John MacDonald: Where's the justice in concurrent prison sentences?

Canterbury Mornings with John MacDonald

Nothing brings out the redneck in me as much as a judge handing out a concurrent prison sentence.

You know the situation. A person’s found guilty on, say, two charges —let’s say they get two-year sentences for each— but they don’t go to prison for two years plus two years (four years), instead, they serve the sentences concurrently. Meaning they’re serving both sentences at the same time.

It’s something the Government is turning its attention to with these tougher sentencing laws it’s cracking on with, but I don’t think it’s going far enough.

It’s introducing legislation to deliver the tougher sentences it promised prior to the election. Paul Goldsmith, the Justice Minister, says the changes are going to mean criminals will “face real consequences for crime and victims are prioritised”, saying there has been a trend in recent years where courts have handed-out fewer and shorter prison sentences.

Stupidly, he’s saying that the legislation changes will help ensure there will be 20,000 fewer victims of crime within five years and that serious repeat offending by young people will be down by 15 percent.

I say stupidly because the Government has no idea whether that will happen or not. It might be its target. But, anyway, they’re a couple of outcomes the Government thinks we will see as a result of these tougher sentences.

And it’s all the stuff that people have been talking about and the politicians have been banging-on about for a while: the legislation is going to put limits on sentencing discounts judges can apply.

It’s going to mean harsher penalties for anyone involved in crimes against sole-charge workers or at places where people live and work. So that’s your dairies, where the family lives out the back or upstairs.

Young people who commit crimes over and over again can forget about sentence discounts because of their age or because they say “sorry”.

But the one that I’m most interested in, is what the new legislation is going to do about concurrent sentencing. Which I think is a good start, but I also think the Government should be doing more, going further on this one.

As it stands at the moment, through this new legislation, the Government is going to encourage judges to hand out cumulative sentences for crimes committed by people on bail, in custody or on parole - instead of concurrent sentences.

So if they’re in custody and commit a crime in prison, that’ll get added to the time they’re already serving. If they’re on bail and commit more than one crime and they’re sent back to prison, they’ll serve time for each crime. Not concurrently. The same if they’re on parole.

And, as far as I’m concerned, these are all good things. I don't necessarily think that this will stop these people from re-offending, because I’ve never bought the argument that tougher sentences stop people from offending.

Because, most of the time, their heads aren’t screwed on properly, anyway. And thinking about the punishment they might get if they’re caught is probably the last thing they’re thinking about at the time.

But these changes are great for victims of crime and their sense of justice. But, as I said earlier, I don’t think the Government is going far enough.

I think we need to pretty much do away with concurrent sentences for all crimes. For all criminals. Because how can anyone think it is fair and reasonable to send someone away for the least amount of time?

Which is what happens when someone serves their sentences concurrently. They’ve done multiple crimes, they’ve been found guilty on each of them, there is a punishment for each crime, but —in real terms— they are punished as if they’ve only committed one crime.

And I reckon that if the Government was really serious, it would be doing away with concurrent sentences altogether.

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