Hipkins Chris: Wanganui District Council (Prohibition of Gang Insignia) Bill — In Committee 
Hipkins Chris: Wanganui District Council (Prohibition of Gang Insignia) Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:653;Page:2563] 
CHRIS HIPKINS (Labour—Rimutaka) 
: 
 I am happy to take a call on clause 6 which states: “No person may display gang insignia at any time in a specified place in the district.” and makes one of the penalties for that a fine of $2000. I thought I would consider some of the innocent members of the public who could if this legislation is used incorrectly be impacted by it. When I wondered what would be a good example to draw on I thought of the ACT Party. I know that Mr Garrett from ACT has some strong views on this bill and I wondered whether the ACT Party could be impacted by it. 
The bill states that people may not “display gang insignia at any time in a specified place in the district” so let us think first of all about the definition of gang insignia. Clause 4(1) states that gang insignia “(a) means a sign symbol or representation commonly displayed to denote membership of an affiliation with or support for a gang; and (b) includes any item of clothing to which a sign symbol or representation … is attached”. Let us think for example about Rodney Hide’s bright yellow jacket. If we take out the word “gang” we see clearly that Rodney Hide’s bright yellow jacket meets the definition of gang insignia. 
Let us consider the definition of a gang. Clause 5(3) states that a gang “has the following characteristics: (a) a common name or common identifying signs symbols or representations;”. Well the ACT Party clearly has those does it not? It has a common name identified signs and symbols and so on. 
Under clause 5(3)(b) a gang is a group whose “members associates or supporters individually or collectively promote encourage or engage in a pattern of criminal activity.” I thought that the ACT Party could not be covered by that definition but actually it can because Rodney Hide went on TV not long ago and encouraged members of the public to break the law. Is that not right? I cannot remember the exact provision of the Building Act he was referring to but he was encouraging people to breach the Building Act. So Rodney Hide suddenly meets all the criteria for the ACT Party to be deemed to be a gang. 
Moana Mackey 
: Let’s vote for it! 
CHRIS HIPKINS 
: Maybe we should vote for it—I do not know. That is a worry—who else could be covered by this bill? Just today or maybe yesterday Kate Wilkinson encouraged retailers to breach the law. So suddenly National meets all the requirements to be deemed to be a gang. Let us look at some of the penalties that could be imposed. Those members could be arrested on the spot for wearing their gang patch. If National members wore their National Party rosettes in Wanganui and went to an area where gang patches were prohibited they could potentially be arrested. We might think that that could not happen because those members would know they were not allowed to wear their National Party rosettes in the specified places in case they were deemed to be gang members. Clause 5A “Signposting of specified places” states that those places must be signposted. But as my colleague Grant Robertson pointed out earlier in the debate those signposts will end up taking pride of place in gang headquarters around the country so there will be no signposting. 
The other way we could find out about specified places would be to go to the council building to inspect the by-laws which this bill allows people to do. But as I pointed out the other day in order to go to the council building to inspect the by-laws the members would first have to go into the area where they were prohibited from wearing their gang insignia. Suddenly our ACT and National colleagues who were wearing their insignia—and who met all the requirements in this bill to deem them to be gang members—would be breaking the law by going into a specified area in order to find out what the law was in the first place. This really highlights does it not the risks in making these kinds of laws on an ad hoc basis. 
Fundamentally the National Government knows that this is a bad bill because we are discussing it only as a local bill on members’ day. National does not support this bill enough to make it a Government bill that applies to the whole country. If National members thought that this bill was worthy of pursuit they would pick it up. This would not be just a local bill; it would apply to the whole country.