Borrows Chester: General Debate 
Borrows Chester: General Debate 
[Volume:647;Page:16692] 
CHESTER BORROWS (National—Whanganui) 
: 
 It is interesting to note that the previous speaker Lianne Dalziel started talking about youth justice programmes because in South Auckland at the moment there is a man called Steve Boxer. He runs a very successful youth justice programme along the lines of a military-style programme. Only 2 weeks ago he was in the newspaper saying that his programme would fall over because it is underfunded by the Government and that the Government refuses to give it the money it needs—in the very area that we have been learning about this week down in South Auckland. 
What has become very plain over the last few days is that violent crime is out of control around the country and in South Auckland and the Prime Minister does not know it. Members will recall that yesterday when John Key asked questions around violent crime statistics for South Auckland the Prime Minister put it all down to the reporting of family violence. That is it. She said that it all has to do with TV ads; there is no increase in violent crime. What did we hear today from the Prime Minister? When John Key talked about the murder of Navtej Singh what did she say? She said that one swallow does not make a spring. Well for goodness’ sake! I ask how abhorrent that is to anybody who has paid any attention to this incident because Mr Singh is not just one victim; he is the fifth shop owner in the South Auckland area who has been murdered since this Government has been in power—the fifth. And she says that one swallow does not make a spring. 
You know I spent Friday and Saturday in South Auckland. I went to five different meetings with the Indian community talking about the threat to retailers and about the way they are responding to it. I also went to the Singh family home and I spoke to members of the family. I also spoke to members of another family whose son had been badly beaten. What became abundantly clear was that robberies are occurring in South Auckland on a daily basis at knifepoint or with baseball bats. People are being beaten property is being stolen and it is going unreported. It is going unreported because the victims do not believe that the police have the ability or in some cases the willingness to be able to respond. 
I would bet anyone that all the South Auckland Labour MPs have had the same message and I believe that they have the integrity to tell the Prime Minister what they are hearing. What I do not believe the Prime Minister has is the integrity to listen to her own members. Hence the stuff-up that has occurred this week where we have the Prime Minister saying that there is no complaint going before the Independent Police Conduct Authority and we have George Hawkins saying that he is assisting the people to put together a complaint that is to go before the Independent Police Conduct Authority. 
I want to make another point on the back of what Mrs Collins said and it is this. The police received a hell of a lot of criticism about the way they went in on the night with regard to the death of Mr Singh and I ask exactly what happened there. The police have become tentative in respect of their response and tentative on the back of the sort of criticism they received from the Alliance in league with Labour at the time of the Steven Wallace shooting. They have had a lack of resources since that time and they lack an ability to respond. I would put damned good money on it that the reason why the police were tentative last week if that was the case was not because they were afraid of being shot—and they have been accused of cowardice; I do not believe it was that—but because they were afraid of shooting somebody because of the criticism they would receive in that situation. 
I will finish off with one point that the previous speaker Lianne Dalziel has made. She has said in respect of sex crimes that Labour has taken its eye off the ball in putting action into the action plan on sex crimes—and it has. The Minister of Police admitted too that Labour had missed the boat in the battle on P. When she says that in acknowledging that the pushers the manufacturers of P in this country are the gangs she says that Labour has taken its foot off this road with regard to the gangs too and it should have been moving on that. Hence today we had a letter come before our party leader asking us whether we will support this and it was signed by the Minister of Justice. Who? It was Mark Burton signed on 9 July last year. No one in Labour gave a stuff. What happened to the ministerial working group that was supposed to be working on crime? It did not meet for 3 years. Its members were supposed to be working on initiatives to combat crime—they never met for 3 years. Time and time again we hear the rhetoric and they never ever front up.