Burns Brendon: Vehicle Confiscation and Seizure Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Burns Brendon: Vehicle Confiscation and Seizure Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 20 October 2009. Volume:658;Page:7254. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
BRENDON BURNS (Labour—Christchurch Central) 
: 
 I am very pleased to take a call in respect of the Vehicle Confiscation and Seizure Bill as we go through Part 2 of this important legislation. I reaffirm as we enter a new day—although it is still the same day in terms of parliamentary sitting time—that Labour strongly supports this legislation and its progress through the House. However we are trying to make sure that Parliament does not have to revisit this bill on an ongoing basis because it is our very firm belief that although the bill includes very many good measures it still has a gap in respect of how we best deal with the issue of the confiscation and seizure—the very name of the bill—of boy-racer cars. The Minister of Police has been stating that she wants to see behavioural change in respect of boy racers and our very clear position is that it will not be achieved by the measures involved with car confiscation and crushing if indeed we go through the process that this bill outlines. That process involves boy racers who have a deal with a mate or a family member for the car to be owned by somebody else. The driver does some illegal drag racing or burnouts the police pull him up and they then send a warning to the owner of the car. Under the procedures of this bill a second warning is then sent and then finally on the third offence the car may be seized— 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: May be! 
BRENDON BURNS 
: —may be seized—and at the discretion of the judge if there are not extraordinary circumstances that he or she wishes to take into account the car might be crushed. The estimate from the Minister of 10 cars crushed a year nationally could mean that in my city of Christchurch with 10 percent of the population of New Zealand we may see just one car crushed a year. I hardly think that that will deliver the sort of behavioural change that is needed. Labour wants to see behavioural change because the boy-racer menace affects many parts of the country and none more so than my electorate. I was thinking last night about the visit I made earlier this year to a woman living on Fitzgerald Avenue who has moved out of her home and gone to live with family because she has had a gutsful of the menace that is brought. It is not just the noise; it is the ongoing behaviour and the threats that have been brought against her—quite a strong older woman—over the years. It has worn her down to the point where she has left her home without I believe having sold it because it is sometimes quite difficult to sell properties in that area of Christchurch because of the menace that these boy racers bring. She is a strong person who after years of going out watching the boy racers taking down the number plates and trying to do her best to give the police the support they need to deal with the problem has finally called it quits and moved at considerable cost to herself. 
I think the police deserve the best possible support that we can give them and I truly do not believe we are doing it with this bill. It has a kind of pyrrhic quality to it in that a few cars may be—may be—crushed but there is no signal to boy racers that they will lose their cars. That is really what is needed and that is why I strongly support the Supplementary Order Paper tabled by my colleague Clayton Cosgrove. 
Another visit in my electorate reinforced the need for some really tough legislation on this issue. It was a visit—again earlier this year or late last year—to residents living off Edgeware Road. They were not actually on the circuit of the boy racers—they were well away from the four avenues—but had the unfortunate experience of living a few houses away from a property where boy racers were resident. Of course on a Friday and Saturday night the boys like to begin their evening by doing a few burnouts up and down that street. These people want tough action against it and I believe they want to see the strongest possible measures emerging from this Parliament to deal with the problem. I do not think they would look at a bill that sees perhaps one car a year taken off the streets of Christchurch as a truly effective behavioural signal to the boy-racer fraternity; I think they would be strongly looking at the Government to do the very very toughest that it can. 
I believe the Supplementary Order Paper from my colleague Clayton Cosgrove would indeed deliver a tougher message. It would give a signal on the first offence that if the boy racer does it again his car will be gone confiscated sold and out of his ownership and he will not be able to get it back. One or two members opposite have suggested that this will simply allow boy racers to go and buy their cars back. I challenge any members opposite who want to state that again to give us some evidence. A number of inquiries have been made about that issue and no evidence has been put up to suggest that that is in fact happening. If we think about it for a moment how could it happen? If we are putting up for sale a car that is worth $10000 or $20000 and if we have people who have no credit history who often have bought the car on a long stretch of credit and who in many instances have a large number of fines against them where will they find the cash? If they are buying the car at Turners Auctions they will have to buy it via cash. They cannot put it on the never-never. They have to be able to actually buy the car so I ask how they will be able to do that. If any member wants to raise that issue again I ask him or her to bring some evidence to the Parliament that that happens. 
Let us look at another aspect of crushing. Here we are as a nation and as a planet debating issues like climate change. We need to make the best possible use of our resources. Crushing might have a photo opportunity attached but if the car has plenty of miles left in it still I ask what on earth is the sense in putting a perfectly good vehicle one that admittedly may have been used for some heinous purpose and which perhaps may need modification to put some decent tyres and other things back on it into the crusher. Perhaps one car a year will be crushed in Christchurch for a photo opportunity for the Minister and no doubt one or two other National members from Christchurch all so that they can stand there and have their photos taken with a car that is being crushed. That is what it is about. It is not about delivering the best possible outcome in terms of dealing with the menace that boy racers present both in my city and many other parts of the country. 
There is a very viable method here and I think my colleague Clayton Cosgrove has even indicated a preparedness—and the Government has this opportunity—to amend the Supplementary Order Paper to maybe look at crushing after the confiscation on the second offence. That is something that the Government could dwell on. It would then be making the bill tougher than it is currently. But at the moment there is no signal to the boy-racer community that this Government truly wants to be tough on the issue. This measure would in fact send the real signal to them. It would say that if they misbehave they have one chance. Everybody deserves one chance but people certainly do not deserve three chances with the possible outcome of a judge maybe sending a car to be crushed. I commend the Supplementary Order Paper to the Committee.