Borrows Chester: Budget Debate 
Borrows Chester: Budget Debate 
[Volume:647;Page:16510] 
CHESTER BORROWS (National—Whanganui) 
: 
 It was interesting to listen to the member David Benson-Pope’s contribution—if we can call it that. 
I will speak about law and order. Last Friday night I was down in Christchurch travelling around with the police. It was a freezing cold night down there but it was a good night to be out and about. The police are doing an excellent job right around the country and especially in Christchurch. For the first 3 hours or so we were looking at boy racers in their flash cars as they were cruising around and around the streets. Then for the second half we were looking at disorder within the central business district in Christchurch. 
We can look back at the Government’s record on law and order and policing specifically and that is where I want to focus some attention tonight. You see when this Government came to power in 1999 there was the pledge card which everyone remembers. And on that pledge card which we all paid for there were huge promises around dealing to youth crime and to burglaries. But what happened then? Shortly afterwards there was a little blip as far as the number of burglaries went. The number pretty well flat-lined and in some cases went down slightly and the Government crowed about it. But then of course we found out through the complainants anecdotally and through the newspapers that the reason burglaries were not being reported to the police was that people could not get anyone to take their complaints. It ended up that they would make telephone calls and report burglaries or report that young people had been seen breaking into their houses but the police would say things like “Oh well you know—there’s not much we can do about those young guys.” and they would not bother to turn up. People could not get a uniformed policeman to come along and appear because the police were busy enough with other stuff that was going on and they were short on resources. 
But then the Government changed the language. It started to talk about reported crime and in relation to young people coming before the courts it talked about “youth apprehensions”. Well it is very difficult for the police to apprehend youth if they do not look for them. It is very difficult for the police to apprehend youth if they are tied up doing other stuff that is right in front of their faces and the disincentive for dealing with youth is the protracted paperwork that has to be gone through in actually attending to them and attending to that job. But we know that in the last year the violent crime rate has gone up 4.4 percent—that is in just 12 months. The rate of grievous assaults is up 10 percent and that of serious assaults is up 4.8 percent. Since 1990 the rate of violent crime is up 32 percent which equates to about 13000 violent offences. The Government’s answer to that is to say that it has initiated a programme— 
Bob Clarkson 
: Can you count Mallard’s two swings? 
CHESTER BORROWS 
: Ha ha! Yes that was reported; that will be in that 13000 there somewhere I tell Mr Clarkson just to put his mind at rest. 
There have been about 13000 extra offences but the Government’s response to that rise is that it is much easier to report that crime now and also that the television advertising campaign has actually lifted the rate of reporting. But counter to that is the fact that the number of domestic non-violence or protection orders is down about 30 percent. We have to wonder just where these offences are coming from and how they are being reported. We know that the rate of youth violent crime is up 47 percent so it is up by nearly half as much again since 1999. Well what are we going to do about that? We have heard what the Government will do about that and what it says it will do pretty much mirrors exactly what National says it will do. 
On 29 January the Leader of the Opposition John Key announced a policy around youth justice issues. He said that National believes that all young people under the age of 18 should be in work in education or in training. Helen Clark was delivering a speech the next day—the next day—and she said that Labour would keep young people in school until they were 18. But the whole of the education sector said: “Like hell you are! Who is going to be looking after those little 18-year-olds? It is going to be us.” So she changed the policy; she said that if young people were under 18 they should be in work in education or in training. What do you know! So who came up with that policy? It was National Party policy and Labour adopted it straightaway—just as it has in so many other areas. 
We moved on and released a number of other youth justice initiatives. We talked about extending the jurisdiction of the Youth Court and lowering to 12 the age at which a young person can be prosecuted for crimes punishable by more than 5 years’ imprisonment—that is for serious offences. Then Labour came out with its amendment to the Children Young Persons and Their Families Act which will reduce to 14 the age at which young people can be sent to the Youth Court for sentencing. That was not where National was going—Labour did that in response. 
Then we had new orders for the Youth Court. The problem we have within the Youth Court was clearly outlined on a trip to the Rolleston youth justice facility recently. We spoke to about 10 kids in the course of that day; about eight of those kids were on their fourth or fifth return trip to the youth justice facility. They were doing their fourth or fifth stint of 3 months for totally new offences on each occasion. That is a ridiculous situation. National’s response to that is to say that we have to be able to put these kids on programmes for longer. Sometimes that will mean that they stay incarcerated for longer but sometimes it will mean that they will attend a supervision-with-activity course for longer. We think that is a really good idea and Labour members said they did too. That measure is now in the legislation as well. I say “Good on them!”. 
But Labour is also saying that we should treat 18-year-olds as youths as well. Why would we do that? When we left school and when our parents left school we were treated like adults. Kids are not adults but when it comes to serious offenders serious assailants and serial burglars and thieves they need to be dealt with in a way that reflects society’s abhorrence. Just because we do that does not mean to say we do not understand the problem. National is very much in tune with the problem and very much in tune with where New Zealanders stand on this and now every other party wants to put up its hand to and say it is too. 
People will remember that before the last election the National Party campaigned on increasing police numbers significantly. We did not put a number on it but we said that it would be somewhere around 1000 extra police officers. Labour said that it was rubbish—absolute rubbish. In fact the Prime Minister said that anyone who talked about increasing police numbers in those sorts of figures was not on the same planet. New Zealand First said that it would do it too—in fact New Zealand First said that it would double police numbers. What happened? What do you know just before the election—it was not announced at Budget time but just before the election—the Government said that it would provide 250 extra community constables. We then had an election which Labour won. What happened next? Labour needed a coalition partner so it said to New Zealand First that it would give us 1000 new cops. We asked whether that was on top of the 250 community cops. New Zealand First said yes it was; Labour said: “Ah dunno.” Now Labour has decided that it is not. So there we have a complete flip-flop on its programme heading into that election. 
The next point we made around the youth justice sector was about parenting orders. In other countries—for instance the United Kingdom—the parents of young people who get into trouble need a hand. When people talk to those parents they say they are pulling out their hair and need a hand. They are instructed to attend a parenting course and 90 percent of parents who attend those courses say that they would recommend a course to their friends because it has been the biggest help that they could get. Labour said that it quite liked that idea too. 
Then we move on to National’s police policy. National announced its police policy in November last year and that policy was around four issues. One of them was the introduction of Tasers. John Key announced at the Police Association conference that given a positive report Tasers would be issued. Labour then said that it would do that. Then John Key announced that DNA samples would be taken mandatorily on arrest for an imprisonable offence—so if people are arrested for an offence punishable by 3 months or more in prison they get their photograph their fingerprint and their DNA sample taken. Labour said that it would do that. Then John Key announced that the police would issue on-the-spot protection orders in family violence situations where for instance a woman was being beaten up. The police would issue a protection order on the spot which would give her the opportunity to go to a court and through legal aid obtain a protection order through the court. Annette King’s response was that Labour would do that too. 
The last pillar of the National Party police policy at that stage was that we would unwind the Bail Act provisions that last October put up the risk threshold for offenders to be remanded in custody. This was the Government’s initiative—not to deal with offenders not to keep the public safe but to keep people out of jail. So National came out and said that it would unwind that because the police were telling us that it did not work and the judges would tell us behind their hands that it did not work either. Guess what? The Government did not say that it would do that. It did not say it would do that because it would look silly. At the moment it is crowing about having 1600 fewer people in prison beds which is generally due to the remand process and the fact that violent offenders are still out on the street. 
There is the policy around youth justice and there is the policy around the police. Members can rest assured of one thing—that is if it were not Budget day then there is no way in hell that this Government would have released its economic policy for the next election. It just happens that they had to do it.