Victims of crime say they've been frozen out of the Government's justice summit and reforms, prompting the Justice Minister to consider holding a specific victims only version of the conference
Andrew Little acknowledges the summit's focus was initially more on offenders, but what the summit did hear from victims was both moving and shocking.
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Twins Tane and Aka Pakeha, 13, have been through more than most could bear to imagine.
Their mother Talla, whose image they wear on their T-shirts, died when they were five. Their father was so out of it on P that paramedics couldn't get to her in time to treat the asthma attack that killed her.
"We still remember her, and she was so beautiful," Tane says. "She was the best mum in the world."
Aka says their mother was a victim of domestic violence.
"My dad was a violent person."
They were beaten by him as well; the boys tried to tell neighbours and get help, but no one paid attention.
"Being a little kid, it was really hard and no one would listen to you," Tane says.
The twins now perform to give children a voice, and were centre stage at the Justice Summit on Wednesday - but other victims of crime felt sidelined.
"This has been quite a horrendous summit for victims of crime, because we've been re-victimised," Jayne Crothall told the room.
Her daughter would have turned 25 today if she hadn't been the victim of horrific violence.
"[My attacker] smashed my body to pieces, fractured my skull, broke teeth. What I didn't know was that my little three-year-old daughter in the next room had already been murdered."
Ms Crothall wants victims to be a focus of the Government's justice reforms.
"I definitely think we've been frozen out," she told Newshub.
Justice Minister Little denied freezing victims out of the process, but acknowledges those who feel they don't have a voice.
"I hear that, and certainly when you look at yesterday it was certainly very dominated by the needs of offenders."
Black Power member Denis O'Reilly believes helping offenders and victims isn't mutually exclusive.
"People who have been hurt, hurt, so the interests of the victim are only solved by resolving the victimiser," he told Newshub.
The Justice Minister is now considering another summit with a focus specifically on victims.
The issues raised on Wednesday speak to how fraught justice reform is - and when it all comes back to Parliament, it's likely to be a monumental political scrap.
Newshub.
