taken into account by the courts. Paul Goldsmith Photo: RNZ / Marika Khabazi Long battles over name suppression retraumatised victims, as did the inability to discuss what happened to them and to warn others. Police Minister Mark Mitchell spoke on behalf of the Justice Minister during the third reading. "It is abhorrent that the law allows questions about whether children enjoyed or agreed to sexual activity. We're fixing that. "It is unconscionable that victims feel silenced by our laws especially when they've braved the scrutiny of the court process to prove their case. We're fixing that too." Mitchell said victims had been clear that name suppression settings had disempowered victims, prevented them from speaking out about their experiences and warning others. New Zealanders also believed the way children were questioned in court was unacceptable, Mitchell said. MP Kahurangi Carter spoke in favour of the bill on behalf of the Green Party. "I know that we all feel this really heavily for victims under 12. It seems so obvious. "I'm glad today we're bringing our legislation, our laws into line with what is right." Goldsmith recognised some victims would not want to make the decision about name suppression themselves. In those cases, the decision would rest with the courts. He believed the changes would assist in ensuring 20,000 fewer victims of violent crime by 2029. While the bill was passed unanimously, there were no Te Pāti Māori MPs in the House at the time. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
Al Jazeera
05-06-2025
- General
- Al Jazeera
New Zealand parliament suspends Maori MPs who performed protest haka
New Zealand legislators have voted to suspend three MPs who performed a Maori haka in the House to protest against a controversial bill. The MPs from Te Pati Maori – the Maori Party – were handed the toughest sanctions ever imposed on legislators by New Zealand's parliament on Thursday. Te Pati Maori co-leaders Rawiri Waititi and Debbie Ngarewa-Packer were both suspended from parliament for 21 days. Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, New Zealand's youngest legislator, 22, was suspended for seven days. The length of the bans was recommended by parliament's privileges committee, which advised the trio should be suspended for acting in 'a manner that could have the effect of intimidating a member of the House'. It recommended Maipi-Clarke be given a shorter sanction because she had written a letter of 'contrition' to the parliament. Previously, the longest suspension imposed on an MP had been a three-day ban. Prior to Thursday's vote, Maipi-Clarke told legislators that the suspension was an effort to stop Maori from making themselves heard in parliament. 'Are our voices too loud for this house? Is that the reason why we are being silenced?' she said. 'We will never be silenced and we will never be lost.' The legislators had performed the haka in parliament in November. Their protest interrupted voting during the first reading of a proposed bill to legally define the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi, the 1840 pact between the British Crown and Indigenous Maori leaders signed during New Zealand's colonisation. The proposed law prompted widespread protests amid concerns it would erode Maori rights. It was later scrapped. Maipi-Clarke had begun the protest by ripping a copy of the legislation, before she and fellow MPs approached the leader of the right-wing party that had backed the proposed law. Their actions prompted complaints from fellow MPs to the parliament's speaker that their protest was disorderly, and the matter was sent to parliament's privileges committee, prompting months of debate. A report from the privileges committee said that while both haka and Maori ceremonial dance and song are not uncommon in parliament, members were aware that permission was needed from the speaker beforehand.
RNZ News
28-05-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
What did the House get up to during Budget urgency?
A number of bills were debated in urgency over the weekend. Photo: VNP / Daniela Maoate-Cox Parliament sat for two extra days last week for an especially long and jam-packed edition of Budget urgency. It's pretty much routine for governments to adjourn the Budget debate and move to urgency once all the parties have given at least one speech. The purpose of Budget urgency is to progress legislation directly related to the Budget, but unrelated bills usually get thrown into the mix as well. On Thursday afternoon the House heard from Finance Minister Nicola Willis, Leader of the Opposition Chris Hipkins, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon, Greens co-leader Chloe Swarbrick, Act leader David Seymour, New Zealand First deputy leader Shane Jones, and Te Pāti Māori MP Tākuta Ferris. After that, Leader of the House Chris Bishop adjourned the Budget debate with just under six hours remaining and asked the House to accord urgency, so that 12 bills could progress through 30 stages of debate. By the time urgency was lifted and MPs finally got to go home at midnight on Saturday evening, there had been nine first readings, five second readings, two completed committee stages, and two third readings. For more on why the government's urgency plan was so unsuccessful read The House's story Government urgency plans slow to a crawl . Exactly which bills did MPs spend most of their weekend debating? David Seymour's contentious Regulatory Standards Bill is one of the government's flagship 'cutting red tape' bills. Seymour and his party have long been proponents of reforming New Zealand's regulatory system in the name of lifting productivity and reducing regulatory burden. Specifically, this bill would create principles of responsible regulation that future lawmakers would have to adhere to, as well as a Regulatory Standards Board, which would be in charge of examining current and future legislation against those principles. During the bill's first reading on Friday afternoon, Seymour told the House: "If you want to tax someone, take their property, and restrict their livelihood, you can, but you'll actually have to show why it's in the public interest. The bill demands you show your working." Labour's Duncan Webb called the bill "a cherry-picked right wing neoliberal agenda" that, ironically, lacked a regulatory impact statement. The Regulatory Standards Bill was referred to the Finance and Expenditure Committee and is open for public submissions until 23 June. You may have heard the Building and Construction (Small Stand-alone Dwellings) Amendment Bill being referred to as the Granny Flat Bill. The proposed legislation is another deregulation-oriented bill. If passed, Chris Penk's bill would allow stand-alone dwellings (up to 70m2) to be built without requiring building consents, as long as they adhere to certain requirements. The bill is now with the Transport and Infrastructure Committee and is also open for public submissions until 23 June. The Public Finance Amendment Bill is, while not explicitly a budget bill, it is certainly budget-adjacent. Broadly speaking, it aims to promote increased transparency of government in its management of public finances, and also seeks to improve the practical functionality of the Public Finance Act. It was referred to the Finance and Expenditure Committee after its first reading late on Saturday night and is open for submissions until 7 July. The last bill to be sent to select committee during budget urgency was the Judicature (Timeliness) Legislation Amendment Bill. The bill's purpose is to increase the efficiency of the courts and by extension the police and corrections systems. Being an omnibus bill, it does this by amending several justice-related laws and making technical changes to the running of court proceedings. All parties except Te Pāti Māori supported the bill at first reading before it was sent to the Justice Committee, which will report back to the House by 23 September. The Taxation (Budget Measures) Bill (No 2) was agreed by the House and, pending Royal Assent, gives legal effect to budget announcements. Specifically, it changes KiwiSaver (increasing employer and employee contribution rates but reducing government contribution from 50 to 25 cents per dollar earned, capped at $260.72), increases the Working for Families abatement threshold, and brings in income testing for the initial year of the Best Start scheme. The other bill that is all but law is Louise Upstons' Social Assistance Legislation (Accommodation Supplement and Income-related Rent) Amendment Bill. The bill aims to ensure households are treated more equitably when calculating housing subsidies, and perhaps more notably, it seeks to mitigate the double subsidisation of housing subsidies, which in the context of accommodation, is a term for when a boarder and the person receiving board payments are both claiming accommodation subsidies for the same accommodation costs. When the House adjourned at midnight on Saturday evening, MPs were halfway through the debate on the first reading of the Legal Services (Distribution of Special Fund) Amendment Bill, which they will likely resume when they come back for the next sitting block, which commences on 3 June. *RNZ's The House, with insights into Parliament, legislation and issues, is made with funding from Parliament's Office of the Clerk.
