Sir Ron Young: Former High Court judge discusses mandatory sentences policy

A law expert says the court system can be fixed by understanding facts - not mandatory sentences. 

Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith hasn't ruled out the policy which would see a minimum standard set for various crimes. 

Judges currently have discretion to give discounts based on aggravating or mitigating circumstances. 

Former High Court judge Sir Ron Young says New Zealand has a lot of people in prison as it is. 

He told Heather du Plessis-Allan the courts are already on the heavy end of sentencing, with people serving up to 20 years for murder compared to just ten, 30 years ago. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Looks like the government is considering a major change to
our sentencing laws and that it might introduce minimum sentences. Now,
we already obviously have maximum sentences that can be handed out,
but as it stands, no minimum Sir Ron Young is
a former High Court judge and with us now.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Ron, hello, Hello, how are you heaven?

Speaker 1 (00:15):
Very well? Thank you? Do you think we should have minimums?

Speaker 2 (00:19):
No? No, it's going to cause an injustice that because
it will mean the judges can't take into the facts
of the case and they can't take into account the
offender's personal circumstances, and that's going to mean that they'll
be unfair and unjust.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
Sense Well, they can, can't they They can take it
into account to a point, but not beyond that point.
Is that not fair?

Speaker 2 (00:41):
Well, many of the situations will likely occur where the
minimum sentences actually too long based on a proper assessment
of the facts and the personal circumstances, So they won't
be able to do so in those circumstances, and justices
will occur.

Speaker 1 (00:59):
So part of what is going on here is a
reaction to the fact that the judiciary, in handing out
what the public may consider too light a sentence is
losing the confidence of the public. How do you fix that?

Speaker 2 (01:09):
Yeah, well you fix it by understanding the facts. I mean,
thirty years ago, people who were convicted of murder and
sentenced in life imprisonment generally served around about ten years
before they were released. It's now fifteen, eighteen, twenty years.
Sentences for rape were three or four years thirty years ago.
And in our eight to nine years public have gone

(01:32):
a completely wrong idea about the kind of level of sentencing.
New Zealand has a heck of a lot of people
in prison compared with most of other similar countries, so
we're not light in sentencing. We're actually at the heavy end.

Speaker 1 (01:47):
Have you done any comparisons as to the cumulative sentence
discount that is handed down how that compares to historically.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Sure, I mean, sentences have got much much heavyer in
the last thirty years. And the I mean, the cumulative
concurrent issue is as I think, a bit of a
red herring, because sentences do take into account the total
number of offenses and how they work across the various crime.

Speaker 1 (02:15):
What I mean, ron is we've got judges handing out
sentence discounts of you know, in some cases seventy to
eighty percent, which is enormous.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Is that normal? No, And I in fact agree with
the limitation on forty percent. I think that's fair enough
because I do think the sentence must bear a relationship
to the criminal offending. So that's an area where I
do think seventy and eighty percent is wrong and I
think that it does undermine that connection, that important connection

(02:45):
between what you do and what the punishment is.

Speaker 1 (02:48):
Ron, it's good to talk to you. Thank you for
your time. That sir Ron Young, former High Court judge,
chairperson of the New Zealand Parole Board. For more from
the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen live to news talks that'd
be from six

Speaker 2 (02:58):
Am weekdays, or follow the plodcast on iHeartRadio