Nash StuartHon STUART NASH (Minister of Police): Thank you very much Mr Assistant Speaker. This is my third term in Parliament and I've sat through a number of these members' days. You can tell the bills that are probably going to make it because the member stands up and he or she speaks with conviction with passion. They go hard they've done their research they know what they want to say they bring people into the gallery who are there supporting them because this is a passion of theirs. This is why they got into Parliament: to change the law to change people's lives. This is not one of those bills and that was not one of those speeches.I hold these things called street corner meetings". I've been doing them for about six years now and every Sunday that I can I go along and I speak to the people of Napier and ask them about the issues. Law and order is a big issue—law and order is a big issue—but I can tell you with my hand on my heart that no one has ever said to me in a street corner meeting or in my role as Opposition spokesman for police or in my role as a Minister of Police "Mr Nash if you change the law from providing explosives to commit a crime from two years to five years I'm going to vote for you." And I'll take it even further: no one has ever said to me "I'm concerned about Kiwis making bombs to kill people or I'm concerned about Kiwis providing explosives to terrorists." It has never once come up.Now I'm not saying that the street corner meetings are a fair or true representation of what happens around New Zealand. I'm not saying that in the Manawatū or Wairarapa or Masterton or Dannevirke this isn't a really big issue because it might be. It might be. And maybe Mr Scott has been approached by a group of concerned citizens who have said "You've got to change the law here because we are really concerned that there's a group in Dannevirke who are making explosives." But I doubt it.When I said that this is my third term here and that I've sat through a number of these members' days and have spoken to them I also know what happens is that members like Mr Scott put a bill in the ballot because they've been told "You need to fill a spot. You need to fill a spot and you'll take this one." So Mr Scott said "OK I'll put it in there and the odds of it being pulled out are highly remote." When my bill got pulled out of the ballot it was fantastic because it was about an issue that was really important for the people of Napier and we lost by one vote. But I know that when Mr Scott's bill got pulled out he went "Oh my God! What's happened here?" I remember because this was pulled out in the last term. This came to the select committee that I sat on and the member sat in front of the select committee and said "Well this is what I want to do." and we looked at him and said "Are you really going to waste the select committee's time with this?" And he said "It got pulled out of the ballot." So as a select committee we talked about how we were going to go through this.I think if I'm right—and the member may correct me if I'm wrong and please take a point of order if I am because I'm happy to be corrected here—there's been about two people tried under this clause in the last 50 years.Priyanca Radhakrishnan: Three people.Hon STUART NASH: Three people and is it 50 or 100 years? Well anyway this is not something that the police are spending an inordinate amount of time on rounding up people and putting them in front of the judiciary so they can go to jail. In terms of the police work plan in terms of the justice work plan this is not high on it. I'm sorry but this is just not high on it. Mr Scott there are important law and order issues. There really are things that we want the police to concentrate on. There are things that really concern the people of New Zealand about our law and order system in our communities which we are going hard on and that I know members from both sides of the House will have been petitioned on by constituents—things like burglary things like sexual assault things like robbery things like car conversion even homicide. These are serious law and order issues and the lack of police to deal with them—the fact that less than 10 percent of burglaries crimes against property are being solved. These are big issues—Darroch Ball: All under a National Government.Hon STUART NASH: —and Mr Ball's got it right. This is why we love coalition politics because New Zealand First and Labour heard what the people of New Zealand were saying about law and order and we have said that we are going to strive to put 1800 officers on our streets over three years. It's why Mr Bishop is being very very quiet on law and order. He knows this is the right thing to do and he knows his Government wouldn't even come close to delivering this if they were there. Thank God they're not. Thank God they're not.Chris Bishop: How's the 1800 going?Hon STUART NASH: So we don't hear anything from Mr Bishop on this one. But I will also say that Mr Bishop hasn't come to me nor has Mr Scott come to me as the Minister of Police and said "Hey can we work together on this one? Can we work together?" There's been no reaching across the House to say "This is an issue that the people of Wainuiōmata have come to me and said they want Labour and National to work together on because it's important." because it's not. It's not.The other thing is that we have a problem at the moment: it's the fact that our jails are full. They're full of people who possibly shouldn't be there because they haven't committed a crime of violence; they don't pose any direct threat to our community or our societies. But they're there and we're trying to deal with this at the moment. Any piece of legislation that comes before this House that I have a look at that says "Increase the term of imprisonment" I take a good hard look and say "Why? What is the overriding business case to keep someone in jail for five years rather than two years?"—if in fact they are put in front of a judge for committing such a crime; if in fact they are.In fact what will happen is that the judiciary will look at this and go "Hmm I don't think that this really fits with where we want to be."Alastair Scott: Talk to the Law Commission.Hon STUART NASH: Well I've talked to the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Justice spoke to the select committee and the Ministry of Justice said "We don't think this is a good idea."—we don't think this is a good idea. In fact there are very few people who do believe this is a good idea. This is not the sort of bill that we want to be wasting a whole lot of time on and what I urge Mr Scott to do—and I'll be so bold as to give him some advice and I don't mean to sound arrogant about this because I don't mean to be in any way shape or form. His electorate sort of abuts the electorate that abuts mine. We're provincial MPs. What I would ask him to do is actually go out and speak to his constituents. And that would be a drive because he lives in Wellington so he would have to drive over the Rimutakas. So he would have to be over there—he'd have to live there—but that's beside the point.What he would have to do is just have a talk to his constituents and be direct—just be really direct and call a public meeting go to his constituents put a message up on that big billboard and say "I'm calling a public meeting on the issue of increasing penalties for providing explosives to commit a crime." If he gets more than three people there—and they'll be his electorate secretary if he employs one—then I'll eat my hat. The reason I say that is this is just not an issue that is important to the people of New Zealand. It's just not an issue on the law and order spectrum on the justice spectrum that's front of mind—not even back of mind; it's not even "in" mind.Mr Scott well done on getting the bill pulled out of the ballot. I think there was a little bit of analysis there because you talked about a case that was in Brisbane. I didn't see that in a google search but maybe this is an issue in Brisbane. Maybe what we could do is take this bill give it to the state Parliament in Queensland and say "It hasn't worked in New Zealand but maybe you need it here." And do you know what the Queenslanders would say to him "Go away. Go away. Have a beer and go away."This is just not an issue that is important to people but good on you for getting it to the select committee. The fact is that the Government members on the select committee saw sense and actually said themselves "We are not going to clog up our legislative agenda with something that's not important. We're not going to fill our prisons." Well we're not going to fill our prisons because no one's been tried under this. No one's in front of the judiciary. It's like arguing about an issue that simply doesn't exist. In fact the issue does exist because Mr Scott brought it up. So it goes along like this: if this is the radar it's way below the radar it's up and it will drop below the radar again.I just hope that Mr Scott comes up with something meaningful because I would hate to think that his legacy is being the MP that brought the bill before the House that wanted to increase penalties for providing explosives to commit a crime. Go and talk to the constituents about law and order. Go and talk to them about what is important what the police should spend their time doing who we need in our jails what we need to do there what the judiciary should be counting on. I'm not going to be support this bill if that's not obvious already. I can't support his bill because I just think it's a nothing; it's a waste of time. We don't need it it doesn't address a substantive issue and there are 10 minutes of my life that I'm never going to get back. Thank you very much."