DAVID GARRETT (ACT): It is rather surreal sitting here and listening to this debate about ideology from the other side of House. Let me get this right. I will go slowly. Your ideology is like this: State control good—

The CHAIRPERSON (Eric Roy): Order!

DAVID GARRETT: I am sorry, Mr Chairperson. I meant Labour—and the Greens even more so, but I will come to them in a moment. Labour’s ideology is: State control good, private enterprise bad. So to say that this measure is driven by some sort of mad, right-wing, privatising market ideology is really quite amusing. I expected far better from the Hon Rick Barker, whom I happen to respect considerably as a man of integrity and experience. But my incredulity was increased even more when the Hon Lianne Dalziel got to her feet. She is a graduate of the same law school I went to.

Hon Darren Hughes: She got better marks.

DAVID GARRETT: I doubt that, actually, I say to Mr Hughes. We can compare academic records any time the member likes. When I was at law school our court hierarchy went like this: the District Court, the High Court, the Court of Appeal, and the Privy Council. Now, thanks to a—thankfully departed—politician, who is now on the far side of the world, our hierarchy of courts is like this: the District Court, the High Court, the Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court—that monstrosity over the road.

Ms Dalziel was at law school before me, and at no time, to my knowledge—and I have done a wee bit of legal history—has the Supreme Court of Israel been part of our court hierarchy. I find it very amusing that Ms Dalziel stands there brandishing a judgment from the Supreme Court of Israel and cites it with approval. If I am not much mistaken, I have heard that party over there, Labour, and certainly that one down there, the Greens, bagging the country of Israel at great length and on many occasions. Those parties say they are Zionists and have oppressed the Palestinians. Well, I happen to agree with them. Israel did not come into an uninhabited desert, as they would have us believe, and make orange groves out of nothing. They came in and drove the Palestinians out. So for Ms Dalziel to be quoting the Supreme Court of Israel is, as her colleague Mr Cosgrove says frequently, a bit rich. So that is point No. 1.

Now, talking of ideology, the more ideological party here is the Greens. Former Green member Mr Tanczos has admitted in this House that although the Auckland Central Remand Prison had better indicators on suicide, suicide attempts, violence to guards, and violence by prisoners against each other—he admitted that all that was true—the Greens were against it. He admitted that even if that result were repeated in spades, the Greens would be against it. That is ideology, is it not? Let me ask the Green Party a question. Let us say, for example, that a private prison, run in conjunction with an iwi, reduces Māori recidivism from 70 or 80 percent, as it is now, to 25 percent in 5 years. I ask Mr Clendon whether the Green Party would still be opposed to private prisons. The answer is yes, because of ideology. It does not matter what works. It does not matter what the indicators are. The Greens would be opposed to it. What about Mr Hipkins? If we establish a private prison—and it will happen, as the member knows—and if in 5 years the recidivism rate is 25 percent less than it is now, will you still be opposed to it?

Chris Hipkins: There is no evidence.

DAVID GARRETT: No, just answer the question—it is quite simple. Would you still be opposed to it?

Chris Hipkins: It’s completely hypothetical.

DAVID GARRETT: You obviously have not read the Standing Orders. You are allowed to ask hypothetical questions in here, even in question time.

I simply make the point that on the limited experience we have, private prison operation works. We will give it a go. We will see. ACT is supposed to be the ideological party, but on this occasion we in ACT say “Let us see what works.”