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Police don't need rescuing but Dr Brash does

George Hawkins

12.09.2005

Nats' "police rescue" package doesn't stand up to scrutiny

There's nothing new in National's so-called 'police rescue' package announced today and it still doesn't stand up to scrutiny, Police Minister George Hawkins and Justice Minister Phil Goff said today.

"Last time Tony Ryall sat around a cabinet table he voted to pour Police resources into the Incis computer debacle and then had to cut both the Police budget and 540 jobs," said Mr Goff.

"No wonder the crime rate was through the roof in the 1990s and 92 per cent of New Zealanders expressed their lack of confidence in National's law and order performance in a 1999 referendum.

"Labour listened and since becoming government has increased sentences, toughened bail and parole, boosted Police numbers by around 1500 and funding by $280 million a year and provided $45 million to fix 111.

"Crime is now at its lowest level in 25 years."

Mr Hawkins said National's vague promise to increase frontline Police numbers was worthless.

"National claims it will match Australia's police per population ratio. Even putting aside National's record of Police cuts, such comparisons are totally spurious because they don't take into account the fact Australia has nine police forces to our single, highly efficient organisation."

Mr Hawkins warned that the quality of recruits would take a dive.

"Labour's sound management has created the lowest unemployment rate in the western world, but even in such a tight job market it is important to maintain high standards around police recruitment.

"Unless, that is, Dr Brash is thinking of re-training the thousands of teachers, nurses and Police non-sworn staff who do most of the paperwork now, and who could lose their jobs as a result of his multi-billion dollar public service cuts.

"Meanwhile, National keeps on recycling the same tired old lies about road policing, but the reality is there are no traffic ticket quotas and traffic units are available now to respond to priority one emergencies.

"National is essentially sending the message: 'speed is safe' with its plan to take police off the road and to order them to stop issuing tickets," said Mr Hawkins.

"The dramatic fall in the road toll since we introduced our road policing policy proves that consistent, fair and well resourced traffic enforcement saves lives."

Mr Hawkins noted that the last five years had produced the lowest road tolls since 1964 and lowest rates (fatalities per 10,000 people) since records began in 1951.

Justice Minister Phil Goff said Labour had already introduced civil forfeiture legislation to take the profit out of crime and hugely increased the resources targeted at organised crime.

"Another area in which Labour has been acting while National's still talking is early intervention to stop kids entering a life of crime. For example, in 2004 we committed $32 million to expand Family Start and followed that up with $18 million this year."

Mr Goff also questioned where the money to pay for National's latest promises would come from.

"Assuming that National were sincere about keeping promises such as abolishing parole, this so called 'rescue' would cost billions of dollars that John Key has failed to budget for.

"National would already have to borrow $3.5 billion and slash public spending by $3.7 billion to fund their tax cuts; implementing this plan would mean even more savage cuts to core services like health and education," said Mr Goff.

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