The way in which children are questioned in forensic contexts can impact on the accuracy of their responses. Past studies have shown that children were often questioned in the New Zealand courts in ways that profoundly contradict best practice. This study analyses the questions posed to 18 child witnesses by forensic interviewers, prosecutors, and defence lawyers during criminal trials held in New Zealand courts in 2008. The results suggest that, as was found in earlier studies, many of the questions posed to children during cross-examination in particular were inconsistent with best practice in terms of eliciting full and accurate information from children. Indeed, the heavy reliance on closed, leading and complex questions, along with other common practices, casts doubt on the forensic safety of cross-examination, calling into question its fairness for children. The implications of these results for policy and practice are explored.

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This paper reports on lawyers’ and victim advisors’ experiences with nine pre-recorded hearings involving young people as witnesses in criminal court cases in Auckland. Focus groups, interviews and a questionnaire were used to elicit perceived advantages and disadvantages, issues in the preparation for hearings, conducting the hearings and showing the pre-recordings at trial. Although the sample is not large enough to generate definitive conclusions, 21 of 24 participants described pre-recorded hearings positively with only two prosecutors and one defence counsel expressing concern about increasing the use of pre-recording in the future. Participants raised a series of practice issues which could readily be addressed. Presuming provision to recall the child if necessary, late or incomplete disclosure from third parties is the only significant challenge to these pre-recorded hearings. The logistical challenge of accessing timely relevant information from child protection records was overcome in Auckland through the development of an inter-agency protocol. Pre-recording children’s and young people’s entire evidence appeared to be a constructive contribution to the criminal justice system.

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As part of its 2012 Youth Service package, the Government has introduced compulsory income management for recipients of the new Youth Payment and Young Parent Payment benefits. The scheme involves dividing beneficiaries’ payments between automatic redirections for rent and other bills, an electronic payment card that can only be used for food and groceries and a cash payment of no more than $50 per week The only other country to operate comparable programmes is Australia which introduced income management in 2007 as part of the Northern Territory Emergency Response. This paper presents a preliminary assessment of the income management scheme introduced in the Youth Service package. We examine the design of, and apparent rationale for, the policy and consider some of its implications. We also compare the New Zealand policy with the way income management operates in Australia. We conclude that there is no evidence of widespread poor expenditure patterns amongst the two target groups that might justify the blanket application of the policy; that the design of the scheme inhibits people’s ability to budget optimally; and risks a number of negative and perverse outcomes. It appears that the rationale underlying the use of income management is to deter benefit receipt rather than to assist with financial management. In our view, this is not an appropriate use of the policy, especially if in doing so the scheme also risks negative outcomes.

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While language specialists and legal professionals have voiced concerns about the language used to question child witnesses in the Aotearoa/NZ courts, it is unclear whether both groups share a common understanding of what those language problems are. This study compares five Aotearoa/NZ defence lawyers’ and two England/Wales intermediaries’ perceptions of the developmental (in)appropriateness of the language used to question an 11-year-old witness, based on their assessment of the witness’ anonymised trial transcript. The comparison showed that both groups agreed on the categories of language features that might confuse children, however, intermediaries identified many more instances of problematic language within those categories than lawyers. Training on developmentally appropriate language and pre-trial preparation of questions would certainly help lawyers improve the comprehensibility of their questions. However, the implementation of a full intermediary scheme, such as that in England/Wales, probably offers the best prospects for a sustained sea change in questioning practices.

This article derives from doctoral research on the ability of Angeles City's poor and marginalized biracial children to exercise their rights, including, but not limited to, children who were offspring of Filipina sex workers and foreign sex tourists. To illustrate the research context, this paper starts with a discussion of Angeles City and its biracial children. Next, the study's Maka-Pilipinong design is explained, particularly the application of a Filipina as worldview and dangal as a lens. Details about the relevance of the Philippine oral traditions with Sikolohiyang Pilipino (SP) are also provided. The final part of the article reports on the primary researcher's fieldwork experience.