Mark Ron: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Mark Ron: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:648;Page:17487] 
RON MARK (Chairperson of the Law and Order Committee): 
 It is a pleasure to rise to speak on Vote Police on behalf of New Zealand First largely because there is a lot of good news in there. There is also a lot of good news in the report back from the Law and Order Committee on Vote Police because of the agreement and understanding entered into between the Labour-led Government and New Zealand First as part of the confidence and supply agreement. 
It is timely for us to reflect on some of the criticisms made by members of the National Party and by the National Opposition spokesperson on police at the time of the announcement of the agreement between New Zealand First and the Government for an extra 1000 police officers. I point out that when our agreement was struck there were people who said that it could not be done it would not be done and there would not be that level of interest. People such as Chester Borrows and Simon Power were very very quick to assert their knowledge of the police force and to tell the whole nation that the Police College could not handle that number of recruits. Well coming up to 3 years on the recruitment figures are slightly ahead of target and the way they are going we not only will achieve 1000 extra police and recruit the extra 250 support staff but also are already on track to start looking at the next part of the New Zealand First agreement with the Government. 
I find it very interesting that of all the criticism of the Government and New Zealand First for having a policy to dramatically increase police numbers those people never commented on the second part of the agreement which would see the Government of the day—Labour—move towards adopting the same policing ratios per capita as Australia. 
It is interesting that it took about a year before the National Party copied that New Zealand First policy and started doing private interviews around the country saying that the National Party policy would have a police per capita ratio that is equitable with that of Australia. Well we got there about 5 years ago with our policy. The National Party got it wrong again—duh! We were at that point 5 years ago which begs the question as to what the hell National has been doing for 9 years in Opposition if the only thing it can do is to steal other people’s policies. I suggest that those members have been unemployed for 9 years that their policy is devoid of originality and any depth and that the only policy they have that has any depth or substance or is in any way achievable is the policy they steal from New Zealand First. 
Vote Police makes good reading. If we take the first line we see that it states that the appropriation for the police in 2008-09 is a total of— 
David Bennett 
: When are you paying it back? 
RON MARK 
: There is the boy from San Francisco talking. He should tell members what he does in San Francisco and why he goes there so often. I will get him later. He does not wear a flower in his hair—that I can tell members. He is like me; he does not have much hair so I would ask what he does there. San Francisco is a funny place is it not? It is well known in many circles for certain things. 
Anyway the total appropriation for Vote Police is $1445.785 million—an increase of 9 percent. That is an increase in the police budget of 9 percent. What we are seeing with the increase in the police budget and the increase in police staffing is the biggest increase of police resourcing if not a single increase in one term of Government in the history of this nation. Contrast that with when Tony Smith was a Minister—I mean Tony Ryall. It is hard; one gets confused. “Tony Smith” “Nick Ryall”—they seem to me like one and the same. They are just as crazy as each other. When Tony Ryall was Minister of Police in the National Government he had a policy of slash and burn. In those days we heard about police cars with 300000 kilometres on the clock about dented cars with no warrants and officers complaining they were repairing the cars out the back of their police stations because there was no money. 
Hon Member 
: No Tasers. 
RON MARK 
: Well New Zealand First is pleased to see that the police are still considering Tasers; we just wish they would hurry up and issue them. We will not rest until we see a Taser on every duty belt of every front-line police officer on the beat. National is jumping on the bandwagon saying “Yeah yeah!”. It agrees with that policy as well. Contrast that with what National said it would do for police safety. National was going to issue body armour. Well 9 long years went by and nothing happened. 
New Zealand First is pleased to say that we are quite happy with the appropriations for police. The only thing concerning us is if certain people get control of the Government benches and cut the budget again.