Hon STEVEN JOYCE (Minister of Transport) Link to this
I move, That, pursuant to section 8A(2) of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner and Judicial Conduct Panel Act 2004, this House recommend His Excellency the Governor-General appoint Mr Alan Deans Ritchie of Wellington as the Deputy Judicial Conduct Commissioner for a term of five years from the date of appointment having noted that the Attorney-General advises this House, in accordance with section 8A(3) of the Act, that the Chief Justice has been consulted about the proposed appointment. The Judicial Conduct Commissioner and Judicial Conduct Panel Act 2004 came into effect on 1 August 2005. The role of deputy commissioner was established by section 8A of the Act as recently amended. The Act provides for the Office of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner and sets out a statutory regime for dealing with complaints about judges’ conduct. If appropriate the commissioner or the deputy commissioner may recommend the appointment of a judicial conduct panel to inquire into any matter about the conduct of a judge.
The Act established processes that recognise and protect the requirement of judicial independence and natural justice. The deputy commissioner will perform the commissioner’s functions when the commissioner has a conflict of interest or is otherwise unavailable to address a complaint. In performing these functions the deputy commissioner will be required to act independently.
The Attorney-General has received support from all parties for the appointment of Mr Alan Ritchie as the Deputy Judicial Conduct Commissioner. Mr Ritchie was admitted as a barrister and solicitor in 1971. He practised with Spencer and Ritchie in Ashburton and Chapman Tripp in Wellington for some 12 years. He has been a consultant to the New Zealand Law Society since 2008 and was the chief executive officer and executive director from 1985 to 2008. He is also a member of the New Zealand Parole Board. In 2008 Mr Ritchie spent 3 to 4 months deputising for the previous Judicial Conduct Commissioner. The term of appointment must be for not less than 2 years and not more than 5. It is proposed that Mr Ritchie be appointed for 5 years. The deputy commissioner is remunerated at a rate set by the Remuneration Authority and the current commissioner is Sir David Gascoigne.
CHARLES CHAUVEL (Labour) Link to this
Although it is always a pleasure to hear from Mr Joyce, it is a shame that the Attorney-General was not able to move the motion we have just heard, because it would have been too difficult to resist the temptation to remind the Attorney-General of what he said when it was first proposed by the Labour Government that the Office of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner be created. He said: “The Labour Party approach is illustrated by this foolish legislation: set up an office, create procedures, appoint a commissioner, and then bring on the inevitable amendment bill that seeks to appoint a deputy commissioner.” Well, he was quite right, except, of course, that an amendment bill came in under the National Government last year. “The next thing we will have is a registrar, a council of worthies, hundreds of bureaucrats, and, lo and behold, a culture of complaint being encouraged and nurtured. There are plenty of litigants out there who, having lost their cases, will personalise them against judges. They are encouraged by this ridiculous regime to make complaints.” I suppose it is different being in Government, as we saw with the flip-flop over the therapeutic goods administration earlier in the week.
Turning to the merits of the motion, I tell members that new sections 8A and 8B of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner and Judicial Conduct Panel Act 2004 now provide for an office called the Deputy Judicial Conduct Commissioner, and I remember the debates we had in the House on this last year. The reality is that the Judicial Conduct Commissioner has become an important office. It is a place where people feel that they can go when they have a concern about the way they have been treated in our court system that they do not like. As a result, the number of people seeking to use the office has increased greatly.
I looked at the annual report of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner from last year, where Sir David Gascoigne takes great care to recount the level and volume of complaints that have been made to his office. It is instructive to consider that report, because it indicates that not only have people found the office to be a useful place to take concerns and complaints but also the number of complaints that have been found to have any substance is very, very small. So I think we can take double comfort from this. First, people are using the office—hence the need for a deputy to the Judicial Conduct Commissioner. But, secondly, many of the complaints are not being upheld. So people have a safety valve. They have somewhere they can go if they do not feel well treated and they get a decent process. The complaint is investigated, and, no doubt, they feel they have had a fair hearing as a result of the process. But in the end it is confirmed that, generally speaking, we have a judiciary that is working well, because most of the complaints are not upheld. So there are two reasons to be pleased about the way this office is working and the fact that it has been introduced.
The other comment that is useful to note in the report of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner is that the judiciary itself has been very cooperative with the Office of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner. Judges are independent: they have tenure, they are not public servants, and they are under no duty to cooperate with any statutory officer whom we may appoint. The fact that they have almost universally adopted an approach that is cooperative indicates that they too have come to welcome this move as one that enhances confidence in the judicial process and in our judiciary—a very important pillar, one of the three, in our constitution. They are things that I think are appropriate to put on record, particularly given certain events over the last year.
Mr Ritchie is somebody who is known to any lawyer who practised during the period that he was executive director of the New Zealand Law Society. I was admitted to the Bar in 1989; he began working at the New Zealand Law Society in 1985. All communications from the society were signed by him, and he was a figure who I think was regarded as somebody who worked diligently as an administrator in the society. As the motion from the Attorney-General on the Order Paper records, as is required by the Act, this is an appointment that the Chief Justice concurred with, so we can fully expect that the cooperation that has been extended to Sir David Gascoigne in his role as Chief Judicial Conduct Commissioner will be extended also to Alan Ritchie, as his deputy. We can fully expect that the confidence that has been enhanced in the judiciary by the existence of this office and its fair and full processing of complaints will also continue.
There are other things that this House needs to look forward to. One member has already foreshadowed a proposal to bring forward a register of judicial pecuniary interests, and members on this side of the House have indicated that we approve of that general approach and would support it. It is necessary in this day and age that every public official appointed or elected acts with appropriate transparency, and it is inevitable that that is the direction in which we are moving. It is something that, rather than running from, all actors in the constitutional drama should actually embrace. But, as I say, the appointment of Alan Ritchie is supported by members on this side, and we hope that his work as the inaugural Deputy Judicial Conduct Commissioner will continue to bolster the important work that the Office of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner conducts, in terms of assuring people that the judiciary is somewhere they can go for a fair and full disposal of the litigation they may wish to engage in.
SUE KEDGLEY (Green) Link to this
The Green Party also supports and welcomes the appointment of Mr Alan Ritchie as Deputy Judicial Conduct Commissioner. He has had a very distinguished—indeed, exemplary—legal career, and I think he is very well suited to this new role.
I agree with the previous speaker, Charles Chauvel, that although the Office of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner is reasonably new, it has established itself as an important place of last resort that people can go to when they feel aggrieved by the court process. It is important that we have these checks and safety valves. We are very pleased that this body exists, and that people, as I said, have a place of last resort where they can go.
I agree also with the previous speaker that we look forward to having a judicial register of pecuniary interests. Kennedy Graham, a Green MP, has a member’s bill on this issue awaiting consideration by this House, and we hope that it will be considered soon or taken up by the Government.
I repeat that we very much welcome Mr Ritchie’s appointment, and we believe he will bring great strengths to the important role of the Office of the Judicial Conduct Commissioner.
Hon DAVID PARKER (Labour) Link to this
I rise to take a brief call also in support of this appointment. Alan Ritchie is well-known to most members of the legal community in New Zealand who have held practising certificates for a while. Indeed, he has a lot of experience already when it comes to running disciplinary proceedings and trying to winnow out whether there is an issue to be dealt with in response to somebody’s complaint. Of course, in his role as Deputy Judicial Conduct Commissioner, what he will be trying to do is ascertain whether a complaint made is founded on any basis. If it not founded on any sound basis, it will be rejected pretty pre-emptorily, and if it is, in his view, then the complaint will go a bit further and he will look into it further or create a process that properly considers it.
Mr Ritchie had a similar role to that when he was at the New Zealand Law Society for many years and was secretary of the New Zealand Law Society, I think—
—executive director—for more than a decade, I think from memory. During the period of his tenure there were some problems in various nominee companies in the legal fraternity, which resulted in a loss, initially, to contributors, but which was repaid by the Lawyers Fidelity Fund, thus forcing good lawyers—well, not forcing but having them do what good lawyers then had to do as a consequence of their professional duties—to top up the fidelity fund to meet what were very significant frauds. That of course then led to the Law Society taking action against those errant lawyers who had misused the money of their clients, although that money had been reimbursed by other lawyers. The particular lawyers who had caused the problem were effectively brought to heel and kicked out of the Law Society, and that assessment of those complaints against lawyers, in that case, would have been something that Mr Ritchie had a role in.
This new role in the judicial conduct arena is probably more important, and there is no doubt in my mind that Mr Ritchie is a suitable appointment to the role. I do see slight irony in the fact that the amending legislation has been promoted by Mr Finlayson, who spoke so stridently against it when in Opposition. But that matter has already been covered properly by Mr Chauvel, and I have nothing further to add.