Editorial: Rape-claims inquiry has lost its way

Opinion

It has taken 20 years for Louise Nicholas to get her claims, that she was raped by policemen, taken seriously. It has taken 17 years for Judith Garrett to be heard on her complaint that she, too, was raped by a policeman. But it has taken just 15 months for the commission of inquiry into police conduct to become so circumscribed that one could question if anything useful will come from it.

To work, the commission must be thorough, specific and public. By last Friday, it had become general and largely secret.

This is a commission of inquiry which has lost its way in a thicket of worries over court suppression orders and the need for a fair trial for any police accused. It should either be delayed until any trials are over, or reconstituted with a fearless mandate. Either would be better than the slow reduction we have now.

The problems for the commission, announced by Prime Minister Helen Clark in February last year, stem from fears that its inquiries could prejudice the right to a fair trial of anyone arrested in the Nicholas or Garrett investigations. This is a legitimate concern. So last month, Attorney-General Michael Cullen announced a change to the commission's mandate. It would no longer look at specific cases but police conduct generally.

Four weeks later, the commission announced it would now hold its investigations largely behind closed doors. It would also not look at anything that the police are investigating or that has gone to trial.

Yet this commission was set up to throw light on to the murky question of whether the police do enough to investigate their own. The public were shocked by the cases of Judith Garrett and Louise Nicholas and, rightly, wanted an inquiry that publicly answered the troubling questions raised by the women.

But in a remarkably short time the commission has been reduced to the point where it will not achieve that. The time has come, then, to rethink the commission.

The most obvious solution is to delay it until any trials are out of the way. Any accused need a fair trial. Justice should be done. But justice also needs to be seen to be done at the commission - with open hearings and open discussion.

The Prime Minister herself said when announcing the commission that it was "better to do it properly than a rush job which leaves the public unsatisfied". Yet that is what the commission risks now, leaving the public unsatisfied.

Another option could be to reconstitute the commission with its original aims but give it the power to suppress incriminating discussions until any trials are finished. But whatever the options, the current situation is unsatisfactory.

The commission was set up to answer public questions raised by the cases of Louise Nicholas and Judith Garrett. That is not something that should be left to the courts. Their role is to apportion blame - if there is any. The commission's function was originally to investigate, explain and censure. Now it will do none of those things in the Garrett or Nicholas cases.

It is no wonder that Judith Garrett was furious at the commission's decision to hold hearings behind closed doors. She had waited a long time to bring her story into the open. Now the commission may not hear it at all. Neither will the public.