What about the victims?

The needs of the victims of crime go unmet by the current emphasis on punishment, believes former Prison Service head Kim Workman, now a research fellow at Victoria University’s Institute of Criminology. “We haven’t properly invested in victims,” he says. “There’s been a focus on victims’ rights rather than victims’ needs. Also, we define victims only in terms of the immediate personal victim. We disregard the wider family and how the traumatising effect sometimes spreads into a whole community.”

The face-to-face encounter that is central to the restorative justice process is particularly healing. “We had victims coming five or six years later, saying, ‘I can’t get that offender out of my mind. I want to tell him exactly what he did. I want to meet with him.’”

Workman says 93% of victims who went through the process said they’d recommend it. “Their message was often, ‘I thought I was going to meet a monster but I met a socially pathetic individual who I felt sorry for’, and what a help that was. Victims feel much better represented and assisted by that process than having the person who did something to them taken away and that’s it. They’re locked out of the process by that.”

The obstacles

There is no shortage of impediments to prison reform. Conspicuously, there’s the moral panic to hose down. Scaremongering in defiance of the facts has driven public debate on crime and punishment for the past few decades. “If it’s the only thing you’ve been told, that’s what the public will believe,” says Jarrod Gilbert.

However, statistics for the 12 months to May 2018 show a 3.9% decrease in criminal acts against property and people, while a report released in August found the number of crimes committed by those aged 19 or younger has fallen 30% in the past four years.

The consequence of this gap between perception and reality means prisons are an easy-to-press political button. Kim Workman says both National and Labour have found there are votes to be had in taking a firm line on prisons and promoting their use. In the past six years, he adds, “there have been something like 15 pieces of legislation introduced – 11 relating directly to prisoners and offenders – that have breached the Bill of Rights.”

When considering those suffering from the exploitation of crime and criminals for political gain, we should also spare some thought for the Department of Corrections, faced with the impossible task of keeping up with the increasing demands of their political masters. Their efforts to provide vocational training and other assistance to prisoners, for instance, must be made in the face of political and public indifference, if not downright hostility.

It’s not as if they don’t know what works. Just ask Stephen Cunningham, the department’s director, offender employment and reintegration: “How does Corrections stop people coming to Corrections? The best thing is, while they’re engaged with us, to work on their rehab, education, alcohol and drug dependency. And more support to reintegrate later.”

The end may be in sight. Justice Minister Andrew Little is clearly reform-minded and knows he has to bring the public with him if he is going to change anything. To that end, he has convened a Safe and Effective Justice Programme Advisory Group, featuring a wide range of authorities and advocates, and is holding a Criminal Justice Summit on August 20. “As well as victims’ voices, there will be those who’ve served sentences, psychologists and other specialists,” says Little. “I don’t want to do too much in the way of reforms and new laws until we’ve had the debate.”

His plan to repeal the three strikes law was shot down due to opposition from New Zealand First – which would have made the throw-away-the-key brigade happy. Little understands how people feel. “There are legitimate concerns,” he says. “People want to know they will be safe. The discourse of the last 30 years has played to that. It tends to focus on isolated and dramatic cases. But most offenders in prison aren’t at that end. We also have to acknowledge the voice of victims and the fact that the system hasn’t accommodated them very well. I’m confident there’s a lot more we can do. There will be a lot about victims.”

In a reactive political environment, Little will have to fight for vital cross-party support, but he’s sure there are many National MPs who can put the public good first. The appointment of former National MP Chester Borrows to chair the advisory group may serve to encourage the others. “I’ll certainly be reaching out and involving them in the discussion,” says Little. “Ideally, we’ll get to a point where we get as much cross-parliamentary agreement as we can.”

And then, perhaps, with goodwill, smart thinking and hard work, there’ll be fewer places in prison for people who shouldn’t be there.