Mark RonRON MARK (Deputy Leader—NZ First): Well it is interesting sitting here today and listening to the Prime Minister's answers around decisions made by his Government in policing. I think what is starting to unravel now is that the Prime Minister got it totally wrong when he fired Judith Collins from the police portfolio. Not only did he appoint Paula Bennett to become the Minister of Police something she is clearly not doing very well at at all but his caucus also made her the Deputy Prime Minister. They did what we often see in the Civil Service: they promoted her completely above—completely above—her level of competence and skill. And why do we say this? Why did we say that Inspector Clouseau" is now the Minister of Police and that Paula Bennett is a disaster? Well let us go to the 2 February announcement where the Government talked about their great announcement to increase police staffing by 1125.Here it is: " 'We're making a commitment that people in cities the regions and rural areas will have officers they can call on 24/7' Mrs Bennett says. 'Our commitment is that 95 per cent of New Zealanders will be within 25 kilometres of patrolling police day and night.' " Yeah—95 percent of rural New Zealanders on the back of these announcements are within 25 kilometres of a patrolling police officer? You have got to be joking. Go to Pongaroa as I did last weekend. Go to Ākitio. Go to Porangahau. Go to Flat Point. Go anywhere outside of the bubbly little metropolises be it Auckland or Wellington and ask rural New Zealanders whether 95 percent of them are within 25 kilometres of a patrolling policeman. What an absolute joke.These numbers announced today prove a couple of things. One the promise made by the Minister on 2 February has fallen flat. It is good for her in Auckland great for her in a leafy lane and all of the rest of the National Party caucus who all live in Auckland but here is a newsflash for Mr Guy who stood up and gave such a raving rousing speech in defence of rural New Zealand: rural New Zealanders are way outside of that. What 40 kilometres 60 kilometres—how far from a closed police station in Pahīatua is Pongaroa? Well maybe the member for the Wairarapa should get in his car and drive out there occasionally and then he would know.The other promises around policing—let us have a look at 9 February. On 9 February—this shows how out of touch the Minister is—we asked her how many of the police were going to be allocated into rural New Zealand. She did not have an answer. "Oh it's the responsibility of the commissioner." She ducked and dived the question. We pointed out that between 2008 and 2016 there were 215 burglaries in Taihape for which there were only three arrests—35 cars stolen for three arrests. The last arrest has been in 2013. How many police officers is Taihape going to get? We still do not know. And now we have an announcement saying: "Oh they are going to keep some police stations open 24/7." What they do not say is that there are 271 that are not; 271 police stations will not be operating 24/7—271 police stations from which people in rural New Zealand will not get a patrolling officer.Are we meant to hail and applaud this Government for its wonderful initiative that it has announced on increasing police numbers? Well let us have a look at what the Police asked for. The Police gave the Government three options. The first was prevention to change the trajectory of rising crime. That is not our comment. That is the Commissioner of Police's comment—rising crime—that blows into the ether those members' assertions that crime is going down. That was prevention to change it. It gave the Government another option: targeted crime response—this is the dollar-down one is it not? And then there was an option for meeting demand pressures—this is just going to keep your nose above water but you are treading water like fury. Which one did the Government go for? Did it go for the best option for New Zealanders for the safety and security of rural New Zealanders? No it did not. It went for the el cheapo model. Did it approve the 1450 officers that Police actually asked for? No it did not. It gave it the dumbed down cheapo model which will do absolutely nothing for the people in Northland the Wairarapa Hawke's Bay Bay of Plenty or any other rural province you care to look at."