Borrows Chester: Policing Bill — In Committee 
Borrows Chester: Policing Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:649;Page:17926] 
CHESTER BORROWS (National—Whanganui) 
: 
 I find it hugely ironic that New Zealand First should make a big staged presentation about conflicts of interest especially— 
John Hayes 
: From the deathbed. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: —well Mr Mark got off his deathbed to come here and that was worthy of him—when we have a party whose leader is a lawyer and was a partner in a law firm. Mr Mark is going on about conflicts of interest and we have to ask ourselves with regard to some of the things that have been talked about today and some of the things that are currently before this Parliament if that leader is as smart as that how come he finds himself in the predicament he is in today? 
Pita Paraone 
: What’s that got to do with the bill? 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: Well it has plenty to do with the Policing Bill because Mr Mark stood up and spoke about a person from Waimakariri. Mr Mark did not name the person but we all know who the person is because Mr Mark has been making personal comments in respect of that particular councillor for some time. 
The very incidents and examples that were quoted by Dail Jones were from exactly that situation but the trouble is that the members had their hours mixed up. One member said it was 30 hours a week and the other said it was 42 hours a week but then he said it was 45 hours a week. But it all relates to one person: a councillor from Waimakariri. 
Ron Mark 
: It was Thames; he was talking about Thames. 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: When the member was talking about the waste management guy he was referring to the man from Canterbury right? So there we go. In any event Mr Mark drew specific attention to a specific councillor from Waimakariri whom Mr Mark has had some sort of stake with for a long time. 
What Mr Mark fails to talk about though is the incredibly good work that police officers do in district and regional councils around the country on behalf of their local communities. Then Mr Mark says those police officers would not know when to recognise a conflict of interest even if it bit them on the bum and would not excuse themselves. In actual fact those people do that every day and so do other councillors. When we have a councillor who is in business in a town that councillor exempts him or herself when the time is right. 
We have heard other people who are not supporting Supplementary Order Paper 213 which was put forward by National in my name talk about a separation of power and about advice on that from those who came before the Law and Order Committee to advise it on legislative matters. Yet the whole reason we have a Parliament is to make sure that the people who make the law are representative of the constituents of this country because if we left it only to the lawyers and academics to make the law in this country we would be living in a pretty clinical sort of a world. 
The fact is that those of us who are elected to come to this House and represent our constituents have a job to do and we are charged with doing that. I make absolutely no apology for disagreeing for instance with the advisers who came before the select committee and talked about the separation of powers. In fact what do we know one of the submitters came from Waimakariri as well. I make absolutely no apology for disagreeing with the Commissioner of Police and I am absolutely convinced that he disagrees with me on a regular basis. So what? The point is that we have an adversarial system. We also have a system whereby this is a House of Representatives. It is not a House of head-nodders who will listen to everybody who wants to give advice then run off down that track. 
If we look at the legislation that has been brought forward by district councils and local authorities around the country we see some of it has gone on to become nationwide criminal law. An example of that is the curfew system that was introduced in Te Kuiti. Another example was the liquor bans introduced in places such as Tauranga and for instance to take account of New Year celebrations in places like Whangamata. 
People would say there is a conflict in for instance a councillor who gives a view on the importance of legislation around liquor bans then being the person who has to go on to enforce a ban. What about the other Government agencies that have staff members who are working on local authorities? Does it mean for instance that a customs officer should not be part of the Taranaki Regional Council which happens to own the port at New Plymouth? What a ridiculous situation we would have there. Another example would be an Inland Revenue Department officer who is employed by the Government for 40 hours a week but who also works on a local authority. Will we exempt then from serving as a councillor any Government agent who is able in his or her occupation to enforce the law? What about health and safety inspectors? Will they not be allowed to be on local councils too? What about those people who work for the Department of Labour investigating industrial accidents? Should they not be allowed to be on councils as well? Just how far will it be taken? 
The whole point is that this particular provision came out of the beef of one person from one party and it was about one district councillor in particular. It is a convention that one incident does not make the law. 
Just to follow up on another point made by Mr Mark five serving police officers are currently on local authorities and as far as I understand it there are 11500 police employees. Well where is the problem? 
If we are going to talk about previous mayors are we going to talk about Mayor Ron Hibbs from Greymouth? He served his community for many years as the local mayor while he was a community constable. He was able to fit his work hours around that office to the pleasure of his district commander and the commissioner because later on he was esteemed by the police themselves for the work he had done locally. Are we going to say Ron Hibbs’ service was not worth much and we can forget about his contribution to his local community or are we saying he was in some way defrauding the New Zealand public because there was no way he could have been the mayor of a small provincial town and been a police officer for 40 hours a week? In actual fact the issue of whether some extra duties are going on by way of an officer being involved in a regional council—or in anything else for that matter—and whether an officer can complete his or her hours of employment are matters entirely between the officer and his or her employer—the police. It is not uncommon for the police to give flexible employment opportunities to people so they can do just that. 
I say to those parties who will not be supporting Supplementary Order Paper 213 that I believe they are being duplicitous. I believe they are not valuing the work of those police officers who have served and are currently serving their communities incredibly well on local authorities and they are not valuing the realism those police bring to the role. Mr Benson-Pope has said that that information can be called upon at any time but in fact that very rarely happens. If someone has the ability to add to a discussion and to enhance the debate while sitting at a table that person should be given the opportunity to do so. To fail to support Supplementary Order Paper 213 which will allow our hard-working police officers to continue to serve in this way is wrong and those concerned will have to live with the consequences of that. 
As a final point I would like to say it is very interesting that no grandfathering counter Supplementary Order Paper was presented until today. It is interesting to note that the person we all esteem highly—Alf Filipaina from Manukau City Council—has been spoken about in glowing references today and Supplementary Order Paper 226 in the name of Annette King will allow him to continue serving as a councillor. I bet members anything they like that if he was not there and Mr Robbie Brine from Waimakariri was there instead there would be no grandfathering clause—he would be gone by lunchtime.