Collins Judith: General Debate 
Collins Judith: General Debate 
[Volume:647;Page:16689] 
JUDITH COLLINS (National—Clevedon) 
: 
 I wish to talk today primarily about the good people of South Auckland. The vast majority of people who live and work in South Auckland—and that includes me—do our very best to be good law-abiding New Zealanders. In fact the good people of Manurewa and Randwick Park who have been absolutely assaulted by the events in the last few days are crying out for people to remember that they are human they go to work they take their children to school and they have to live in an area where most people are fantastic New Zealanders or people who are wishing to be New Zealanders. But those good people have been held hostage by groups of street gangs who have been allowed to run riot. And who is to blame? 
David Cunliffe told people assembled at the Mahatma Gandhi Centre on 14 June that Pacific and Maori youth were the problem. He labelled all Pacific and Maori youth as the problem and that is not something he should be proud of. There are Pacific and Maori people living in Randwick Park who are as frightened as every other person who lives in Randwick Park and who is not part of a street gang. It is all very well for Labour members to make those sorts of observations—which David Cunliffe made to an audience he thought would think was the answer—but that is not the answer. There are multiple answers. 
For a start I heard one of the previous speakers talk about tougher laws. We know we need tougher laws but we also need tougher police. I have seen the police hierarchy become politically correct and I wonder why. I take it back to the time when Helen Clark became the Prime Minister and there was a shooting in Waitara. Steven Wallace was killed by a police officer defending himself and others and what happened? The Prime Minister Helen Clark came out and abused the police. She called them racist. She attacked them. Senior Constable Abbott’s name was right through the newspapers. He was prosecuted he was absolutely denigrated out there and he incurred costs. What happened? Where was the Government? Was it supporting him? No it was not; it was blaming the police. Since then we have seen a hierarchy in the police working absolutely towards keeping this Government happy. 
Jill Pettis 
: Provide the evidence of what you’ve just said. 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: I say to Labour members over there who scream and shout as they always do when they do not like what they hear that we need things like Tasers. Give the police Tasers! I am so sick of hearing the Minister of Police and Howard Broad say they are waiting to see what happens. I will tell them what happens: people are dying. 
Hon Steve Chadwick 
: Is that your policy? Tell us what is the policy. 
JUDITH COLLINS 
: I say to Mrs Chadwick that people are dying while she is sitting around and waiting for a review. We have had so many reviews from this Government. We have had review after review after review. I went to see Mrs Singh. I sat on the floor in the garage with her family. I can tell Mrs Chadwick that those people are hurting. They are hurting. They live right behind where the attack happened and they are so hurting. And what did the taggers do—the people this Government wants to make excuses for? They went and retagged the place to show how proud they were. They are the sort of scum that this Government has let out on the streets and has kept there. 
What National wants to do there is get them while they are young. We need to get them into a Fresh Start camp where they see there is a life other than the one they have now and where they learn some self respect because how can we possibly expect these people to respect others if they have no respect for themselves? 
The good people of South Auckland are sick of being told that they live in a bad area. They do not. They have good people there; they live in a good area. They have some bad people who have been allowed to stay there—bad people who should never have been allowed there and who should be locked up. Those are the people they have there. But in every instance that people try to do something about the situation that sort of member over there always wants to talk about civil liberties.