Nicole McKee
Spokesperson
Fair and Reasonable Campaign
Day One:
I’m now out of our first day of hearings and a “Zoom” meeting with our lawyers. Of course a result is impossible to predict, and I make this observation as a non-lawyer, but it appeared Justice Cooke really engaged on the arguments we made.
The Judge certainly made our QC earn his fee! The whole day was full of detailed legal questions and clarifications from the Judge as Jack Hodder QC presented our case. It wasn’t until 4:30pm that we finished our case and the Crown began its defence.
The Court spent most of the day discussing the issue of compensation and whether Stuart Nash had the ability to provide compensation for banned ammunition. Our argument is largely that there is a common law right to compensation when you a deprived of your property rights – an important issue that goes well beyond the question of compensation for ammunition. There was a detailed discussion on the case law for the principle – our case is that it does not matter that possession was criminalised (rather than in most of the cases, which are about Government confiscating property), compensation must still be made. If you are interested you can read our written submissions here.
The Judge was also looking at the intent of Parliament closely – what did Parliament intend to ban, how much decision-making power did MPs intended to give to the Minister, and whether Parliament considered the issue of compensation. As Parliament is the ultimate decision-maker, what MPs were looking at when they gave the Police Minister the ability to prohibit certain types of ammunition is key.
This afternoon the Court looked at the detail of the types of ammunition that were banned – focusing on enhanced penetration and tracer. There is a lot of detail, including evidence from our expert witnesses, in our submissions. What is clear is that the Police Minister did not seek to make a decision that would make us any safer.
Stuff and Radio NZ had journalists in court/watching via private video link. You can read the Stuff coverage here, and listen to the Radio NZ story here.
Once the Crown’s lawyers have finished presenting their oral arguments, our lawyers get a right of reply.
Day Two:
The hearing wrapped up early – at about 1 pm today. A shorter day that was focused on the Crown’s response, and the reply from our QC Jack Hodder. The Crown, as you might have seen on Stuff, argued that the Minister didn’t even have to give LFO’s compensation for firearms let alone ammunition. This was a pretty disappointing admission from the Crown that they believe the Government should just be able to take an individual’s property without paying for it.
Our QC hit back on this strongly arguing that regardless of how the Government takes one’s property – whether they physically take it from you or ban you from having it – you are legally entitled to compensation. The Herald also covered the story. The Judge also sent the Crown away with some homework to do. He believes that there is likely to be more paperwork on the decision to not give compensation for ammunition than what was provided to the Court. It will be interesting to see what that unearths.
We finished the hearing by returning to the heart of the issue. The Government claimed that all the firearm changes were to make us safer but there was little said by the Crown on how the decision on ammunition did so. What happens next?We can’t predict when the Judge will issue his decision but we are hoping that it will be well before the election. A positive outcome, in this case, would send a strong signal to all politicians that you if make unjustified policy decisions that trample on property rights you will be held to account.
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