Mark Ron: Budget Debate 
Mark Ron: Budget Debate 
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RON MARK (NZ First) 
: 
 It is indeed a pleasure and a privilege to be able to rise as New Zealand First’s spokesman on police to speak to this Budget. My pleasure is in being able to rise and speak on behalf of New Zealand First; it is not a pleasure to speak to this Budget. I look at the press release from the Hon George Hawkins the Minister of Police for this Government who is the best man Labour could find to represent the fine men and women in blue. Helen Clark deemed George Hawkins to be the best man for the portfolio in the entire entourage of that overinflated Cabinet. Among a number of things he has produced a press release that states how wonderful this Budget is. Let us look at it piece by piece. 
The press release refers to an increase to the police budget of $73.6 million. That is pathetic. New Zealand First does not believe in any way shape or form that this Government has a hope in Hades of getting on top of serious crime of the nature that we are now witnessing under investigation in Feilding. This Government has no hope of getting on top of serious crime with a pathetic injection of $73.6 million into this Budget—that at a time when “Uncle Scrooge” the Minister of Finance brags to the country that he has historic record surpluses to play with. He has a surplus of $8 billion and the best he can do to placate mums and dads and nanas and granddads who are worried about safety and security for themselves and their children is an extra $73 million. Let me remind the House that the same Government gave $40 million to Indonesia to help it to run education programmes. That tells me that the Government thinks that the education of Indonesian citizens and nationals is almost as important as the safety of New Zealanders in New Zealand. That is patently wrong and the Government will suffer the consequences of it at the polling booth. Indeed it is already suffering the consequences in the polls that are now being run nationwide virtually every week as it watches the support from the public plummet away from it. 
The next line of the press release states: “The total over the next four financial years of new Police initiatives is $172.9 million.” That will prove to be wrong. The next 4 years will see a Government that will occupy its seats only because of New Zealand First. If Labour members think that with the aid of New Zealand First they will get away with putting only an extra $172.9 million into policing over the next 4 years they can forget it—they are dreaming. New Zealand First believes that if we are to get on top of crime and deal with drugs methamphetamines and violence we must put more money into policing. Let me talk about violence. The Government never talks about reducing violent crime. It has given up on that. It brags that it has got recorded crime down. It is easy to get recorded crime down because all that needs to be done is to destroy the public’s confidence in the police and members of the public will then stop reporting crime. Therefore recorded crime is down. Every police officer says that that is precisely what is happening. 
The area about which New Zealanders have been increasingly concerned for the past 5 years is violent crime—homicides murders and rapes—and what do we see from this Government? We see an extra $73.6 million going in this year and we see that Mr Clarke has been let out of prison to do home detention—a man who kidnapped and raped a 15-year-old girl. That is the Government’s answer to violent crime. What is its answer with regard to methamphetamines? It is to pull the drug investigative squads—to not have drug squads any more—and to tell the officers not to focus on methamphetamine investigations because the evidence cannot be processed through the Institute of Environmental Science and Research quickly enough and the police do not need to find any more. That is the Government’s answer to violent crime. 
Let me give members an example of a man quite independent from New Zealand First who does understand what needs to be done: Chief of Police Bratton of the Los Angeles Police Department formerly the Chief of Department of the New York Police Department who implemented strategies based on the “broken windows” policy and zero tolerance. In 1 year with the policies that New Zealand First advocates and supports that man has reduced violent crime in Los Angeles by 23 percent and he now says that he can reduce it by a further 43 percent. Homicides are down by 18 percent in Los Angeles. What is this Government’s answer to violent crime? It sits there and tut-tuts as the body bags containing an elderly couple are brought out of their home and that is shown on television. The Government has no answer or strategy. It simply turns a blind eye and tries to tell the public—who are not fooled—that crime is going down. Yeah right! That would make a damn good Tui advertisement. 
There is funding for an extra 245 police positions. Well what a joke that is! One hundred of those positions have been earmarked to prop up and rebuild a failing 111 system. That has been deemed necessary by an independent inquiry team brought in from overseas. But no that is to fix a problem that did not exist. It is to fix a problem that was brought to the personal attention of Mr George Hawkins 3 years ago by a police officer—a uniformed member who risked his career his livelihood and the security of his family by daring to write to the Minister of Police in September 2002 to tell him that the 111 system was failing: that it was understaffed that it did not have the resources it needed and that police officers who were not real police officers but traffic officers were turning their radios off. George Hawkins denied that. For 3 years he said it was not true that the Opposition was making it up and that it was not happening but he had the written evidence in his desk. 
 Not only did George Hawkins have the information but so did the Commissioner of Police whom this Government rewarded for his silence by extending his contract for another 2 years and giving him a $40000 a year pay rise. Let us just remind ourselves that included in this Budget for the police is the salary being paid to the Commissioner of Police who is now the highest-paid civil servant in this land. He oversaw the 111 system but denied that a problem existed and the disaster in that system cost Iraena Asher her life. The question on the hustings during this election will be: why did Iraena Asher have to die in order for the Government to finally accept that the 111 system was falling over? Why did she have to die—because dead she probably is? 
This Budget is appalling. It talks about hundreds of extra police officers but it does not tell us how many new front-line real police we will see on the streets. It talks about youth services and Youth Aid. It talks about having more of those people whom police officers call shiny bums: people who sit on their backsides or police officers who do not staff the patrol cars walk the beats or make the arrests. They are the shiny bums—they got the ticks in the boxes but they did beggar all time actually on front-line duty. That is the area where police numbers will increase. This Minister has failed; he has failed the people of New Zealand. This Government has failed. This Prime Minister has failed the people of New Zealand. 
When New Zealand First members are on the Government benches we will not be talking about hundreds of extra police; we will be talking about thousands. We firmly believe that the police to citizen ratio in this country is so appallingly bad that the only way we will get on top of crime—serious crime violent crime the rampant drug industry the methamphetamine problem and the gangs that are earning $600 million a year through pushing drugs on to our kids—is to double the size of the uniformed police force rather than tinker around with it. What an insult it is to our intelligence to tell us that for the first time the police ranks will be over 10000 in number. The Minister has just lumped in all the non-sworn staff. That sort of deception will not be forgotten. It will be remembered at the polling booths and New Zealand First will enjoy reaping the benefits of it.