Andersen Ginny; Ferris Tākuta; Goldsmith PaulHon GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour): Oh thank you Mr Chair—thank you very much. I would just like to draw the Minister of Justice's attention—and I appreciate you know the Official Information Act (OIA) is an important Act which we all abide by sometimes challenge but it's really interesting: I found that the only section in this entire regulatory impact statement that I can find—there's a couple of minor ones but the main one that's got some information that's been withheld under the Official Information Act and it's withheld under section 6(c) of the OIA directly relates to implementation challenges. There's only two paragraphs in this on implementation challenges and the one that we're allowed to read reads If a public display involves multiple gang members a larger operational response may be required to enforce a ban on the spot."—so you know that's Police saying that "If you're wanting us to do this we're going to need a whole lot of cops at once in order to make this work."I was just wondering in terms of the interests of transparency and also the public interest of New Zealanders who I'm sure are very curious as to how this legislation will play out in practice whether he wants to enlighten us as to what paragraph 118 of the regulatory impact statement actually says. I'd be interested to know: what are the grounds for withholding this information from the general public? You know if there are clear challenges that police have identified to be able to operationally enforce these new laws is it not right that when we are debating this legislation we should know what those are? That would only seem fair and right in terms of having transparency having an open discussion about how these laws will impact not only our police but also other communities in which these new laws will be played out.We can only guess—and the mind boggles—as to what those implementation challenges may be. We do know that since coming into office this Government has got fewer police officers on the front line than it did when it came in. I think that number is currently sitting at around 124 and as we see a new wing graduate the new wings now have around about—used to have about 90-plus; they're now looking at sort of high 60s for a wing. With the number of police who are retiring or choosing to take on other work that number of police coming in is not sufficient to meet attrition currently and that is why the numbers of front-line serving police have decreased under this Government.So I just wonder whether paragraph 118 may be that Police is drawing the Minister's attention to the fact that there will be significant problems with the operational capability of front-line police to be able to enforce this law right across New Zealand—that as in paragraph 119 if there is a large gathering it will require numerous police to do a specific operation in order to enforce the law and that might potentially act as a deterrent.But there also is the concern that has been raised quite rightly by the Police Association that having a law that is not operationally able to be implemented risks undermining the confidence that the New Zealand public have in the New Zealand Police and that is a real concern. That is a real concern because what that pretty much says is that this Government is prepared to want to look tough so much that they're prepared to risk the actual credibility of our police service who do an amazing job to actually risk that credibility of being able to enforce the law in order to demonstrate on the tally that they're looking tough and they're doing something.I really consider that the reason that this paragraph has been withheld by the Government under the Official Information Act is it gives further insights as to the fact that this law will struggle to be enforced and that this law may and will undermine the ability of the police to do their job and be seen by people in New Zealand that the police are able to do their job. There is a fear that that may have a spreading effect to having people immune or saying that this law isn't—"I won't abide by it if it's only applied in Auckland and not in Kaikohe; why should we do it if it's not here and there?" So it raises some very real concerns and I think the Minister needs to address some of those.TĀKUTA FERRIS (Te Pāti Māori —Te Tai Tonga): Tēnā koe Mr Chair. Look I just want to probe a bit at some of the underlying things I believe are missing and it's based really on the fact that given what we know and understand around things like Māori incarceration as a country around things like poverty that Māori endure and have endured for centuries as a country the things that we already know—Māori are overrepresented in incarceration figures as we know.You know it all stems from the early history of this country when the economic pieces that were available to two societies in this country were either taken by force and one was advantaged and one was disadvantaged—these are things like economic dispossession of Māori you know as a result of illegal purchases or invasion and confiscation of lands effectively castrating Māori economically; the displacement of Māori through education. These are all things that led to the impoverishment of Māori. They're the things that underpin what grew out of that impoverishment the social displacement and deprivation of Māori as a result of these things you know and the fact that as the country began to develop post the wars there was a significant and intense privileging of the Pākehā partner in the Treaty of Waitangi as returned servicemen were granted more than 800000 acres of farmable land to develop farms for their families. Māori were left out of that equation and some—CHAIRPERSON (Greg O'Connor): Mr Ferris I just remind you we're on Part 1 of this bill at the moment so you'll need to start contexting that and referring back to the bill.TĀKUTA FERRIS: Oh yeah that's all right—yep ka pai. So I'm just setting the scene of where Māori impoverishment—CHAIRPERSON (Greg O'Connor): We generally allow about two minutes' context but we need the bill now.TĀKUTA FERRIS: Yeah ka pai. So these are well-known things yet I just see no attempt no appetite to apply or consider any questioning or analysis that addresses these things which means that the efforts of the current Government are more about dealing to symptoms of problems rather than addressing root cause of problems. So it's clear to me that this side of the House has no desire to ask themselves "What's the impact of my ideas or the bills I'm putting forward on Māori? What will the impact be?" Given that the gang patches legislation has been commented on broadly and it's quite clear that it will disproportionately negatively affect Māori and their associated communities why is it that the Government can't ask themselves that simple question: what is the likely impact of this law on Māori and Māori communities going forward?—not finished.CHAIRPERSON (Greg O'Connor): Then finish quite specifically.TĀKUTA FERRIS: And given that the Minister is the Treaty settlement Minister I would expect that he has been exposed to—at least exposed to—some quite robust Tiriti analysis frameworks as he works through that portfolio of work. Then I would consider: how is he applying those frameworks a Tiriti-based analysis framework to his decisions as the Minister of Justice and what expectation he has of his team who sit on the Justice Committee to know and understand or have some capacity—some capacity—to apply a Te Tiriti - based analysis framework to the decision-making efforts of the Justice Committee or to apply the same approach to analysis to the questions.CHAIRPERSON (Greg O'Connor): Mr Ferris I think you've had a pretty fair go. You need to talk about the bill.TĀKUTA FERRIS: Kia ora e hoa. Āe tēnā koe—those are my questions.Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (Minister of Justice): I hesitate to reply again because on a number of occasions I've replied on the issue of the impact of this legislation on Māori.The previous speaker Ginny Andersen was concerned about the adverse impact of this legislation on young Māori. I suppose the only point I would make is: we on this side of the House are more concerned about the adverse impact of gangs on young Māori and on the negative influence of gangs in their community. We recognise that Māori are more likely to be victims of crime than other New Zealanders and that is why we're very focused on this legislation reducing the negative impact of gangs on young Māori growing up throughout the country and getting drawn into a very negative way of life.Now in response to the observations by our member from the Māori party Mr Ferris what I would point out is that if our only response to the increase in violent crime that people have seen in our community and the rise of gang activity—if the only response from this Government was this legislation he might have a point. But that is not the only response of this Government: we continue to invest widely in many innovations such as Te Ao Marama court system and many aspects of our justice system which are designed very much to work with specific needs and requirements of Māori in relation to the crime and we work very closely with many iwi groups right up and down the country.Of course our broader response to dealing with crime involves investing in many many programmes in relation to addictions in relation to dealing with the huge challenges that we have around emergency housing huge challenges around truancy in schools—there's a wide range of Government policies. So anybody who asserts or assumes that this legislation is our only response to what is a much broader issue—which everybody recognises is a much broader issue—would be false."