Mackey Moana: Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
Mackey Moana: Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill — Second Reading 
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MOANA MACKEY (Labour) 
: 
 It was hard to believe that the previous speech was from the chair of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. One would have thought that the chair of the select committee might have had a little bit more to say about legislation that he thinks is so great than 30 seconds of random comments and rhetoric strung together. David Bennett will be able to add to his resume “random rhetoric generator” when he leaves this place because he is capable of delivering speeches that go for 10 minutes and saying absolutely nothing. I pay tribute to him for that skill; it is very difficult to speak for 10 minutes and say absolutely nothing. This time fortunately he spoke for only 30 seconds and said absolutely nothing. 
One thing he said was that this Government is delivering to the people of Christchurch. They are going to pass legislation that does nothing more than the legislation that Labour passed when we were in Government; it does nothing more than the legislation that my colleague Clayton Cosgrove put through when we were in Government and he is a Christchurch member of Parliament who knows the reality of what people in Christchurch are having to deal with. I do not know whether David Bennett just did not read his research notes properly or whether once again we have National trying to rewrite history. But the fact is that while Labour will support this bill because it backs up what we did when we were in Government— 
Hon David Carter 
: Huh! 
MOANA MACKEY 
: —we have serious concerns I say to Mr Carter about whether it will do anything. We support any moves to enhance the power of the police to deal with illegal street racing and with the antisocial behaviour that goes along with it and we know how terrifying this behaviour can be for many members of our community who have to deal with it. The noise is very intimidating and people are scared to go out on the streets at night particularly if they live on a main drag. I myself live in a cul-de-sac but it is a cul-de-sac that is nice and long— 
Hon Tau Henare 
: What sort of sack? 
MOANA MACKEY 
: Watch it! It is a long cul-de-sac and we have a lot of boy racers who love to whizz up and down it. One night it would have been about— 
David Bennett 
: I hope we are not paying for the bridge. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: I am sorry? 
Hon Clayton Cosgrove 
: Get the breathalyser out. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: I know. The member’s interjections are just as incomprehensible as his speeches. One night it would have been about midnight I was sitting in the front room of our house. We know when we hear that boy-racer sound coming down the street and then hear the terrifying noise of a car skidding out of control and just wait for the crash. Well the crash came and thankfully the car took out a tree on my front lawn which I was quite fond of and did not take out the front room of our house. If the tree had not been there there is absolutely no doubt that that car would have come straight through the front room of our house. 
John Hayes 
: What’s that got to do with the legislation? 
MOANA MACKEY 
: It was a boy racer I say to Mr Hayes. He might want to listen instead of interjecting the whole way through my speech. 
So I understand how terrifying this can be. I went outside and found the boy racer backing away hurriedly but fortunately he left his front bumper behind with his licence plate number on it which made it a lot easier for the police to trace him. I can absolutely testify to the fact that it is terrifying when it happens. When it happens on a main drag when there are a lot more boy racers than just the one or two I get every Friday and Saturday night it is a problem that needs to be dealt with. 
My question is whether this bill will actually do that. I have serious doubts that it will. There has been a lot of talking up of this legislation. As I said Labour will support it because we do not think it does any harm but we need to make sure there are the police resources behind this bill to make sure they can police it. There is no point in having laws if we do not have the police resources to back them up. On Friday and Saturday nights that is a real issue. But it is good that this law is being updated. As I think Mr Garrett said times do change and laws do need to be updated to reflect the reality of what we are dealing with. When I was at high school only one of my friends had a car. It was a Morris Minor and if it went above 75 kilometres per hour bits started to drop off it. One day the gearbox dropped out in the middle of the intersection of Lytton Road and Gladstone Road and that was the end of the car. 
If one goes to a high school now one cannot get a park because of all the students’ cars parked there. The fact is that more young people have cars nowadays the cars are more powerful and more expensive and the laws need to be updated to reflect this reality. 
It is important that this bill differentiates between those who are causing a serious problem and those who are acting legally—those who are law abiding. There is nothing wrong with having a car and there is nothing wrong with enjoying having a car and taking pride in it. If a young person gets a part-time job and saves up to invest in a vehicle and work on it and takes pride in it that is a good thing. One of the problems we have is that it is difficult for the police to differentiate between those young people who are law abiding who are acting responsibly who just want to be able to enjoy their vehicle without causing problems without being antisocial and without scaring and intimidating people and the ones who are causing all the problems that we are trying to deal with in this legislation—the ones who want to act illegally the ones who want to act dangerously the ones who put people’s lives at risk the ones who terrify our elderly people terrify our families and the ones who keep our families off the roads on Friday and Saturday nights. That is one of the most important things that this legislation can do. 
I am a member of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee but I was not on it for most of the deliberations because I was on the ridiculous Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee which was a waste of time. But I understand that there were a number of submissions on the bill. There are a large number of young people out there who hate this problem as well for the reasons I have outlined. They do not want to be targeted for what their peers are doing. They do not want to be targeted when they are acting legally and responsibly because of the actions of a few idiots who come alongside them. I think they probably have a better idea than we do of what would work to stop those people. We come from a completely different generation. Tau Henare probably acted up by listening to rock and roll music— 
Grant Robertson 
: On his crystal set. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: That is right; on his crystal set. There are a lot of young people out there who would tell us what we can do to knuckle down on these young people and make it difficult for them to act in the way they do. We should engage those young people who want to be part of the solution and then we can help to deal with the young people who are the problem that we all want to solve. 
I shall talk about police resourcing. This bill will not work if we do not have police resourcing. I know that Government members do not want to hear about police resourcing; they are out there taking police cars off the roads and closing police stations. As any of us who have been out with our local police on a Friday or Saturday night know the police can be overwhelmed by the sheer number of people whom they have to deal with particularly when it comes to illegal street racing. The police need to be in a million places at once. The police also have to deal with the serious problems of domestic violence in this country which often come up on Friday and Saturday nights when people have been out to the pub or have been drinking at home. When the police get a call to say that there is an illegal street race occurring there are often not enough police officers out on patrol on Friday and Saturday nights to be able to get over to the other side of town or out to the rural areas where a lot of this activity happens. These people know that the police cannot get out to those areas fast enough. They know that the police will be tied up in town with the liquor bans and with all the issues that occur in the cities. 
If we really want to crack this problem we need to drastically increase our police numbers and we need to drastically increase their resources so that they are able to deal with this problem. [ 
Interruption 
] I say to Mr Woodhouse that we can pass all the laws in the world but if we do not have the police numbers to enforce them they will not make a blind bit of difference. I think it is a very good idea to allow our local communities to make by-laws relating to this issue. They know where the problems are they know what will work and it is much better than having a top-down approach from central government where we decide what will happen. The local people can make that decision. I hope this bill works. 
John Hayes 
: Boring. 
MOANA MACKEY 
: I say to Mr Hayes that I think he is boring so there we go; we are equal. I hope this bill does make a difference. I seriously doubt that it will but as I said it will not cause any harm. 
The confusion around the definition of “cruising” just highlights how difficult it is to legislate in this area and how much easier it would be if we gave the police more resources to deal with the problem that we have and to use the laws that we already have. I remind this House that Clayton Cosgrove’s legislation already allows for the permanent confiscation of cars yet the courts are not enforcing it. Once again if we do not have the police resources to back up this legislation it will not work. If the courts are not prepared to back up Parliament’s intention which was to allow for the permanent confiscation of vehicles where there is a serious recidivist problem then we will never get on top of this problem as my colleague Lianne Dalziel said. We need to make very clear Parliament’s intentions in the event that the courts do what they did with Clayton Cosgrove’s legislation which was to have such a low rate of confiscation as to render it ineffective compared with what it could be if they followed Parliament’s intentions. 
The definition of “cruising” is difficult and we will trust the police to use their discretion—that they will know that an ACT Party cavalcade is not cruising and that illegal street racing is cruising. Once again this is another law and order bill that is all public relations and no substance. As we say it does not do a lot of harm. Government members will go out there and crow about it but the reality is that it is not a lot different from the present legislation. I look forward to the next stage of legislation and the support of this House for Labour’s amendments that will toughen it up and make it easier to enforce.