Mitchell Mark: Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMitchell Mark: Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 10 July 2013. Volume:692;Page:11875. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]MARK MITCHELL (National—Rodney):I will take a call now just so that I can address a couple of the issues that have been raised. But before I get started I would like to refer to an article written by Anna Williams. It is in relation to an interview that she did with the Mayor of Marlborough District MrSowman. He said that “five people had reported seeing patched”—this relates to last week—“Mongrel Mob members in public including at a netball game at Horton Park in Blenheim and in supermarkets. … ‘The community needs to combine together with police to make them unwelcome to ensure there isn’t illegal activity in Marlborough’ he said. ‘There’s an old saying if you take away the oxygen from the flame it goes out and that’s what we need to do. … These people who wear patches they won’t give them up easily’ he said. ‘The patch gives them identity and they won’t want to lose that. I have no sympathy for them.’ Heplanned to talk to the Marlborough police area commander to make sure everything was being done to ensure gangs did not thrive in the region.” So this is an issue that does affect our communities.I would just also like to briefly mention that in my speech in the second reading of this Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill—and of course I acknowledge the Hon Todd McClay who brought this bill to the House—I spoke about an incident that I had to deal with personally when I was down in Rotorua. It involved two young girls who had been attacked by prospect Mongrel Mob gang members and patched gang members as well. That is going back 12 years ago. Some people would say to me: “Well you know we have moved on. Is this really still an issue?”. Yet I was sad to read in the media reported through theThe Daily Post in Rotorua 2 weeks ago of a young girl who was attacked by four Mongrel Mob prospects walking through the grounds of a school. She was raped pretty savagely attacked and physically damaged. Of course she will be emotionally and psychologically damaged as well. So this is still a real clear and present problem that as a country we have to face.In terms of whether there is current legislation in place that can deal with this—no there is not. The legislation that is in place at the moment—and Miss Wall made a very good point on this—however requires an action. It requires gang members to actually do something to meet the elements of the offence whereas what this bill does is allow the police to come in and take action purely off the fact that a gang member is wearing his patch. I would like to bring us back again and remind us all in this Committee actually what that patch signifies. The patch signifies that someone has got into a gang—and gangs unfortunately use our youth; they are recruiting from our youth. Sadly the youth see this as a way of identification the camaraderie and the rest of it—that sort of collectiveness that you were talking about. It would be much nicer if they could get that through a sports group through a sports club or through a community group rather than a gang. I come back to what that patch means. What the patch means is that they have to have achieved a pathway of committing crimes and normally violent crimes against our communities to get themselves to the status where they are awarded a patch and they become a patched gang member.For some reason in this country over the years—I do not know whether we have become desensitised to it or whether we have just learnt to live with it—we have actually allowed these people to walk around with patches on which clearly say to the rest of us: “Hey we have committed offences against you.” I think it is time as a country as we say that we use every chance that we have to say: “You know what? We are not going to accept that any more. You are not going to wear patches around. You are not going to”—The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Order!MARK MITCHELL: Sorry Mr Chairperson. I think these are the important points we really need to think about when we are talking about this bill.The other thing that I just wanted to point out very quickly is that we had a very good trip the Law and Order Committee down to Christchurch recently. Kris Faafoi was with us. We were talking to the police there and they spoke about—I think they are called—the domestic protection orders. Do not quote me on that; I am pretty sure that is what they call them. What they allow police to do is go to a violent domestic and they can remove the offender without actually having to rely on or have a complaint generated from the victim or the complainant. So they remove the onus and they remove the stress of the complainant or the victim having to make the complaint. The police can just go in there and remove them under these domestic protection orders. And actually Kris thought that was a great idea.The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Order!MARK MITCHELL: Sorry. Mr Faafoi thought that was a great idea. Well actually this bill is exactly the same principle as it removes the onus of a member of the public someone working in a Work and Income an administrator or a receptionist at a school or a teacher at a school from having to actually generate a complaint. They do not have to do that. [Bell rung ] The minute a gang member walks on to a school—