Borrows Chester: Summary Offences (Tagging and Graffiti Vandalism) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Borrows Chester: Summary Offences (Tagging and Graffiti Vandalism) Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:647;Page:16633] 
CHESTER BORROWS (National—Whanganui) 
: 
 I rise in support of my colleague’s amendment in respect of this matter. The point that our colleague the Hon David Benson-Pope made was that most businesses are already taking these steps so what is the point of penalising them for not taking those steps bearing in mind that they do not want to lose stock and they are putting in place measures to make sure they do not. Why should they be penalised when somebody comes along and steals from their shop or later uses a spray-can? If a shop has sold a spray-can and if information or verification that the purchaser was over the age of 18 was not provided then the shop will be penalised for that and this legislation is relatively punitive in that respect. 
What bothers me is that time and time again we see that the actual perpetrators the offenders are being patted on the head and told that it is not their fault. In these circumstances the law seeks to penalise a legitimate business person for trying to put it beyond the capability of some young person to be able to get hold of a spray-can—not everybody just those who are under 18 years. 
What that means is that shop assistants do not have to bother securing spray-cans from people over 18 years of age. In actual fact what happens now and what will continue to happen is that they have measures in place to do that. Why do we need to have the punitive aspect of fines if they do not measure up to where a local inspector tends to think they should be? Why is it not enough of a disincentive that they would lose the value of the product they are trying to sell or that there is the threat that if they do sell to the wrong person without seeking verification they will be charged and are likely be convicted and fined in respect of that? 
I think we also need to draw a bit of a line under the comments in respect of obtaining firearms and knives and the hoops that have to be jumped through in order to be able to have a decent look at and handle a firearm in a sports shop. By the way I indicate to my friend Mr Mark that if he wants to borrow a .22 Ruger Ms Wilkinson has one available. He will have to ask for it but she will deliver it! But of course there is a lot more incentive for a shop owner to open the cabinet and go through the whole sales pitch for someone who will buy something that is worth somewhere between 750 and 1000 bucks. 
Ron Mark 
: $650! 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: OK. I did not realise that the Warehouse was selling .22 Rugers these days—it cannot be the rotating magazine version. 
Of course another side to this is the fact that skinning knives boning knives and pocket knives or anything else that one could get stuck with are weapons. There are also some other incentives apart from that especially in a sports shop for instance where there are other goods that might be attractive to people who would use a weapon they got hold of to rob the store in any event. So the point of the amendment is to say where the blame lies and the blame lies with the people who are using the spray-cans not with the hard-working shopkeepers who are seeking to sell to legitimate clientele. 
The question was put that the following amendment in the name of Kate Wilkinson to clause 6 be agreed to: 
to omit from subclause (1) new section 14B.