Goldsmith PaulHon PAUL GOLDSMITH (National): Thank you Mr Speaker. We started this morning with Minister Stuart Nash beating his chest on radio saying he was tough on crime and he remembered calling the Commissioner of Police his mate to surely challenge or appeal a decision. At 11 o'clock he was still beating his chest in front of the media saying I'm not doubling down. I'm not turning around. I did the right thing." and then by 1.30 he was beating a retreat and handing in his resignation one minute before he was about to be fired by the Prime Minister. But the point of this debate is not about the resignation over an act by a Minister of Police—interfering with the Commissioner of Police. It was the Minister of Tourism—Mr Stuart Nash was the Minister of Tourism when he interfered and then he subsequently became the Minister of Police. And then this story came out and yet he was a Minister of the Crown interfering with a police investigation and criticising the judiciary. And that was the breach of the Cabinet Manual. And what has been the punishment? Well the punishment has not been his removal as a Minister of the Crown as a Cabinet Minister. In fact the punishment has been to lighten his workload a little bit and to lose the police portfolio. And that is not a strong and decisive decision by the Prime Minister. It's a weak decision by the Prime Minister. It is a decision that defies any logic because the breach that the Minister made as the Minister of Tourism meant that he is not fit and appropriate to be in the Cabinet and he should be removed from the Cabinet. And every hour and every day that he remains in the Cabinet shows that the Prime Minister Chris Hipkins has made a weak decision and has low standards for his Government—he needs to be removed. The wider context that my colleague Mark Mitchell referred to is the critical one: why did he do this? Why did he go on the radio in the morning and beat his chest and try to pretend to be tough on crime? We all know the answer to that. We all know the Government knows the population of New Zealand knows everybody knows that this has been a Government that has been both soft on crime and soft on the causes of crime and that is why this country is facing real issues on our streets. They are soft on the causes of crime because they haven't dealt at all with the long-term drivers such as truancy where 50 percent of kids are not attending school regularly such as emergency housing where 4000 children are being raised in emergency housing such as all the other long-term drivers of crime that haven't been dealt with effectively by the Government. There are lots of intentions lots of announcements lots of statements but no real action. And then when it comes to crime itself the two things that they've done is repeal the three-strikes legislation because they've come to the conclusion given the 30 percent increase in violent crime given the massive increase in ram raids given the explosion in youth crime and given all the delays to justice that the one thing we need to do is reduce sentences for our worst repeat offenders by removing three strikes. And then the second signal they sent to the judiciary was that they want to reduce the prison population by 30 percent—that's the goal. That's the signal they send to the judicial system. And then they have specialised in the culture of excuses. If there's a crime—if there's a ram raid if there are kids not being at school if there's any problem it's not the individual's fault; it's something else. It's their background it's history it's the community it's everything other than people taking responsibility for their actions. And that has led to this culture of impunity and violence that we've seen on our streets. That's why people are worried about crime. Poto Williams the previous Minister of Police exemplified that approach. Then we had Mr Hipkins come in himself as police Minister so-called "Mr Fix-it." I've never understood that notion—five years as the Minister of Education with only half the kids going to school cannot be regarded as a "Mr Fix-it" in any way shape or form. And then we had Stuart Nash trying to get tough. And so he went out trying to be tough and overreached and made the mistake and now he's paying half the price that he should be paying.And the point that New Zealanders are worried about—yeah they're slightly worried about a ministry and about a Government that's losing Ministers and they're slightly worried that a new Prime Minister's come and he's promoted a new bloke back as the Minister of Police and he's had to sack him effectively within six weeks. So that looks messy. People will be worried about that. But they are more fundamentally worried about the fact that we've lost a sense of law and order on our streets and they're worried about that. If they live in Auckland like I do they're worried about the helicopter flying overhead every night and ram raids every night and they want to see a Government that's going to make a difference—and let this be a lesson to this Government: don't actually talk about being tough; actually get things done."