The Christchurch Civic Creche Case
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	One News May 11 2007 Privy Council back in spotlight The latest twist in the David Bain case has thrown the spotlight back on the Privy Council. The Supreme Court is now New Zealand's ultimate authority, but some experts are questioning that decision. For over a century the Privy Council in London was the highest - and final - right of appeal for New Zealanders. However, that changed under the Supreme Court Act 2003 when it was scrapped in favour of a New Zealand Supreme Court. Cases where the Court of Appeal made its final judgment or decision before January 1 2004, like Bain's, are still being heard. In a 46 page report, the five law lords of the Privy Council found there was a substantial miscarriage of justice at Bain's 1995 trial for the murders of his parents and three siblings in 1994. His conviction was quashed and a retrial to be considered. But the promising outcome for Bain has now raised debated about whether New Zealand was right to change. "The Privy Council clearly has the geographical advantage which enables it to be totally objective," says criminal lawyer Stuart Grieve. However lawyer Greg King says the New Zealand Supreme Court provides far easier access to justice for far more New Zealanders. "Well I'm sure that David Bain agrees that the Privy Council was the preferable option, but all the Privy Council have done is really make an order for a re-trial. They are very careful to say we're are expressing no view at all on guilt or innocence," he says. Privy Council proponents say New Zealand's legal community is too small. Bain is a case in point - two of the judges who sat on his Court of Appeal hearings, and turned him down, now sit on the Supreme Court. While Supreme Court judges can excuse themselves from sitting on cases in which they have been previously involved, King believes another option is needed altogether. He wants a criminal cases review authority set up independent of the judiciary. "You've got cases like Peter Ellis, like Scott Watson, like David Bain...these are cases which normal rational New Zealanders have concerns about and there needs to be some mechanism in place where they can be properly assessed and investigated by someone that is not concerned with trial procedure, but is concerned with guilt or innocence," he says. However, legal professionals do agree that New Zealand's Supreme Court is here to stay and needs to be supported to ensure it provides appropriate justice to the New Zealand community.