Goldsmith PaulHon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you. Following on from a previous Government speaker talking in this debate on firearms protection orders who has just said that this Government has made a difference in gun crime and that is true—they have made a difference—it's increased by 50 percent in Auckland over the past 18 months. And it is part of the wider decline in general law and order and public safety in this country over the past couple of years under this Government's watch. That's a tragedy for many New Zealanders and their families and their communities because people no longer feel as safe in their communities when they see a rapid increase in gang membership—increased by 50 percent—when they see a near doubling of serious violent crime since this Government took office and that increase in gun crime. So that's why there is so much interest in this and so much concern about law and order generally. So this Government has made a difference but sadly it is not the difference that we want to see—they've made things substantially worse.So this legislation the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Bill is introducing firearm protection orders that can be made against somebody who has been convicted of a serious offence under the Arms Act or the Crimes Act or various other pieces of legislation to ensure that they do not have access lawfully to weapons. People might say Well why on earth is this not the case already?" And that is the issue. The problem that we're trying to deal with is the fact that the Arms Act and its regulations are insufficient to prevent access to firearms for these sorts of high-risk individuals because while they might not be a fit and proper person to get a firearms licence they can still access firearms and associate with people who access firearms or reside at or live in locations where firearms are held and that's what we're seeking to deal with.The reality is that this Government has been very reluctant to introduce this piece of legislation—the third already that National members have tried to get variations of this legislation through this House and have been voted down by the Labour Party in the past. Changes could have been made but they weren't. Despite many promises it's at the very end of the fourth year of this Government that this piece of legislation has been introduced. We will support it because it is a step in the right direction and we're finally making some progress although we do continue to have concerns around the limitations of what has been introduced. The need for better warrantless search powers for police to actually get the weapons and find the weapons I think is a missing piece and we will be now looking to include that during the select committee process and I do hope the Government has an open mind on that issue.We also heard from the previous speaker Arena Williams and a number of other speakers around it being important to also focus on the causes of crime and I couldn't agree more than that. This piece of legislation which hopefully will make it harder for some of our most hardened criminals in this country to get access to firearms and will give the police more powers to deal with those people it will make a small difference. It's not going to solve all the problems. It's certainly not going to stop some of the most dangerous criminals in this country getting hold of firearms and doing real damage and killing people and maiming people and making lives miserable across this country. They will still carry on doing that. Hopefully more of them will be caught and punished for doing it but it's not going to solve all the problems on its own.What we do need to do in conjunction with passing legislation such as this is to make progress on dealing with the deep-rooted causes of crime and to enforce the law effectively today. And that's why again if we were to criticise this Government on law and order we could point to the absolute lack of progress on dealing with some of those long-term deep-seated causes of crime such as: there's no better crime prevention strategy than ensuring that every child has a decent education. Yet after four years only 60 percent of kids are regularly attending school—making no progress on that. Or housing: 4000 kids being raised in motels alongside gangs and drug dealers and in a totally inappropriate place to be raised as a child which is a direct result of a complete failure of housing policy. So when you talk about crime and crime prevention policy and four years later into the fifth year of the Government we still have Ministers—ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Jacqui Dean): Order! The member's time has expired."