How the parties plan to tackle crime

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1. 0:06Speaker 1: Kia ora, I'm Chelsea Daniels, and this is The Front Page, a daily podcast presented by The New Zealand Herald. MUSIC
2. 0:16Speaker 1: Each week up until Election Day on November 7, we'll be taking you through each party's policies on issues that matter most to New Zealanders. Crime has been one of
3. 0:27Speaker 1: the defining political issues of the past few decades. From ram raids and retail crime to gang violence, youth offending and the pressure on police and prisons, parties across the
4. 0:39Speaker 1: political spectrum agree New Zealanders want to feel safer. But they have very different ideas on how to get there.
5. 0:48Speaker 1: Is tougher sentencing the answer? Should we be putting more money into prevention? Are we locking up too many people or not enough? Today on the front page, we'll talk
6. 0:57Speaker 1: to representatives from each party about where they stand on crime and what they want to do to tackle it once and for all.
7. 1:07Speaker 2: We're now joined by.
8. 1:08Speaker 1: Nationals Police spokesperson Mark Mitchell. Mark, what do you think is the biggest failure in New Zealand's approach to crime right now?
9. 1:17Speaker 3: Well, right now we're actually doing extremely well. When you look at the stats, we've got 37,000 fewer victims of violent crime. Ram raids are down 85%. 26% less serious
10. 1:29Speaker 3: violent youth offending. Foot patrols have doubled. uh you know and gang patches are gone in public which i get massive uh positive anecdotal feedback you know sort of getting
11. 1:39Speaker 3: around the country so we've got a lot more work to do um but we're definitely starting to make some positive inroads around public safety uh we came into government obviously most of my adult life has been dedicated to
12. 1:51Speaker 3: public safety in this country um i was disgusted at what happened under the previous government uh they definitely can't be trusted on public safety and we saw that when
13. 2:00Speaker 3: the only um The only policy they had was reduce the prison muster by 30%, whilst not having any good public policy sitting behind it in terms of how they're
14. 2:10Speaker 3: going to keep Kiwis safe. So I'm really proud of what we've achieved. I've got police and corrections, and I want to acknowledge both those agencies. They have such an important role to play around public safety, and they're just
15. 2:21Speaker 3: full of the best Kiwis we've got. Tens of thousands of positive actions every day. We've pumped a lot more money into rehabilitation. We changed the law so that people
16. 2:31Speaker 3: that are on remand can now have programmes delivered to them.
17. 2:36Speaker 3: The police have stood up beat sections, gang reduction and harm sections right across the country. We've got most of the leaders now from our worst, most violent gangs in prison.
18. 2:48Speaker 3: We're starting to see a slowdown and a reduction of people wanting to join the gangs. We want to make New Zealand... the most difficult place to be a gang member or part of an organised crime, without a doubt.
19. 2:58Speaker 3: Like I said to you, Chelsea, we've got more work to do. We're only just getting started. But I'm very proud of our track record. I'm very proud of what's been delivered over the last three years in this coalition government.
20. 3:08Speaker 3: I think the country can feel that we take their safety seriously and that we're going to be a country.
21. 3:14Speaker 3: I don't know if you saw, but there was a recent survey that came out That actually moved us, I think, from fifth or fourth up to the second most peaceful and safest country in the world. And I want us
22. 3:25Speaker 3: to be number one. And I sort of said that right from the start. So a lot of work has been done. And by the way, it's not just police.
23. 3:33Speaker 3: It's not just government. This has been working with other stakeholders in the community, CPNZ, our Maori wardens.
24. 3:40Speaker 4: They do an outstanding job.
25. 3:42Speaker 3: It's been a sort of a whole society mobilisation and working together to make our country a much safer place.
26. 3:49Speaker 2: What about the next three years?
27. 3:50Speaker 1: What's something new that National would bring in if returned to government?
28. 3:54Speaker 3: Well, I think we will continue to look at legislation.
29. 3:56Speaker 3: So one of the things that's really been brought forward to me through the campaign, I think I've done about...
30. 4:00Speaker 3: 14 public meetings around the country now is the right to silence for adults when there's been some sort of crime and violence perpetrated against our kids who of course
31. 4:12Speaker 3: are our most vulnerable and we have to do more to be able to support to make sure that we've got tougher rules around that That is complicated, but I think that's a piece of work that we should definitely
32. 4:22Speaker 3: work on. Look, with the police, it was simply a matter, we've got a very good commissioner in place now with Commissioner Richard Chambers, with a new executive, strong leadership right
33. 4:32Speaker 3: throughout the organisation, a big focus back on standards, and we're in a very good place in terms of having a world-class police service that's delivering services.
34. 4:42Speaker 4: For the communities that they serve. Obviously, we will continue.
35. 4:46Speaker 3: We've made a big investment into our justice sector, including corrections and police. We will continue that with that because we are the party of law and order.
36. 4:55Speaker 4: But, you know, but fundamentally....
37. 4:58Speaker 3: Other than looking at new legislative settings, what we're doing is working.
38. 5:02Speaker 4: We're not over-complicating. It's back to basics.
39. 5:05Speaker 3: Highly visible policing, targeting the gangs, for example, only 1% of the population responsible for 24% of the offending. So
40. 5:13Speaker 3: that's proving that that's working, without a doubt. Yes, we've had a big increase in our prison muster and corrections.
41. 5:21Speaker 3: That is symptomatic of the public policy that we've come in with in terms of prioritising victims and public safety.
42. 5:29Speaker 3: But I hope that over time we'll start to see that flatten out and start to come down when the criminal community realises that actually they're not getting away with it now and the seriousness of their offending will be
43. 5:41Speaker 3: reflected in the consequences.
44. 5:42Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Mark.
45. 5:44Speaker 4: Thanks, Chelsea. Thanks for having me on.
46. 5:48Speaker 1: And now we're joined by Labour's crime spokesperson, Jenny Anderson. Jenny, what would Labour do to put an end to crime as we know it in New Zealand?
47. 6:00Speaker 5: Well, for a start, you should deliver the amount of police officers that you promise. So National promised at the last election that they would have 500 more police officers
48. 6:12Speaker 5: in two years, I think they said. So we're at three years now and they still don't have those police officers yet. So you need frontline officers out there able
49. 6:21Speaker 5: to respond to crime is a good way to get on top of criminal offending. And so properly resourcing police and having those police officers in place is a good way forward.
50. 6:31Speaker 1: Has Labour got a timeframe kind of thing of when you want to see those frontline police officers on the ground?
51. 6:38Speaker 5: Well, we actually think better equipping our police service, whether that be with the tools and technology they need, or even with the additional support staff in place so that
52. 6:48Speaker 5: they can be not filling out forms, but actually fighting crime.
53. 6:52Speaker 5: And so there has been record levels of cuts under National that have seen all those support staff, many of those IT systems police require not being funded. We think that if we want a police service that's equipped for
54. 7:04Speaker 5: the future and ready to respond, all of those things need to be adequately funded. In the last two budgets,
55. 7:12Speaker 5: the police wages have come out of time-limited funding. This shows you what incredible strain the current police budget is under.
56. 7:20Speaker 1: How do you think boot camps are turning out?
57. 7:24Speaker 2: They've been an absolute failure.
58. 7:26Speaker 5: They've been a waste of money and all of the evaluations have demonstrated that. The programme that did work and has continued to work that was rolled out under Labour
59. 7:36Speaker 5: is Circuit Breaker, which is a short intervention immediately after a young person has offended. We know the statistics of
60. 7:45Speaker 5: that programme show over 80% of young people who go through that programme do not re-offend. And the young people that go through boot camps or military-style camps, roughly about
61. 7:57Speaker 5: the same percentage do re-offend. So the science in itself reports with the data shows that those boot camps are just a waste of money.
62. 8:06Speaker 1: Right, so pretty safe to say that Labour will get rid of those boot camps. What about the gang patch ban or the non-consorting laws?
63. 8:13Speaker 2: Have they worked?
64. 8:14Speaker 5: Well, they have kept gangs not from being visible. But of course, under National, we've seen there be more gang members than police officers. So that ticked over. So while
65. 8:26Speaker 5: you might not see their gang patches, they are making record profits from peddling methamphetamine right across New Zealand. And
66. 8:33Speaker 5: methamphetamine levels in the wastewater testing have increased hugely under national.
67. 8:39Speaker 4: So while it.
68. 8:40Speaker 5: Might be good in our communities, we don't see those gang patches, all of the negative impacts that organised criminal groups continue to have on our communities have got worse under national.
69. 8:50Speaker 2: And how will Labour get those numbers down?
70. 8:53Speaker 5: We want to make sure that there are good programs in place in communities for methamphetamine to be able to address those. And we do have some policy in that space.
71. 9:02Speaker 5: But we also want to make sure that our police service is adequately resourced. to be able to respond to crime.
72. 9:09Speaker 5: And that means having those community partners that we can refer people to, to get access to mental health treatment, to get access to addiction services. Those are also fundamental
73. 9:20Speaker 5: ways that we address the causes of crime in our communities.
74. 9:24Speaker 1: Now, forgive me, but I have dug back into the archive.
75. 9:27Speaker 1: We actually spoke about crime three years ago before election 2023.
76. 9:32Speaker 1: And ahead of that election, we spoke about Labor wanting to make sharing crimes on social media and influencing young people to commit a crime to become an aggravated factor
77. 9:43Speaker 1: at sentencing. Is that.
78. 9:46Speaker 2: still the case?
79. 9:47Speaker 5: We haven't made that policy announcement this election, but I do understand that National was actually supportive of that as well.
80. 9:53Speaker 5: We know that online harm is an area that's really concerning for our young people and we would not want to incentivise young people to have further harms done for
81. 10:02Speaker 5: them by having really quite distressing and even traumatic instances being recorded and uploaded onto social media. So while we
82. 10:11Speaker 5: haven't announced it as a specific policy, that's an area we're always watchful of making sure that we don't want to encourage that type of behaviour.
83. 10:20Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Jenny.
84. 10:21Speaker 5: Thank you.
85. 10:30Speaker 2: Now we're joined by ACT spokesperson, Nicole McKee.
86. 10:33Speaker 1: First off, Nicole, if a voter is concerned about crime in this country, why should they vote for ACT?
87. 10:41Speaker 6: Well, I think our past record, especially over this term of government, the last three years, has shown a massive reduction in the amount of crime that we're seeing within
88. 10:51Speaker 6: our society. And it's been quite substantial. I mean, if you think about before we came into government, we were looking at two ram raids a day that was happening,
89. 11:01Speaker 6: and now you barely hear of them at all. In fact, if you look at the work that Karen Chaw has done as Minister for Children, she's managed to reduce child
90. 11:10Speaker 6: offending or youth offending rates by 25%. And this is around her ability to be able to do wraparound support for some of these kids, but also hold them to
91. 11:22Speaker 6: account for what they've done. I mean, I remember when I was growing up, the best way for me to learn was to be held accountable for whatever I did.
92. 11:30Speaker 6: And under the previous Labour government, there was no accountability.
93. 11:34Speaker 6: And so we had kids out there creating crime all over the place. But some of the policies that have come through under this government, especially under ACT, bringing back
94. 11:44Speaker 6: three strikes for very serious, violent offending. I think that these are sending very clear signals to the community, the
95. 11:52Speaker 6: offending community, that New Zealand's had enough. And under ACT, of course, we will be able to do more with a second term of government and some of our plans
96. 12:03Speaker 6: to continue to crack down on the crime that's still occurring.
97. 12:07Speaker 6: out there in our communities as well. So, you know, three strikes has been really good. The reduction in youth crime, the capping on the discounts that people can get for
98. 12:19Speaker 6: sentencing as well. These have all had an instrumental effect.
99. 12:23Speaker 6: And of course, we've had more police, more on the beat.
100. 12:27Speaker 6: So overall, people are feeling like they feel a bit more safer, not only when they're out in the street, but also in their homes. And We need to continue that as well.
101. 12:36Speaker 1: Yeah, let's talk about the next three years if you are in government again. What should we be expecting from ACT?
102. 12:42Speaker 6: Well, some of the things that we have already announced include our rural crime policy, because a lot of what I just talked about happens in the cities or in
103. 12:51Speaker 6: the more provincial towns. The rural crime policy that we recently announced says that we're going to fund 100,000 hours of community patrol in our rural areas by New Zealand
104. 13:02Speaker 6: Police and I think that that is quite substantial for the rural community. They are the ones that don't have the close neighbours to be able to ring the police.
105. 13:11Speaker 6: And also as part of our rural crime policy, we're going to be introducing the ability to text 111, recognising also that those in the rural community don't always have
106. 13:22Speaker 6: connectivity with the telephone. So having the ability for having extra rural patrols around the country or around the rural areas and then being able to text for help means
107. 13:34Speaker 6: that they will be able to be seen to quickly.
108. 13:37Speaker 6: One of our other policies that we recently announced is Anybody that comes to New Zealand, including those on resident visas,
109. 13:46Speaker 6: who commit a crime that is jailable by 10 years or more in prison will be deported. We'll have our own little 501 law here where, you know, if you
110. 13:56Speaker 6: come to New Zealand but you don't abide by the laws, that's one thing. But if you do something that's so serious that you could get 10 years in prison for it, well, then we don't want you here. It's as simple as that.
111. 14:07Speaker 6: You can go back to your country. and behave in that manner there. Of course, we've also just announced three strikes for burglary. That's one of my ones. And I
112. 14:18Speaker 6: think that this was going to go down very, very well.
113. 14:21Speaker 6: In a public meeting recently, I asked people to put up their hands who had been burgled, and about two-thirds of the room did that. And of course, we see
114. 14:29Speaker 6: recidivist burgling, well, the same people doing the recidivist actions.
115. 14:35Speaker 6: And if you talk to police, they'll say to you it's usually the same cohort. And of course, they're just getting a slap on the hand with a wet bus ticket.
116. 14:43Speaker 6: So the three strikes for burglary regime means that when they're caught the first time, they'll get a warning. They'll get told they're now on the regime. By the time they get to the third time, it will be a
117. 14:53Speaker 6: minimum sentence of three years jail. That's minimum. It can go up to 10 years depending on the crime that
118. 15:01Speaker 6: they've committed. So say aggravated burglary, going after somebody's possessions with a weapon, for example, may entail more than three years.
119. 15:10Speaker 6: Of course, that will become the judge's decision or discretion, as we like to put it, when he does the sentencing.
120. 15:16Speaker 6: But on that third strike, it will be a minimum of three years. And we're pretty proud of that one, too, because we know that so many people have been affected.
121. 15:26Speaker 6: We also know, just I'm sticking on this one because it's one of my favourite ones, that that when people are found once they've committed the burglary and they go
122. 15:34Speaker 6: through the process, over 50% of them are convicted, but about 73% actually go on to burgle somebody else within
123. 15:43Speaker 6: two years of being released. So we want to stop that from happening. Of course, there's also the changes that we're making in regard to security guards, making sure that
124. 15:54Speaker 6: professionally trained security guards will have the powers that some police have to be able to detain people in a very safe manner as well. And I'm also in charge
125. 16:06Speaker 6: of the New Zealand Security Association. Well, not in charge of them, but the security guards that they have. And they've already come up with a template on how they
126. 16:15Speaker 6: will go about training these professionals to be able to do more and to protect our retailers when they're out there on the street as well. So there's some pretty good stuff that's come out from ACT. It's all about
127. 16:27Speaker 6: treating victims properly. more responsibly and giving them a say and looking after them as opposed to going after or
128. 16:37Speaker 6: protecting the criminals as Labour did in the past. We've reduced violent crime by 46,000 victims. We had a target of 20,000. We've smashed that, but we can go a
129. 16:47Speaker 6: lot further because the victims of crime are the ones that really matter here with our crime policies.
130. 16:53Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Nicole.
131. 16:54Speaker 4: You're welcome.
132. 16:55Speaker 6: Thank you for having me.
133. 16:58Speaker 1: And now I'm joined by Greens Party spokesperson Laurence Junan. Laurence, how would the Greens make this country safer?
134. 17:09Speaker 7: I think the key thing when it comes to any sort of changes when it comes to crime is to recognize some of the root causes and the drivers of crime.
135. 17:18Speaker 7: So one of the things we have seen that hasn't worked this term, for example, is when you have taken a surface level tough on crime approach and instead kind of moving the crime onto a community level. That's not
136. 17:30Speaker 7: actually where a lot of the fixes should be happening.
137. 17:34Speaker 7: So the Green Party has always talked about winter driver, the.
138. 17:37Speaker 4: Root causes of crime.
139. 17:39Speaker 7: So that includes good education and includes accessibility, food, affordable living and also warm, dry and safe homes. With that,
140. 17:49Speaker 7: you will see that if you do the front-up investment in those core areas, you are going to see a reduction in crime as a kind of a knock-on effect of those because what we often find is we take
141. 18:00Speaker 7: a very bottom-of-the-cliff approach when it comes to crime here in Aotearoa New Zealand when you compare to also some of the areas in other parts of the world that
142. 18:12Speaker 7: have done crime or has genuinely reduced some of those levers of crime. And one of the other things that we always say as well from a Greens perspective is
143. 18:23Speaker 7: we need to absolutely keep victims in the center of when we're looking at how do we reduce crime. But a challenge we always propose is why do we need
144. 18:34Speaker 7: to have victims in the first place for us to do something about it? What if we look at a world and imagine a world where we are mitigating the
145. 18:44Speaker 7: victims and victimization in the first place?
146. 18:47Speaker 1: Another major policy from the Green Party, and obviously this will come as no surprise to anyone, would be a complete drug law reform.
147. 18:57Speaker 2: Tell me about that.
148. 18:58Speaker 7: And again, this is a long-term Green Party policy because if you look at the experts, if you look at data, drug experts, Drugs should be a health issue and not
149. 19:09Speaker 7: a criminal issue. And I think the thing is, it has absolutely nothing to do with how serious we think that any drug law reform rehabilitation should be. But we
150. 19:20Speaker 7: just think that the funding currently is not being prioritized in the rehabilitation in the health space and the mental health space. And that's one of the things that the Green Party is proposing. as a package of our drug
151. 19:31Speaker 7: law reform, to also look at what services we're able to provide in mental health, in rehabilitation, in community wraparound support, in scaling up of public housing and all of those.
152. 19:43Speaker 7: So again, it's a system level health issue when we shouldn't treat drug laws simply from a criminal angle.
153. 19:49Speaker 1: And there's been a lot of changes to sentencing laws during this term of government the coalition have brought in.
154. 19:55Speaker 1: And I understand the Greens are wanting to have a look at sentencing, obviously enabling judicial discretion in sentencing, including abolishing certain things.
155. 20:06Speaker 2: What would that be?
156. 20:07Speaker 7: If I can get a little bit nerdy, so in our Westminster government system, we operate on the separation of power between the legislature, the executive, and the judiciary. And
157. 20:18Speaker 7: each branch of government should be able to have these sort of checks and balances for each other. What we've seen with this government is a complete overreach of the executive,
158. 20:29Speaker 7: and by extension, the legislature, the parliament, because parliament passes the laws. on judiciary and removing some of the discretion around that. It sounds, again, it sounds nice on paper,
159. 20:39Speaker 7: but there's very little, if not no international evidence that suggests longer sentences and that punitive approach will actually have that long-term benefit. It may help some of the more
160. 20:50Speaker 7: extreme ends of violent crime. But in terms of everyday crime, that's not going to be able to have the impact
161. 20:59Speaker 7: that people think they will have, whether it's through strike legislation or through a reduction in sentencing or capping of sentencing.
162. 21:07Speaker 7: So the Green Party is taking a very rational, sensible approach and saying that our judiciary system, our experts in the legal system, they know what's best and they should
163. 21:17Speaker 7: be left to decide on what's best based on their expertise.
164. 21:21Speaker 7: And that's where we're coming from in terms of any changes when it comes to both the sentencing, but also three strikes and any other changes we're seeing by this government.
165. 21:31Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Lawrence.
166. 21:33Speaker 4: Thank you so much, Chelsea. I really appreciate this.
167. 21:35Speaker 3: Thank you.
168. 21:42Speaker 1: Now I'm joined by New Zealand First's police spokesperson, Casey Costello. Casey, if Kiwis are concerned about crime in this country, why
169. 21:53Speaker 1: should they vote for New Zealand First?
170. 21:56Speaker 8: I think the big shift that we've seen and what we've been driving as a programme of work is a recognition that we've shifted from the obvious ram raids, the
171. 22:04Speaker 8: things that impact our day-to-day lives across communities, And what we've now got to address is the drivers that sit behind that, and that's where I'm talking about the organised
172. 22:14Speaker 8: crime component. In day-to-day life, we interact with the burglaries and the ram raids and the violence on the streets.
173. 22:23Speaker 8: But what I'm saying that New Zealand has to wake up to is what's occurring behind that that's driving the misery and harm that's sitting in our communities. We talk a lot about methamphetamine. We talk a lot about the
174. 22:34Speaker 8: drug component. But a lot of us see it as something that happens over there. But actually, you know, I've just come back from Kaikohe and Kirihiri this weekend. And,
175. 22:45Speaker 8: you know, the far north is one of those areas that has impacted greatly. And we have a common enemy in this space. And this is international organised cartels that
176. 22:56Speaker 8: are profiting off misery. and that is the cash wages money laundering that is driving anti-competitive behaviour in construction and
177. 23:05Speaker 8: horticulture and agriculture. This is impacting businesses going into liquidation because they can't compete. People don't see those drivers, and
178. 23:14Speaker 8: that's what New Zealand First is focusing on, is impacting the things that are actually causing harm that most of us don't realise is occurring.
179. 23:24Speaker 1: How would New Zealand First focus on perhaps one of those root causes?
180. 23:29Speaker 8: This is where we've got to bring, and we've already started this work about bringing cooperation across agencies. In the 80s, we had a specific type of crime type, and we
181. 23:40Speaker 8: talked about Sarah's Fraud Office and the need for that.
182. 23:43Speaker 8: We've got now another specific type of crime type. But what we have is really complex legislation that needs to support the enforcement agencies to do better And what we're
183. 23:53Speaker 8: driving for is those practical common sense solutions, our search and surveillance legislation, our proceeds of crime legislation, our Privacy
184. 24:02Speaker 8: Act legislation, our ability to share information to target criminals.
185. 24:06Speaker 8: All of those things are really important, but they're big pieces of work and you need cross-agency support and a really driven government to prioritise it.
186. 24:15Speaker 1: Ahead of the election 2023, I actually spoke to Winston Peters about crime and he told me that he wanted to have dedicated gang prisons and declare gang members terrorists.
187. 24:27Speaker 2: Is that still a party policy?
188. 24:29Speaker 8: So we haven't released a manifesto, but effectively that's exactly the point. We've got to see gangs differently to what we saw them before. And we've already released the report
189. 24:40Speaker 8: on organised crime, which said it is the greatest national security threat we have. You know, the money that is being dragged out of our economy is being used for
190. 24:48Speaker 8: criminal activity that's unprecedented to what we've seen before. And we're talking millions and millions of dollars being dragged out of our economy, leaving behind misery. And that's why we've
191. 24:59Speaker 8: got to be a little bit commodity agnostic, but recognise who the bad guy is. And these gangs are now not, you know, I was in the police in the 80s.
192. 25:08Speaker 8: The gangs we're dealing with now are very, very different to what, you know, we had, you know, 30, 40 years ago. And so we need to respond to them with smarter laws and recognise them for the terrorists that they are.
193. 25:20Speaker 1: What could one of those laws be that New Zealand First would introduce?
194. 25:25Speaker 8: It's not so much introducing, it's bringing it up to speed to current laws. You know, we've done a lot of work around anti-money laundering legislation. But, you know, the
195. 25:34Speaker 8: search and surveillance legislation isn't keeping pace with the technology.
196. 25:38Speaker 8: You know, and this is the part, you know, I say a lot about you know, they're moving at the speed of money and we are moving at the speed of law. Our law needs to be brought up to
197. 25:49Speaker 8: fit for purpose. You know, there's things, and these are the things where I talk about, you know, you've got good politics and good government, the things that sound really good, that,
198. 26:00Speaker 8: you know, look, people can see and identify, but nobody's going to go, oh, the beneficial ownership legislation really needs to be brought up to peace and that's what I'm going to vote for because they don't kind of resonate
199. 26:11Speaker 8: what that actually means to enforcement.
200. 26:13Speaker 2: Thanks for joining us, Casey.
201. 26:14Speaker 6: You're welcome.
202. 26:18Speaker 1: So we're joined now by the Opportunity Party leader, Q.
203. 26:22Speaker 1: Le Wong. Q. Le, how would the Opportunity Party make this country safer?
204. 26:26Speaker 9: Yeah, it's a great way to frame the question because I think that that has to be the objective of any crime and justice policy. It is about having fewer victims and making New Zealand a safe place to live.
205. 26:36Speaker 9: Our focus is really on how do we ensure that less crime happens in the first place? That means intervening early.
206. 26:43Speaker 9: We have young people that show signs of committing crime where they might be dropping out of school or causing a bit of trouble on the streets. And we know that those early intervention programs work very well. But at
207. 26:54Speaker 9: the moment, they are chronically underfunded. So supporting more of that youth mentoring. I've had the privilege of working directly with some of these programs myself, and I've seen the difference that they make in young people's lives. But it
208. 27:05Speaker 9: does require a sustained effort and a significant investment But even with that significant investment, we know that it's worth it because keeping those kids in school, making sure that
209. 27:14Speaker 9: they get their education and can go on to build a career, whatever that looks like, is the best way to prevent them from committing crime in the first place.
210. 27:24Speaker 1: So really tackling those grassroots kind of at the source when they're young kind of thing.
211. 27:28Speaker 9: Yeah, absolutely. And I think even when they do find themselves in the justice system, There's been some really great new courts that have been rolled out recently, things like
212. 27:39Speaker 9: the Alcohol and Other Drug Treatment Court, where they recognise the drivers of crime and try to treat that at the same time as holding people accountable. And this is
213. 27:48Speaker 9: not about being soft on crime or allowing people to get away with things. We absolutely have to hold people accountable.
214. 27:56Speaker 9: But we also need to make sure that we support them to not commit another crime because most criminals that get put into jail end up getting criminalised further and
215. 28:06Speaker 9: then coming out and re-offending. And that ultimately is bad for victims and it is bad for that objective of driving safety in our communities.
216. 28:14Speaker 1: What does the Opportunity Party make of sentencing laws? Do they go far enough at the moment?
217. 28:20Speaker 9: I think we have a separation of the the legislature and judiciary for a reason. Judges are best placed to
218. 28:28Speaker 9: determine what the right sentencing is. And so we've seen the evidence around things like three strike laws don't work.
219. 28:36Speaker 9: I think giving judges the discretion to make the right sentencing decisions is the best place for that to happen.
220. 28:43Speaker 1: So I know that other parties are looking to strengthen those laws.
221. 28:46Speaker 2: You would say maybe get rid of them?
222. 28:49Speaker 9: I think, I mean, the three strikes laws we're not supportive of and we've not seen evidence that that works.
223. 28:55Speaker 9: I think, you know, we need to make sure that we are supporting victims and making sure that we're holding criminals accountable, but not just locking up more people and
224. 29:05Speaker 9: then enabling more re-offending to take place. I think the other side of that is we've seen a lot of good restorative justice practices. So putting the rights and the needs of the victim at the heart they've had a
225. 29:17Speaker 9: really great success rate. Over 80% of victims that have been through that process felt like they had a good outcome.
226. 29:25Speaker 9: So we'd like to see more support and funding for those kinds of things as well.
227. 29:30Speaker 1: And lastly, Te Pāte Māori want to establish an independent Māori justice authority that would operate separately of existing Crown agencies.
228. 29:39Speaker 1: It would invest in kaupapa Māori justice services, like an independent Māori legal aid service, for example, and expand support
229. 29:48Speaker 1: for Māori wardens. The party wants to repeal three strikes legislation, gangs legislation, the Sentencing Reform Amendment Act, and raise the
230. 29:56Speaker 1: age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 16. They want to wipe criminal convictions for drug use and possession, end solitary confinement in prisons and increase the Steps to Freedom
231. 30:08Speaker 1: grant to $ 1, 000. Te Pati Maori would put an end to military-style boot camps, close youth justice residences by 2030
232. 30:16Speaker 1: and abolish prisons by 2040 by replacing them with community-based, restorative and tikanga-led alternatives.
233. 30:28Speaker 2: That's it for this episode of The Front Page.
234. 30:31Speaker 1: You can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage at nzherald.co.nz. The Front Page is hosted and produced
235. 30:39Speaker 1: by me, Chelsea Daniels. Kane Dickey is our studio operator, Richard Martin, our producer and editor, and our executive producer is Jane Yee.
236. 30:49Speaker 2: Follow the front page on the iHeart
237. 30:51Speaker 1: App or wherever you get your podcasts and join us next time for another look beyond the headlines.