Ryall Tony: General Debate 
Ryall Tony: General Debate 
[Volume:621;Page:16810] 
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay Of Plenty) 
: 
 It is little wonder that we have a generation of illiterate young New Zealanders if that member used to be the president of the primary teachers’ union. 
I would like the House to spend some time today looking at what is being proposed in the Government’s constitutional review which is just a smokescreen for a Government desperate to look as though it has some new ideas and a new agenda. I will tell the House what the agenda is: Helen Clark wants to sack the Queen. It is as basic as that. It is worse though. If that happens—this secret agenda of this Government’s review—I say to the House that we do not want people like Helen Clark as president of this country. We do not want someone with a separatist agenda as the president or the leader of this country. We do not want someone who commits art fraud as the president of this country; nor do we want someone who is happy to travel in a motorcade at extraordinary speeds to make a rugby game she really does not want to go to and then who drops the police into the whole issue. 
The fact is that the constitutional review is a smokescreen. When one goes to any part of this country and says that the most pressing issue for the Prime Minister is a constitutional review the people wonder why the Prime Minister is not concentrating on important issues for all New Zealanders. 
Mrs Duncan touched on one when she talked about fairness and security for all New Zealanders. Today in the Law and Order Committee the Commissioner of Police raised a question that I asked in this House in October. I asked whether a woman has to be screaming when she dials 111 in order for the police to come to protect her rather than to send a taxi. The Police Commissioner told the Law and Order Committee that it helps to scream. 
Simon Power 
: What? 
Hon TONY RYALL 
: On the issue of 111 the Police Commissioner told the committee: “It helps if you scream.” That says a lot about where this Government has the New Zealand Police—completely strung out like a rubber band with no resources to provide a decent 111 service. The Police Commissioner even tells people that it helps to scream. 
 I do not think that it would have helped my constituent Mrs Bentley if she had screamed. She was on a 111 call while hiding in the bushes from the men who were undertaking a home invasion where they bashed her husband and her nephew who was visiting from Scandinavia. But under this Government when someone dials 111 it helps to scream. I wonder whether we will hear any explanation of that from a member of the Government. 
We were also surprised to hear that the review of the 111 system will be all about how the calls are handled at the call centre but not about the outcomes of those calls. There does not appear to be any commitment by the Government to ensure that rural New Zealanders’ concerns with the 111 system are being dealt with. 
There was also bad news at the select committee today for the people of Rotorua. For the last 4 years Rotorua has had a relentless increase in crime. Rotorua is now the most crime-infested city in New Zealand short of downtown Auckland and downtown Christchurch according to official figures made available by the Minister of Police in this Labour Government. The number of front-line police in Rotorua has been progressively cut since 1999 and there are now more burglaries car crimes crimes of violence drugs and increases in overall crime in Rotorua than existed 5 years ago and that is on a per head of population basis. 
So I asked the Commissioner of Police—and I would be the first member of Parliament from the Bay of Plenty to do so—“What about extra police for the people of Rotorua?” We know that Mrs Chadwick does not support that position because she says that unless the police tell her they need more police she is not prepared to fight for them. The fact is that there is more crime more burglary and more violence on a per head of population basis in Rotorua—but the Police Commissioner says: “No more police in Rotorua.”