Locke Keith: Policing (Involvement in Local Authority Elections) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Locke Keith: Policing (Involvement in Local Authority Elections) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Sitting date: 22 June 2010. Volume:664;Page:12051. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
KEITH LOCKE (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party opposes the Policing (Involvement in Local Authority Elections) Amendment Bill just as we supported the provision that was put in the Policing Act a year or two back with the support of New Zealand First and Labour and I am not sure who else. We supported the exclusion of police from serving on local bodies and I think there was a good reason at the time. The reasons were well outlined not only by the Greens but by Ron Mark; I think the previous speaker referred indirectly to him. Ron Mark of New Zealand First was very keen on that legislation. The Police Association was at that point and I think still is quite strongly against the exclusion of police officers and is quite in favour of the current bill. So the lines are pretty much the same. 
I think that essentially we have to have a clear separation of powers between the legislators—and that includes the local body legislators—the judiciary and the police as the implementers of the law. I do not think too many sitting judges have run for Parliament or local bodies and served on them. I think they see that they are bringing down decisions on cases of all sorts of citizens who come before them and that they should not confuse that role with being in charge of bringing in laws or by-laws as either parliamentarians or local body councillors. I think the police as the people who implement the law day to day have to be removed from any suspicion that they may be acting in a partisan or political way. That is the particular reason for serving police officers to be excluded. 
It is not like Clayton Cosgrove said just like other conflict of interest situations. Police officers are potentially in a conflict of interest every day they are on duty because during policing they could come across any other citizen including people who voted for them their colleagues on the local body etc. In some ways the provision that was put in the original law which we supported was put in also to protect the police themselves from any suspicion. If for example they told a car that was speeding down the road did not have its registration or was parked in the wrong place to stop and the driver happened to be some political antagonist another councillor or the wife or husband of a councillor there would be no suspicion that the police were acting in a partisan political manner. In most cases they would not be but the suspicion might be that that police officer who is a serving councillor is out to get this other officer who is also a sitting councillor. I think that provision avoided that situation. 
In no way is this a criticism of officers who have served on councils. I know that when the original bill came up I had a chat to Alf Filipaina whom I know well. He is a serving officer who was on the Manukau City Council. He is a great chap and a great community constable and has done tremendous things. If we look just at him and how he has managed the situation we might say there is a bit of an argument to not stop him doing both jobs. But if we look at it at a deeper level and in terms of wanting to remove the conflicts of interest then we should not allow that situation to take place. 
There was reference to the military before and how the military by their own internal system do not allow people to run for office and I think there is a good reason for that. But if it is good enough for the military there is even more reason for the police to do so. The military are not dealing with people day to day on the streets and are less likely to be in a conflict of interest situation than the police are. 
If we add it all up we see that it is important to keep that separation of powers among the judiciary the police and the legislators and not to confuse the roles. For that reason the Green Party is opposing this bill.