Simon Power MP
National Party Justice & Corrections Spokesman

7 December 2007

Corrections learns nothing from parole disasters

Corrections has clearly learnt nothing from the William Bell and Graeme Burton parole disasters, says National’s Justice & Corrections spokesman, Simon Power.

He is commenting on a report that a convicted killer who had to be moved after being paroled to live next door to the daughter of the woman he killed, was then moved to near her workplace, meaning she had to pass within 100 metres of his house every day.

“This department continues to fail the victims of crime as it stumbles from blunder to blunder.

“Has it learnt nothing from the horrendous crimes of William Bell and Graeme Burton, who both offended while on parole?

“We need to be hearing much more from Corrections Minister Phil Goff about how he’s going to fix this.

“He should make it his personal mission to make sure victims are given more input into the parole process in light of this double fiasco.

“Five years ago he promised to improve the process. He said then that new laws would make mistakes like this a thing of the past, and that the Parole Board should be ‘more open in providing information’ to victims.

“But what happened? Nothing – and I’m not expecting miracles from the new Minister of Justice, either.

“As the Ombudsman said just this week, the public will have no confidence in the criminal justice system as long as this type of thing continues to occur.”

ENDS

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