Ward Mike: Land Transport (Unauthorised Street and Drag Racing) Amendment Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
Ward Mike: Land Transport (Unauthorised Street and Drag Racing) Amendment Bill — Instruction to CommitteeCWH In Committee 
[Volume:607;Page:4570] 
MIKE WARD (Green) 
: 
 The name of this bill should be the “Let us Treat Our Disaffected Youth Differently Than We Treat Other New Zealanders Bill”. Do we Greens not care about street racing etc.? Of course we do. I have been out there. I have seen the playing fields that I had responsibility for as a councillor chewed up by hoons in cars. I have attended meetings with disaffected citizens who have been kept awake until all hours. I have sat out there on the streets and heard the noisy vehicles. If we need a law to deal with that then I think we already have it. However if we cannot enforce the laws that we already have what makes us think we will be successful in enforcing this one? 
I have attended residents’ meetings. I have heard the talk and I know what those residents are saying. They focus on this group of young people and say that those young people are the ones who are causing them problems. I say that if the police need more powers then by all means let us give them those powers but not the power to make the decision that those people deserve a penalty and the police will impose it right now. Let us give the police the power to arrest—which they already have—and to put those people in front of the courts. The courts should then have the task of deciding on the penalty. If we think the penalty should be confiscation of the vehicle then we should apply that to all such similar events. 
This bill targets one narrow group of people in the community—the young. That group is no more responsible for deaths on the roads than anybody else. Those young people are not the only dangerous drivers in this country nor are they the only hoons but this bill very specifically targets young people. 
Hon Member 
: There’s no age limit on boy racers. 
MIKE WARD 
: Yes they are the ones. The message we are sending out to our young people is that they are the only ones who drive dangerously so we should have the ability to impound their vehicles. We have a different law for drunken driving; we say that yes all drunken drivers can have their vehicles impounded. We also say that if a person’s vehicle does not have a warrant of fitness and should not be on the road then we can take it off the road. But in this case we are being fairly specific in the target of this legislation. 
I say that the laws are in place now to address this issue. If vehicles are too noisy they can be stopped. I tell the Committee right now that the noise inspection officers simply go out and give a warning and if the warning is not heeded they can then take the boom box from a party and tell the people there that they must do without it and to go back and see the noise inspection officers on Monday. Maybe that is a reasonable way of doing it. [ 
Interruption 
] I have sat out in the streets and I have actually seen the same cars go past. 
I come back to the title which could be the “Let us Treat the Disrespected Youth Differently Than we Treat Other New Zealanders Bill”. Young people are the ones who have the noisy cars and go around annoying citizens with them. I grant members that that happens. I have seen those noisy cars go down the street one after the other over and over again and down the same streets 5 or 10 minutes apart. I hear them and the police must hear them but they do nothing. The laws are there and the police do not impose the current laws. What makes us think the police are any more likely to enforce any new laws that we put in place? It is the courts’ job to decide on the penalty and it is the courts’ job to impose it. 
Green members are not unmindful of the concerns of citizens; they just do not believe that we need another law when the existing law is not being upheld. They do not believe we need a law that places in the hands of the police the responsibility for imposing those penalties without the courts having their say on that.