Carl Bates: Whanganui MP launches bid to raise mandatory age for jury duty

A National MP wants to raise the age for mandatory jury duty. 

Under current legislation, the court registrar must excuse anyone over the age of 65 who's been summoned for jury service if they request it.

Whanganui MP Carl Bates has had his Member's Bill drawn today - proposing to raise automatic excusal from jury duty from 65 to 72.

He says this would update a very old law. 

"There's been a big shift in societal expectations and the way we work - and I trust our seniors to be able to fulfil jury duty."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Gray and breast Rich.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
Did you know for jury service in New Zealand just
gone eighteen after five you have to be sixty five.
You can't do it. If you're sixty five years or over,
you have automatic excusal from jury duty. And Nationally MP
wants to change all this and raise the age of
people on jury service to seventy two. Their Members Bill
has been drawn from the Biscuit Tin at Parliament and

(00:23):
that would raise the age of juris to seventy two.
Carl Bates is the National MP for Huangan Nui. His
Members Bill has just been drawn from the Biscuit Tin.
Carl is with us this evening, Carl, good evening.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Good evening, and happy new Year. Great to be on
the show.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
Great to have you. So I didn't even know this
rule existed. So what happens if you're sixty six and
you go into do jury service or you get called
up or do you not even get called out? What happens?

Speaker 1 (00:48):
So just a clarification there, maybe Ryan, So anyone over
the age of sixty five can still be called for
jury duty if on the elector role, they can receive
a summons, but they can either automatically get it excused
if they choose to exercise this right for an occasion
or permanently, so they can say, look, I'm sixty six,
to use your example, and I no longer want to

(01:10):
be called for jury duty ever in my life and
have permanent excuse or from jury duty.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
Ah, So what you're doing is saying they will have
to because at the moment they can opt out, you're
saying that they will have to do it if they're
sixty five to seventy two correc.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
So essentially, putting together a jury is a numbers game, really,
And last year, during a visit to a courtroom, staff
indicated me that it was far too easy for those
over the age of sixty five to press the unsubscribed button,
if you want to think about it that way. And
this increases the number of summons that they have to

(01:47):
send out, which obviously has an increase in associated costs,
processing times and all of that. And so this bill,
as you say, moves that age from sixty five to
seventy two, So anyone under the age of seventy two
would have to serve jury duty unless any of the
other normal reasons apply, like family commitments or health or

(02:09):
business or religious beliefs or the like.

Speaker 2 (02:12):
What would What was the thought behind this rule? I
guess was it for people who were in their retirement
age superannuation, they're not really interested or not capable. What
was the theory?

Speaker 1 (02:24):
Well, this came in a very long time ago, and
I think we've all seen over a number of years
there's been a big shift in societal expectations and the
way we work. And you know, I trust our seniors
to be able to fulfill jury duty, to be able
to exercise the role that they need to play on
a jury. And I think when you think about community organizations,

(02:47):
sports organizations, clubs, even our churches and schools and the like,
we have seniors participate in all of those running them,
supporting them, and I think jury duty really in twenty
twenty five is no different.

Speaker 2 (03:01):
All Right, nice one, Cayl. Thank you for that. Cal
Bates National MP for Huanganu. We'd love to know what
people think of that one. For more from Hither Duplessy,
Allen Drive listen live to news talks. It'd be from
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