Sharples Pita: Independent Police Complaints Authority Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Sharples Pita: Independent Police Complaints Authority Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:641;Page:11538] 
Dr PITA SHARPLES (Co-Leader—Maori Party) 
: 
 Tena koe. I would like to respond to some of the comments made about my amendment that proposes a new clause 25A and also to talk to the other one. I will begin by saying that there is a lot of concern expressed about having a different separate authority for Maori as opposed to a general one and I share empathy with that thought too. But the reality is it is Maori who are in prison it is Maori who are being arrested and it is Maori who are being apprehended in ridiculous numbers and unless we are prepared to face up to that nothing is going to change. 
I want to tell members something. I have been working with the police since the 1970s and in those days every single recruit and cadet who was introduced into the police force I took for a course on race relations and Maoritanga—every single one in those days including the current commissioner a deputy commissioner and several assistant commissioners as they joined the force in the 1970s. I tell members that the hardest day’s work I have ever done was a refresher course for senior sergeants. They had been in the police for 10 years in charge of the watch-house and I was talking to them about discrimination about prejudices. A senior sergeant stopped me and said: “This is bullshit. I don’t want to hear what you have got to say about prejudice against Maoris. The only Maori I see are bad buggers and I lock ’em up. And you’re not going to change my attitude.” 
So I had a bit of a battle with him in front of his colleagues who were going: “Oh oh oh!” and I told him to stand on the chair and say: “I am a racist.” Of course he refused to do that. I said: “Well you are a racist because of your attitude and what you have said.” Finally I got him on the chair and everyone was saying: “Say it! Say it! Say it!”. So when he finally said: “I am a racist.” the attitude changed and they realised what they had done and what they had said. 
That is the kind of attitude that appears in  
Police Perceptions of Maori  
and  
Maori Perceptions of the Police 
 which were published during the 1990s. They were a collection of interviews by the police and Maori about each other. What it showed up was a distrust and a prejudice on both sides and unless we tackle that prejudice nothing is going to change. So what I am saying here now is that having a separate special Maori authority to deal with those things will do much to take away the mistrust of the police that exists amongst Maori. Members know the statistics. Many Maori are arrested and apprehended. Therefore many Maori go to court therefore many Maori are in jail and so on. What does that mean in real life? It means Maori families know the courts Maori families know the police and Maori families know all about that negative trauma that is associated with one of their family being arrested. 
I am a member of a committee that is trying to do prison reform and we have come up with a lot of things like the new units—but they are not new any more—and the first one we put in was in Hastings. Peter Grant the superintendent there now and I put in our model and we have had other models come up and so on. But the whole point of what I am talking about is that we need to do special things if we want to end the prejudice that exists out there. So I am saying to members that we can carry on in the same way and hide behind the premise that we are all equal and therefore we have to have one process for all people and nothing will change. Nothing will change unless we actually make the effort. I am telling members now that the members of the committee I had that looked into prisons were all university graduates. They were leaders of their iwi or leaders of some authority but working on this national committee and together we designed a change in the prison system. 
But two of those leading authorities on prisons had brothers in jail. So I am saying that we Maori know the courts we know the police and we know the prisons because it is our families. It is the same thing when we are talking about gangs. We know them because they are our families as well. So people just cannot talk about them like they are something out there at all. We have to face the fact that they are us and we are them. It is about getting meaningful examples that really will make a difference and will engender the trust of Maori of the police. 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: It’s just wrong. 
Dr PITA SHARPLES 
: Yeah it is wrong but so is what is happening now; it is more wrong. It is wrong that we have so many people being apprehended so quickly. Kids walking home from an intermediate school social are laughing and the police are being called because they are making too much noise. One car is on the footpath another one is on the footpath and the lights are on because it is in an area where Maori live. 
Hon Member 
: It’s not the normal situation. 
Dr PITA SHARPLES 
: No no—this is the reality of it. People can hide behind one law for all kind of korero but at the end of the day they have attitudes like that of the senior sergeant who says that Maoris are bad and that he does not need to know anything about it. I just put that proposition to members. 
Anyway I would like to speak to the clause in my amendment proposed clause 25A regarding an Independent Complaints Authority Review Agency. The Maori Party obviously would prefer a Police Complaints Authority to be completely independent like the Ombudsmen and the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. My amendments introduce the requirement for an Independent Police Complaints Authority Review Agency to be established in order to allow the decisions and activities of the authority to be appealed. Although the Police Complaints Authority reports now to the Minister of Justice rather than to the police in many respects this is just moving the deckchairs. In all respects the independent investigative role is preferred. Otherwise there is a perception amongst members of the community that the State is acting just as judge and jury in its own actions. 
I mentioned those two formative studies  
Police Perceptions of Maori 
 and  
Maori Perceptions of the Police 
. They reveal total mistrust and prejudice on both sides against each other and that is what has to be dealt with. I refer to the fact that too many Maori have been shot by the police and the people have not been healed over that process. In fact I think about 14 Maori now have been shot by the police in recent years. 
Te Ururoa Flavell 
: 18. 
Dr PITA SHARPLES 
: Eighteen—there we go. Anyway the amendments introduce the requirement for an Independent Police Complaints Authority Review Agency to be established in order to allow the decisions and activities of the authority to be appealed as is consistent with natural justice provisions. There has never been a more relevant time to be considering the role of a Police Complaints Authority in the wake of the fact that 18 Maori have been shot and killed by the police in recent years. So it is about having trust in the authority. And what is wrong with having an appeal agency for an authority that investigates complaints so that there is somewhere people can go to if they are not satisfied with that authority’s decision? 
 The function of the review agency would be to determine appeals brought under section 48. The review agency would consist of at least three members and all members would be appointed by the Governor-General on the advice of the Minister. Surely a basic tenet of all democracies is to ensure that there are checks and balances laid against the authority of the State when negotiating with citizens on matters of law and order. We want a system where the focus is restorative rather than adversarial where reconciliation is valued and where fairness is applied across the operations of its various parts. We need to demonstrate our belief that we can improve the lives of our victims families and communities. This amendment is a means towards that.