Source: New Zealand Parliament – Hansard
HELEN WHITE (Labour—Mt Albert): Thank you. I’d love to just take that point on, Minister, and have a proper conversation about that, because my concern here is that you’re expanding the jurisdiction of people and, as Dr Duncan Webb suggested, they may well be people living in their vans. I know that that might be beyond, hopefully, the experience of most people in this Chamber, but that’s a reality in my suburb that there are people sleeping—I live in a big park, and at the bottom of the park there are people sleeping in their vans in the car park.
What I’m concerned about is the fact that there is such a disparity here in terms of understanding. We know that gangs are often a feature of poverty and alienation, where people find an alternative set of norms and values, which we do not agree with and it is a bad sign, but they find that because they’re displaced from the norms and values of the society that we are lucky enough to live in. It seems to me that by talking about swastikas as not actually meeting the standards—so you can have your Nazi sign, you can have your yacht, you can do that because you’re insulated by where you are. We are laying open a group of people whose intimate space—whose only intimate space—might be their van. And that is a reality. That is not me being melodramatic. Those are the very people that there will be people in that situation in their van, and we are actually opening the door to those people having the door knocked on and people going into that space.
Now, that is an issue. I wondered whether you had had advice on the worry about the bias in that situation, because I take your point that there are some terrible things that happen in gangs—I don’t think I’m ungrounded about that. But I do think there is a real concern about the invasion of space of people who are already fragile in some ways, and it’s going to alienate people way more if, in fact, the only refuge that they have is one that you are invading and you are inviting people to invade without any sensitivity over what that means for them.
So I would really like a genuine answer. I don’t want to hear that gangs are bad—I know gangs are bad. I don’t want to hear that there are victims out there because I know that lots of the people in those gangs and in our criminal system are, in fact, also victims. That does not excuse any bad behaviour or intimidation of others or rape or murder or involvement in issues over drug issues, etc., but neither is it fair to put people into a situation where there is no ordinary, normal refuge, which is so important to our humanity. So I mean this very genuinely—I want a response. Did you have advice that this could actually risk invading people’s privacy to an extent which was out of kilter? And did you have advice on the comparator to people who may be involved in situations where they have an offensive sign like a neo-Nazi sign, like a swastika, like those kinds of signs in their houses, but may be insulated by the nature of their lives and the fact that they live in situations where they’re a lot less vulnerable to a knock on the door.
Hon GINNY ANDERSEN (Labour): Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Look, the Minister’s given us some really good further understanding of how the car provision’s going to work. So what he’s stated—and if I heard this correctly—is that you can’t sort of jack it up like that on the back window, that’s out, but if you were driving your car and your patch was on the back, like that, that might be OK. But what happens if he was in a car crash—not a serious one—and he happened to slam up against the window? Would that be out? So I think it’s really important when we’re talking about what is display from a car.
I think that it’s really important for us to understand this because if the provision that was brought in after the select committee process, which has had quite a bit of coverage in the media—the point that there will now be a power for police after someone’s already been warned for wearing a gang patch, they can go right into their home, and even if it’s in a drawer or a chest of drawers or in their wardrobe or under the bed, that’s a penalty. But this one is saying that if they’re not displaying it, that’s not a penalty. So my concern is you’re giving mixed messages to the gang community on what to do with their patches here. So what is “display”? Is that pushing that, as you sort of said, or really that’s pushing it up against the window? But it does seem to be inconsistent with this new search power that you’ve introduced where, if they’ve got it in a drawer in their home, and that’s infringing the provisions that are in the bill.
Also, I would really like to understand, because we haven’t heard this in any of the debate—and I think the general public want to know this—what was the thing that changed your mind, Minister? So in March when police were asking for that additional power, did they discuss this car thing as well? Did that come up back in March? What was it between then and sort of June, July, where you whacked this new search power in, and then now where we found there’s an additional requirement to include a provision for cars and displaying from a car? Was there any sort of particular information or advice that you received from police or from other agencies that caused you to change your mind and include the later provision and this provision so late in the piece?
I mean, this was legislation that was talked about right through the campaign period, which is nearly a year ago now. There would have been some significant considerations of how this policy would work. But it does seem from the sort of litany of repeat mistakes over this whole course that it has not been very well thought through in terms of how it’s going to be implemented. It doesn’t really give a whole lot of trust and confidence in terms of how it’s going to be effectively implemented if you’re still coming up with new ideas so late in the piece.
The point, I think, that would be really useful to hear, just to recap, is: is it the display? What happens if you’re sitting in the car—where does the line lay in display? But also to understand exactly what the thought process was of the Minister for this second thing in this whole course of legislation to be introduced outside of the normal course of policy and legislation – making, because it does look like it’s kind of policy on the hoof. You’re just kind of throwing everything at the wall in the hope that it’s going to look pretty tough, but the perception that it’s giving is a general sense of disorganisation in terms of understanding how police are going to effectively make this work in terms of law enforcement.
So the main one really keen to hear: patch in a car, what happens and what is classified as display? If they’re wearing the patch in the car, is that OK or not? At what point is turning your back to the window classified as display?
Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (Minister of Justice): Thank you. Just in relation to the question of display, I’ve explained that already; I’m happy just to explain it one more time. The element to display will be case specific and will need to be assessed in light of all relevant circumstances, including the degree of visibility, the size and placement of the gang insignia, and the nature of the public place and the overall context. The purpose of the bill is around display of gang insignia in a way that is causing fear and intimidation. So if somebody’s wearing a gang patch in the car and it’s not visible and they’re not particularly displaying it, then that is not covered and it’s not an issue. It’s only if the game patch is being displayed—so that’s, I think, reasonably straightforward.
The member asked about the thought processes here. I can explain the thought process, which is: we’re passing a bill that is designed to give extra tools to police in order to handle what has been a 50 percent increase in gang membership in the past six years, and to provide them with four new tools to push back against the negative influence of gangs in our community. When the police came along—yes, late in the stage—and said, “Well, actually when we’ve looked at the details, there is a gap here that we think should be addressed.”, we decided to address it. Before passing the law, we’ve made this amendment in a belt and braces way to ensure that the legislation is as tight as it can be in order to ensure that the New Zealand members of the public can go about their lives without the fear and intimidation of gangs in their community.
CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): I’ll call Lawrence Xu-Nan—I’ll just make the member aware that we have your Amendment Paper now.
