“The current supply of restorative justice services is clearly inadequate to cope with the increased demand that will flow from legislative changes. And it will take time to build capacity in the sector, without short-changing the process.”
In the meantime, Professor Chris Marshall, Chair in Restorative Justice at Victoria Univeristy of Wellington suggests, there is room in the legislation for the Registrar to decide that, given current resourcing, “an appropriate restorative justice process” cannot be accessed for all potentially eligible cases.
“An ‘appropriate process’ is one where skilled facilitators have the opportunity to consult with all the parties individually, and the parties have adequate time to reach an informed decision and go through the process.
“If pressure of numbers makes this impossible in every case where there is a guilty plea and a known victim, it would make sense to allocate available resources to those cases where restorative justice could make most difference.”
These are mainly the cases, Professor Marshall says, where significant personal harm or loss has been inflicted by the offending and where both parties feel ready and prepared to meet one another.
“I would encourage judges, prosecutors and community providers to work together on finding ways to focus available services at the more serious end of the spectrum and to ensure that restorative justice is not reduced to a check box process.”