Wellington Mornings with Nick MillsPolitics Thursday: Kieran McAnulty and Mike Butterick talk gang patches, hikoi and haka in Parliament
Today is the first day of the ban on wearing gang patches in public - but will the new law actually be effective?
Also, 40,000 people marched on Parliament this week to protest Act's Treaty Principles Bill. Did the Prime Minister Christopher Luxon know what he was getting into when he agreed to support the bill's first reading?
To answer those questions, Labour MP and housing spokesperson Kieran McAnulty and National's Wairarapa MP Mike Butterick joined Nick Mills for Politics Thursday.
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You're listening to the Wellington Mornings podcast with Nick Mills from News Talk said b focusing in on the issues that matter Politics Thursday on Wellington Mornings, news Talk said, ban.
Can you make joining us to Politics Thursday this week is unriginal. He was the first of Politics Monday's resident members. Then he became famous, really big out of big on the show. That was the only reason he became biggest because he was on the show. And then he sort of ditched us and left us. When he was in parliament, it was big time. Now he's in opposition. He kind of the odd time. He says, oh God, help Nick out. A but Labor MP and Housing spokesburdon General good guy, Karen Chinodie.
Welcome, thanks mate, there are you going.
I'm going good. Great to see you.
Yeah, real good to be here.
And National's MP for wire Rapper Mike Buttering. I run to Mike.
Good morning, Mike, morning morning, Karen. How are we mate?
I'm wondering if the show's gone down a step when I've got two VMPs from the wire Apper. What happened to the big time is that we used to have on the show.
Christ This is a real warm welcomer.
As so much. We can talk about the wire Apple today. I don't think that every time Karen comes on the show. Now you know what, Ethan, I'll tell you this, don't tell the listeners this, But every time he comes on the show, he's got something to promote. That's why he comes on the show. Last time was war Birds over Africa or something, and it was this over there. It was something. There's always something to tell us. So I'm looking forward to seeing what he's going to promote today. Let's start with gang patches, Karen. I want to start with you from today. It's illegal to wear gang patches and public and police took three minutes after the law came into force to make their first arrest and hastings at twelve three this morning. I don't really like this law. I think there's better ways to get around it, and I'd rather know who I'm dealing with a patch on than not a patch on. Yeah, what I don't like about this is that if you're trying to have a reasonable discussion around whether or not this is an effective policy, then all you get met with is, oh, you're soft on crime and your pro gangs. Well, I mean that's just obviously rubbish. I mean, I haven't met a single person who likes what the gangs do and wants to see it happen more.
The only question here is banning gang patches an effective use of police time? And is it actually going to reduce crime? And we're not convinced that that is going to be the case. And I'm with you, Nick. If I'm walking down the street and I'm walking alongside or am about to approach, or in the distance I can see a gang member, I want to know, and gang patches are a pretty obvious way to figure that out. But look, it's the question I want to pose, is is this a good use of police resources? When we see that the governments promised increase of five hundred is under question within the timeline they set in places like Wided Upper we have seen the excuse me, resources pulled from rural areas and all that sort of stuff.
So I'm not convinced, Mike, why do we need this law. I mean, we understand the lord to give police more power, no one's arguing that, but just the gang patches.
Look, look, I mean we could argue till the cows come home about what difference it will make. But this is as much about setting expectations and consequences, and it's about people have got choices that they can make. But you know what, let's get rid of it. We should never forget what a gang member actually has to do to earn that petch And I think about the victims, betrayal of victims, you know, and the tears. Think about you know what them and other innocent people think when they see someone walking down the street wearing a patch. And at the end of the day, the gangs they peddle misery and drugs in our communities and it can't go off because they've got choices they can make.
Do you both have issues with gangs in the Warrior When I grew up, I mean there was some pretty rough stuff over and I mean Featherston had gangs, and you know, there was quite a prominent gang culture in the wire Eport.
What's it like now, Well, certainly that was a prominent feature.
It was slightly before my time, but I know from talking to my parents and police that were around at that time that it was a real worry, a firebomb series that required a significant increase in resources to try and get down. So it's not like that anymore, but there is definitely a gang prisence. Get regular updates from the police about what they are doing with the gangs. Part of the increased funding that happened under the Labor government was to introduce an organized crime unit and wided upper and you know, the police do a fantastic job and that certainly helped them do that.
So that was good to see.
But I guess Mike actually demonstrated exactly the point that I was making. You know, the answer to your question is is this going to be effective? Was that gangs caused misery and all that sort of stuff, that's not into No one here is promoting gangs. The question is we're removing their patch actually reduce crime? And he's got a point, of course, they go through all sorts of terrible things to get the patch. Is this band actually going to stop those processes?
Absolutely not.
It's going to drive it underground, totally underground, that's all it's going to do. Absolutely right, So what's your what's your answer to that?
No, Well, look it's not this is about this is about expectations and consequences, as I said earlier, But just in terms of the wire apper. We did probably thirty years ago there was a pretty significant gang presence or challenges, which has certainly improved. And I would EXeCO what care and said, we've got fantastic police force in the water app They do a brilliant job. So it's not as high profile as it is in other parts of New Zealand, and it hasn't been for quite some time.
Actually, Mike, this is where where I have a little issue with it. The commaceiros you wipe them out. You got tough on crime, you found out what you're doing, you wipe them out in christ Us right, your your words, not mine. You didn't have this law in place then, so if you really wanted to do it, you could do it with us without this law.
Well, there's going to be a number of factors that it can contribute to putting pressure on them. At the end of the day, neck and we make we make edds that you know, apology apologies for focusing on having less victims and focusing on making it difficult and uncomfortable to be in again. I mean, we've had gang membership. It went up about fifty to fifty one percent. You know, there's nearly nine and a half thousand in the last twelve months, it's only risen by one percent. Hopefully the message is getting through, you know, we don't want those people that federal misery in our community. As simple as that.
There's a couple of points there. Neck First of all, the police efforts against the commentarios is to be commended and that and should be congratulated. The tools available to the police were brought in before the election, and so it's to demonstrate that those are the sorts of things that police need to be able to crack down on gangs, not a ban on gang pittches. The numbers of gang members is a really interesting point because I don't know if you saw in the news a few weeks ago, the police have done a sweep of numbers. They've actually significantly reduced and gone through and said oh no, no, they're they're not there. They've just cleaned it up and tied it up the data. And now I see that government members are claiming that gang numbers have reduced. We've got to be very careful about making those claims because it's not that people aren't joining gangs, it's just that they've tidied up the numbers.
Well, the latest figure I saw was is nearly ten thousand police are nearly ten thousand gang members and so one for one two biggest gangs in New Zealand.
Yeah, I'll tell you what I mustered up the coast years and years ago. And they're an old local guy from Proutorio said to meet you, said, Mike said, if you want to join the gang, there's only one game to join, and that's a sharing gang.
There you go, that's spoken like a true wire Rapper farmer, isn't it. Yes, it's Politics Thursday with Karen mcinnulty and Mike Butter at the wire Rapper boys have come to town. Do you I remember when Wyre Rapper was But he's strong at rugby? Whyre Rapper Bush? Do you though it used to be really strong? Maybe think back to my good old days.
Well, I have a theory about this. I know it wasn't on the on the list of topics, but if you're going to bring up rugby and wind it.
Up there, you've got to let us have a quick day.
I reckon the New Zealand Rugby Union should bring back promotion relegation. I do too, and I think it's a it's a real shame that provincial unions like ours are locked into the third or fourth division. Do you think back to nineteen eighty one when Brian Lahaw coach winded up a Bush to the first division and we were there for two or three years.
That's massive and kids like me grew up hearing about this. At this one hundred percent, we'll never be able to do it now.
I went to a semi final when I was a kid with my dad over in Marston and whatever the park's called a memorial park, Memorial Park when Wyre Rapper Bush had to play Taraniki for promotion relegation. Dave Loverage was the All Black half back playing for Taranaki and the whole crowd whatever crowd it was massive, kept on going making He was a pig farmer at the time, and all the crowd this is here how things change your life. All the crowd were making pig noises every time you touched the ball. And I said to myself, that's the All Black half back.
It's like, you know, it was not that day. He wasn't lucky how back?
Yeah, anyway, all right, we digress it of getting told up. Look, I've got a funny look from Ethian's face because he doesn't like rugby anyway, He's the made of forty thousand. Now, I reckon that number is a lot bigger than that, and I'll explain it shortly. People took the streets here in Willington on Tuesday to protest the ex Treaty Principle's Bill, and now the six months Select Committee process begins where the public can have this say on it. Mike, this is a huge protest. There's national beginning to regret or even look at it and say himself, maybe we screwed up on this.
No, look and look it was. It was a number of people in that and I think first point is really pleased that it was peaceful and we speakful, which is great and because you know there's lot of children and adults and older adults, so great that it was peaceful. No, we've been very clear all the way through. You know we will not be supporting it past the first reading.
Yeah, but this is going to be six months of absolute mayhem, isn't it. I mean, this is not you just no one knows what it's going to be like at the Select Committee. I don't think we've got any idea this is going to be six months of all things that we shouldn't be worrying about when it's not going to be about getting our economy right, it's not going to be about getting people's jobs. It's going to be a lot of talk about something that's not going to develop.
No. Look, I think the sect Committee process will be respectful. I think they're just in the process of setting out the terms I guess for that Select Committee. But look, you know we've been very clear all the way through. Nicktette will not come into law, we will not support it.
Past as well, I have the damn thing, Karen. Should they be regretting this?
Absolutely, and I think deep doubt if they're honest, they are because they've slept walked into a really tricky political spot. You know, Chris Luxon said before the election that he was a master negotiated.
Well, that's proven to be false.
And at the end of the day, the coalition agreement says that they will agree to send it to Select Committee. It doesn't say that it had to be a full Select committee process. And if we think back to the first one hundred days of this government, they were sending things to Select Committee for a week or not at all. So they could have definitely dealt with this. They've decided to have a full six month select committee where we will have a lot of division, a lot of racism, and a lot of bigotry for no reason whatsoever. But what I took out of Tuesday's hikoy was that that was the largest march on Parliament in our country's history. It was a reflection of the whole of the country. It wasn't just Maori, it was non Maori, it was ethnic minorities as well, all aspects in his own peap side.
Well, that's exactly right.
As I'm trying to get to is ultimately it was a reflection of society. And they all said this is a waste time. It is a pointless exercise. But also I guarantee that National MPs like Mike are getting emails from people saying why the hell.
Did you support this? What a stupid idea, and also.
Emails from their supporters saying you should support this, and so they are in a tricky spot. So it just goes to show Chris Luckson's political naivety.
In my view.
You know what, the thing that probably annoys me most about this whole Hekoy thing is the numbers, you know. I think everyone's trying to downplay the numbers. My son was at Coldplay last week right with fifty two thousand people, so he knows what, you know, like he sees crowds. He reckons. There was far more at the he Cooy than it was at Coldplay, you know, And it was just massive for the city and from the proliferal from where we were, it was mess.
Yeah, I did that.
Really.
It's Chris Luxon and Winston Peters and David Seymour are trying to downplay that the numbers, But I mean the police they gave updates throughout the day. I think they thought that it was originally thirty thousand and thirty five and then they reassessed at forty to the PSA said that their estimates was fifty five. It's probably somewhere in between those. But if you look at the number of the large protests previously, the Sea Bed and foreshow one that was less than half the size of that, the occupation of Parliament that was actually only a fraction of people compared to this, And isn't it remarkable and says a lot about the organization and the intent of this process that you've got the largest ever march on Parliament and only one person was arrested.
No, that's the great story. That is a great story, Mike, isn't it. One person arrested and that was early on doing something stupid.
Up the street, and you're always going to get a bit of an out by in a situation like that. I said right at the start of this discussion topic, you know, I'm really pleased that it was peaceful and respectable, which was great, but.
Okay, let's move on. Let's move on. Things got pretty heated last in the first reading of this Treaty Principles Bill in the House on Thursday, ended up with the Party Maury Hannah Rawitti Clark being named for leading a hakka. We've got updated right up in David Seymour's face. It was also viewed by nearly a billion people. This has just been huge. But surely, even Karen yourself, you would think this performance like this and it's not right in Parliament.
Well, look, I mean we should always respect parliament rules, but also people need to take a step.
Back and just look at the fact that.
In many other circumstances Parliament does allow a hakker, and I mean I've lost counter the number of times I've witnessed a hakker when I've been in the House and there hasn't been an uproar. We've got to think about the context of this debate. Everyone was able to have their say. The harker was started at the end of the process once every party had registered their votes, except that the speaker hadn't ruled out the result. But every party had registered their vote, they had to sit there, all of us had to sit there and listen to national MP after National MP say how they don't support this bill and how ridiculous it is in the division that it will cause, and how it's too simplistic, et cetera, et cetera, but then also vote for it. It was a pretty strating process, so I'm not at all surprised that they decided to express that frustration in that way, which was culturally appropriate given the topic. And obviously once it started, other MP's decided to join in.
Yes, sorry, Karen, I quite quite agree with you. I think that you know that when I look at it, I say to myself, it's like me putting a baseball cap on and running shoes and going into Mariah and start doing a break dance. You know, there's no there's no real difference. I'm it's not the right thing to do in Parliament House, is it, Mike.
At the end of the day that there's got it. There's got to be some standards, and you know, I expose at the end of the day, we don't We've moved. We're well moved on since the coliseum or pistols at dawn day, haven't we And you know we've got we make sure we have pretty strong standards in the National pot and lot. I get it, things can get pretty passionate on a number of different bills at times.
But you know it is Jerry brownly the right guy to be speaker then, like it is Jerry Brod. I mean you know what did he say? Oh no, oh no, no, don't.
Do that, you know, I mean, I look absolutely look like Jury is doing a very good job as a speaker. But loot of that. You know, we're there to represent your voters and it's not an unfair expectation that we uphold a standard that they would expect, you know, but a degre and some standards and that's not an unfair expectational.
It's just interesting like that people in Parliament are supportive of hakker when it supports something and it celebrates something that a Parliament decides, but they don't like it when it challenges them when they do something it doesn't And say, is.
It the first time you've seen a hacker in Parliament since you've been there? No, that's what I'm saying. I can't remember. I mean, I know this hacker is quite often there isn't it quite regularly, But it's usually in celebration of a decision that Parliament has made.
It's not often in challenge to a decision that Parliament has made, and so we can't pick and choose. I think it's appropriate that the Standing Orders Committee will review the rules, and I think, what's you know, because we've should happen on a regular basis. The Standing Order Committee sits every Parliament. Let's have the discussion, but let's not make this out to be something more than what it was. It was an instinctive reaction to a decision that Parliament made. If we're willing to be supportive of it in the good times, then we've got to suck it up in the bad times to you.
Okay, let's move on because I know you guys are at the time restraints. Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has announced changes to name suppression laws for people convicted of sexual offending. They can't be granted name suppression unless their victim agrees. Karen, why do you guys not like this idea?
Well, the victim's view should always be taken into account. That is a bottom line for us, particularly in something as sensitive as this. But the decision on a name suppression should always be made by a judge because judges they consider all aspects of the case and they make it a decision outside of emotion and based on facts, and giving that role to a victims solely is not necessarily we think the appropriate way to go at about it. And I noticed that there are a number of legal institutions that the Criminal Bar Association that they've come out and made that exact same point. You don't want to go too far where the victim doesn't have some input into it, and that there's significant weight placed on their view, but ultimately the decision should be up to the judge.
Mike, why do we need this change?
Well, there's actually two changes. One is that the courts can't issue that permanent name suppression and less the victim agrees with it. The second one is that victims will sexual crime, including intimate visual recording offenses, are automatically given name suppression. But this is about better impairing victims of sexual offenses and you know, and ensuring victims of crime that they're put at the heart of the justice system.
Just to be clear, Nick, we don't oppose the other one. That makes absolute sense. I just want to see a tweak on the other proposal.
Good, thank you. I just read this morning that you were against one of them, so that's why I brought it up. Let's quickly talk about crime figures before I let you both go. Police Minister Mark Mitchell said he put his job on the line, he said, and he had resign unless crime figures came down. And now they have. Ram raids have dropped sixty one percent, aggravated robbery down eleven percent, and robbery and extortion is down six percent. Foot patrols are up thirty percent. Caaren, Is this a big win for the government or is it stuff? The ram raids stuff, stuff that you guys introduced.
Oh okay, never going to hear me say that reduced crime is bad. But the reduction in ram raids was underway before the election as a result of the changes and extra.
Tools that we gave the police.
So it's very good to see that that trend is continuing. And obviously we need to celebrate the fact that there are reductions and victimizations. But across the board it's three percent a reduction in victimization, so it's not quite as big as what is being made out and I think if we're going to be looking at these things, we just need to have an honest conversation. Retail crime is up twelve percent and that's a worry and anybody that runs retail or hospitality will be concerned about that that the trend is going the other way in that respect. So look, obviously there's more work to be done. I would like to see more progress on the government's promised to increase the police numbers by five hundred within two years. That seem to have gone very quiet on that.
Mike is a is this a big win for government?
You think, oh, absolutely. I mean, look, it's what's not to like about that there's a whole lot less victims when you look through the steps. You know there's still more to do, but you know the indications are we're on the right track and hopefully a few people are getting the message and thinking twice about what they do or don't do.
Thank you both so much for coming in. It's lovely to see you both. Will hear from you both, and I appreciate you taking your time out of your busy schedule. Care and MacNulty and Mike Butterick have a great afternoon.
Thank you, Thanks next, see you here and see next.
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