Hague Kevin: Crimes Amendment Bill Local Government Amendment Bill Sentencing Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Readings 
Hague Kevin: Crimes Amendment Bill Local Government Amendment Bill Sentencing Amendment Bill (No 3) — Third Readings 
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KEVIN HAGUE (Green) 
: 
 I will take just a short call to explain in brief why the Green Party will continue to oppose the Crimes Amendment Bill the Local Government Amendment Bill and the Sentencing Amendment Bill (No 3). The Green Party has no love at all for the criminal activities of gangs. These are organisations that rob young people of their souls and of their futures let alone the victims of their many crimes. 
Since at least the 1960s pretty well every Government has come into power with a promise of being tough on gangs. The approach has been: “Let us get harder and harder and let us increase the powers of the State against gangs and wind them up further and further.” That approach has completely failed to deal with the problem not only in New Zealand but also in those countries that have adopted the same approach. 
David Garrett 
: Wrong! 
KEVIN HAGUE 
: I am aware that David Garrett from the ACT Party is likely to speak next and I believe that he sincerely believes that this legislation will provide the police and other authorities with powers that will assist in curbing the problems associated with criminal gangs. But I am aware that other parties National and Labour in particular will be voting for this legislation and I do not believe that the members of those parties believe it will help. Instead those parties are playing to the gallery. These measures are entirely tokenistic and those parties are supporting the legislation out of a belief that the public seeks simplistic answers to these complex problems. Rather than suppressing these problems I believe that the main impacts of the legislation will be to feed the sense of alienation and grievance upon which criminal gangs thrive. Just as the war on terror breeds more terrorists this legislation will strengthen the hand of the gangs. 
What would we do? The Green Party supports the types of solutions that my colleague Te Ururoa Flavell spoke about in the House today. Complex problems almost always require complex answers and the answers here are for this House and for this Government to support the actions of communities strengthen the hand of communities in dealing with these problems and at the same time take serious and effective action on those social and economic circumstances that drive young people into the hands of the gangs in the first place. 
Finally I want to pick up on a comment of Clayton Cosgrove in this third reading debate. He suggested that this suite of bills will deal with not just so-called Maori gangs. I do not believe for one moment that Clayton Cosgrove was speaking without his tongue very firmly in his cheek. I do not believe that this House will see these powers used against for example those organised criminals behind several of the finance company collapses that we have seen or any of those other white-collar criminal conspiracies that would meet the definition here. This suite of bills is intended for a particular kind of gang and that is the only kind of gang that we will see them used against. This legislation is reprehensible because it is window dressing it is more tokenism and it is more talk of being tough on crime without a willingness to address the factors that fuel crime. The Green Party will continue to oppose this legislation.