Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill

I say, with all due respect to the member, that it is a transport safety issue. The drivers will not drive any bus that has a safety defect that the driver is aware of. Unbelievable! Drivers also will carry out full pre-shift bus checks as described in the defect card supplied with each bus. They will spend 5 minutes at the end of every timetabled trip carrying out full terminal duties, including lost property checks, using toilet facilities if required by the driver or the service person operator, performing stretching exercises, and preparing the bus for the return journey. And they will keep to all lawful speed limits. I want the New Zealand public to know that when we talk about transport safety and Auckland bus drivers, we are talking about a transport safety issue. These workers are following the rule book. I do not want to go on any bus without a current warrant of fitness or safety certificate.

The Government keeps telling us that the role of transport legislation is to keep citizens safe from harm. So I ask why the Government thinks it is OK for Auckland bus drivers to be locked out because they are working to the rule book. In other words, they are working safely. They are keeping their passengers safe, and they are keeping other drivers and pedestrians safe, as well. Transport safety is more than coming up with a couple of laws that might scare a couple of illegal street racers. It is about ensuring that drivers, pedestrians, and everybody else on the road are safe. Unfortunately, it has become an industrial issue in Auckland. In my view, no worker should have to work to rule. What is obvious is that the expectation—

Roy The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Eric Roy) Link to this

I draw the member’s attention to Speaker’s ruling 106/2: “On the second reading of a bill discussion must be confined to the bill before the House as printed.” If the member is making analogies she needs to draw them precisely into the bill. The second reading is really about a response to the work that the select committee did.

Speaking to the point of order—

Roy The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Eric Roy) Link to this

No, the member is not speaking on the ruling; I have ruled. The member will continue her speech.

I am making an analogy in relation to transport safety. The Minister said in his second reading speech that this bill was about transport safety and that he would be looking at safer journeys. I am making an analogy, and although I am aware that some progress is being made with the help of facilitation, I want to know what the Minister will do about safety for bus drivers and the safety issues that the bus dispute has exposed. I am aware that we are dealing with legislation, but there are more important things to be dealing with right now and, forgive me, I do not think it is outside the Standing Orders to draw those comparisons.

Roy The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Eric Roy) Link to this

It is. The member should speak on the bill.

Dalziel Hon Lianne Dalziel Link to this

The Minister of Transport has been promising his friends in Auckland from NZ Bus and Infratil that he will not only deal with this legislation but also repeal another Act, called the Public Transport Management Act, that was brought in last year that gives the Auckland Regional Transport Authority and others more control over routes and conditions, such as those that NZ Bus currently services. What is so dreadful about that?

If the Minister of Transport is trumpeting this bill as a means of protecting citizens from harm, because that is what he is saying it is, why does he think that enabling contractors to hide their books from Auckland ratepayers is OK? I think that is a fair question to ask, and I will certainly be asking it in the Committee stage.

This bill, by and large, will not address the concerns of the submitters who came before the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee with genuine concerns about illegal street racers. Once again I acknowledge those submitters, because it was obvious from their submissions that they are living in some pretty terrible situations, particularly in Christchurch. I am aware that the submitters will not be satisfied with this bill or the next bill to come before the House tonight. The legislation does not deal with the issues they raised. It does not deal with the issues around Nicky Wagner’s petition on noise. She went out and rarked up the issue in Christchurch, and here we are. We cannot find a legislative solution to the problem; it is going to take a lot more than that.

I predict there will have to be further changes. This bill and the companion bill will not deliver on the expectations this Government has raised around the issue of illegal street racers and others. For example, there are some really interesting definitions in this bill, like the definition of “cruising”. I think it will be up for a lot of future interpretation, and it will be a money-spinner for lawyers. It is bad lawmaking. We need to get this right so that we are not providing endless opportunities for lawyers. Labour members are concerned about a number of things—

Cruising? Good grief!

Dalziel Hon Lianne Dalziel Link to this

Yes, honestly. We are concerned about a number of things, which we will discuss in the Committee stage.

Our judgment is that the bill is harmless, although, overall, we think it is pretty useless. As I said at the commencement of my speech, we support this bill, but we will be interested to check in a year to see whether it has made any difference to the issue of illegal street racers. I predict that it will not have done so.

Guy Hon NATHAN GUY (Associate Minister of Transport) Link to this

We have just heard a whole lot of mumble-jumble from Darien Fenton, the previous speaker. I am not sure whether she is aware that there is no illegal street racing going on with buses in Auckland. I was in Auckland on the weekend and I did not see any. We have just heard the member say that the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill is bad lawmaking, but we know from her that the Labour Opposition is supporting it. How can it be bad lawmaking when the previous speaker sat through all of the submissions and, as the chairperson of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, David Bennett, has just told me, never said that this bill was bad law? I think the member needs to take stock of the speech she has just given and get up to speed with a whole lot of the facts.

The member also went on about road safety, which is a real focus of this Government. The Minister of Transport, the Hon Steven Joyce, put out the Safer Journeys discussion document, and we are looking forward to feedback from all of New Zealand by the end of the year. That is very important. What is also important is that 137 serious crashes or deaths have resulted from 15 to 24-year-olds being involved in this type of activity. When we think about the social costs of those accidents, injuries, or deaths, it is huge. It is very important—

From cruising? You’re talking about the next bill.

Guy Hon NATHAN GUY Link to this

No, I am not.

Dalziel Hon Lianne Dalziel Link to this

Yes, you are.

Guy Hon NATHAN GUY Link to this

No, I am talking about—

Hon Gerry Brownlee Link to this

They’re not listening. That’s why they’re not in Government.

Guy Hon NATHAN GUY Link to this

That is right; that member over there is still cruising around in Opposition. She has not quite worked it out yet. When we think about it, the illegal street racing and disorder occur on the weekends. We have serious concerns that the police are out chasing those young hooligans around. They are not necessarily boy racers; they may be girl racers, as well. We have to ask why this is occurring up and down the country. One particular hotspot is Christchurch, and it was good to see the select committee down there. It had a hearing in Christchurch and heard from people who are directly affected in the communities where those people are out hooning up and down their streets in these noisy cars. Noise was an issue that came up, and it was good to hear the Minister talk about how there will be an objective noise test when these people are pulled over, because noise is a serious problem that those vehicles create.

To bring my speech to a very quick summary, this legislation comes into force on 1 December this year. It is very important that all the good work the select committee has brought about is captured in this second reading. I will let some other speakers on the Government side who sat through those submissions talk in detail about those things we gathered through the select committee process. I support this bill in its second reading.

CAROL BEAUMONT (Labour) Link to this

Tēnā koe, Mr Speaker. No doubt everyone in this Chamber recognises that there is a problem, and Labour supports the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill and will support any genuine effort to deal with the issues of illegal street racing and antisocial behaviour. I want to acknowledge the people whose lives are impacted on by the actions of the so-called boy racers. Those people made submissions to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and I am fully aware that in many cases their lives are absolutely blighted by the actions of those people. We listened to a 15-year-old talk about not being able to sleep at night because of the noise and we heard from her parents about their business being impacted on. I acknowledge that this is a serious problem, particularly, it would seem, in Christchurch, and there are genuine issues being raised.

I also want to acknowledge the efforts made by my colleagues, particularly Clayton Cosgrove but also other Christchurch MPs, in relation to this particular issue. But the reality is that this legislation and its companion bill that we will be talking about later are, in many cases, just window dressing. They have the appearance of trying to deal with what is a serious problem. I say that for a number of reasons. One reason is that there is a real issue in enforcing any law that targets boy racers, and that is the ability of the police to have sufficient officers present at the right time and in place to witness offences taking place and then to safely intervene and make arrests. The bill does nothing to deal with those issues of policing, and I will come back to that.

The current legislation, including the bill my colleague Clayton Cosgrove put in place, allows courts to permanently confiscate cars. However, the reality is that tough laws work only if courts back up lawmakers. Confiscation is presently happening in only a very small percentage of cases. The reality is that we have no guarantee that this new bill will change that position and lead to a change in the behaviour of our courts. If the courts do not back up legislation, then we do not deal with the issue. We need to be passing legislation that is enforced, and, of course, the other side of that coin is that we need to pass legislation that is enforceable and practical. I will come back to that later as well, because, as my colleague Darien Fenton said, there are some real issues in this bill that will make enforcement difficult.

The real issue here is that the Minister of Police, Judith Collins, has raised public expectations on this issue by talking tough. This is National talking tough, but she will not be able to carry through on those expectations. This legislation and its companion bill will not provide the solutions she says will be put in place. The reason for that is the issue is one that does not have an easy answer. We cannot just decide that one or two changes to the law will solve the problem. When listening to the submissions, it seemed to me that the key issues were around road safety and safe driving, noise, and antisocial behaviour. The drivers of those issues—road safety, noise, and antisocial behaviour—will require a wider range of interventions than the ones this bill and its companion bill put in place.

Before I go into the detail, I would like to acknowledge the submitters on the bill. There were 126 submissions from interested groups and individuals, and the select committee heard 30 submissions. As has been mentioned, that included hearing submissions in Christchurch and I think it was a very powerful day of submissions. Some very, very good submissions were made in Christchurch by those who are negatively affected by the behaviour of boy racers and, in fact, by those who would consider themselves to be the good boy-racers. Those submissions were important to our efforts and I acknowledge those submitters.

We also received a lot of advice from a range of officials from the Ministry of Transport, the New Zealand Transport Agency, the New Zealand Police, the Ministry of Justice, and the Parliamentary Counsel Office. Again, I acknowledge those people, because they were trying to deal with some quite difficult propositions to try to give us the advice necessary to put those measures into place.

I still think there are many problems with this bill and I will talk about some of those. One of the areas that is covered is the issue of by-laws. This bill provides for the making of anti-cruising by-laws, and it will enable local authorities—road-controlling bodies—to create those by-laws. One of the interesting things was that most of the local authorities that submitted did not want to have that ability. When looking at the submissions and going back to them, we see that considerable concern was expressed by many of those local authorities about the efficacy of by-laws in this situation. So I think that is an issue that sits there for us. Those by-laws will look at things like the roads where cruising can take place, and will deal with issues such as the amount of time that must elapse between successive times a vehicle can be driven along a section of road for it not to be regarded as repeatedly using the same section of road. The Minister also has some powers in relation to those by-laws, including the powers to amend, replace, and disallow by-laws, and there is a really important issue in there about what requirement there is on the Minister to consult. That is also an area of concern.

I suppose the biggest area of concern in relation to these by-laws is the definition itself. The definition of “cruising” refers to the act of driving repeatedly over the same section of road to draw attention to the power or sound of the motor vehicle, or in order to create a convoy that impedes traffic flow. The bill was unclear as to whether a driver should be allowed to drive in one direction along a two-way road and back in the other direction without being considered to have driven on the same section of road twice, so the select committee recommended an amendment to clause 4 to the effect that “cruising” means “driving repeatedly in the same direction over the same section of a road …”. That certainly raises some very interesting questions, because in my opinion driving backwards and forwards along the same stretch of road is just as much cruising as repeatedly driving over the same stretch of road in the same direction. It is as likely to cause people living in the area as much harm in terms of issues like noise as driving over the same stretch of road in the same direction. I think there is still a need for clarity about this matter. It seems a pretty foolish sort of definition, and we do not want to have legislation that enables boy racers effectively to thumb their noses at the police over the issues concerned. So by-laws are one part of this—in particular the interpretation of these terms.

A number of submitters raised concerns about the sort of legitimate activities that they hoped would not fall under the definition of cruising, which is why we ended up with the definition we did. I think that although the submission process was actually quite a good one, and a number of good submissions were made, as Darien Fenton has already raised, the consideration and deliberation phase in the select committee was rushed and quite flawed. We had to deal with things without the documentation in a timely manner, due to some reasoning on the Government’s part that we had to meet some sort of timetable that it had put in place. We were not able to really get down and deal with issues like the question of the cruising definition I just raised.

As I said, if we distil it all down, one of the key issues that came up in the submission process was the issue of noise. Noise is fundamentally the most significant problem that boy racers create. I recognise the fact that provisions are already in place that allow us to deal in some way with noise. They are the Land Transport Rule: Vehicle Equipment 2004 and the Land Transport (Road User) Rule 2004. Those rules provide a range of powers to deal with the issue of noise, but they require sufficient policing resource to do just that. That is a fundamental problem with this legislation, because we are seeing cuts to police budgets at the moment, and we are seeing police cars being taken off the roads. In fact, overwhelmingly, our deliberations showed that police resourcing is the key to dealing with the issue of boy racers. Thank you.

Norman Dr RUSSEL NORMAN (Co-Leader—Green) Link to this

I stand to speak on the second reading of the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill. The Green Party will be supporting this bill, and I have a few short comments to make on it. We in the Green Party support the right of local councils to set by-laws to clamp down on illegal street racing. We think it is essential that councils have those powers, and we support them in doing that.

However, we think that the term “cruising” requires rather more work, as it is a rather loose term, and the definition is pretty loose. The current definition is quite broad, and could encompass, for example, the activities of political parties, such as the convoy of ACT Party sport utility vehicles (SUVs) that were cruising in Mount Albert earlier this year. They were cruising up and down, chewing through gas. We think that the ACT Party’s SUVs could have been caught within the “cruising” term, because that term is a bit loose.

We also think that making vehicle impoundment mandatory may not be the best course of action in all situations, and that it is essential to retain flexibility and discretion for the authorities. Impoundment may have its place, but we think that without some flexibility in the use of impoundment, people will just feel alienated. Heavy-handed enforcement is not always the best strategy. Sometimes it is the only option, but it is not always the best strategy. Boy racers and girl racers are, in fact, examples of young people who are creating their own communities of interest. We should be trying to direct them in constructive directions, rather than simply coming down on them like a tonne of bricks in every situation or occurrence. Obviously, there is the need to have these powers, but we have to ask ourselves this: if we clamp down on young people’s civil liberties and further alienate them, how will that help us? Motor racing is a big business and a legitimate sport, and it would be good to steer young drivers into a more structured and safer environment, where they could race or even just parade their vehicles. We should not forget to find them opportunities to do that, because if we simply go in there and use impoundment and heavy-handed enforcement, we may find that we make the problem worse. It is a matter of using discretion and using our brains to deal with the issue.

The Green Party particularly supports the provisions of new section 121A, inserted by clause 26, where enforcement officers may give directions or immobilise vehicles if drivers such as those on learner or restricted licences breach their licence conditions, and of new section 128C, inserted by clause 27, about vehicle inspections. These are both good safety measures, and I welcome the comments from the Minister about road safety. I will have a few things to say about that myself.

The police already have the powers to deal with people who drink alcohol in cars. That drinking leads to many of the problems associated with illegal street racing. We would prefer the police to have the resources they need in order to enforce the current law around driving and drinking, and we think that that needs to be the first priority. We also welcome the work of the Law Commission on the control of the sale of alcohol, which is also an issue of safety. Of course, the Greens have been advocating for quite some time, with the previous Government and the current one, for there to be restrictions on the advertising of alcohol on television, but so far our efforts have been without any success.

In terms of road safety, which the Minister alluded to, certain things are absent from this bill. For example, we know that it has been very difficult for some communities to impose lower speed limits. The roading authorities have been extremely resistant to communities lowering speed limits, yet we know that doing so would make a significant contribution to safety and may even help with the issues that this bill tries to deal with. There is also the issue of safety for cyclists and pedestrians. Our roads are designed so that they are extremely unsafe for cyclists and pedestrians, and it would be great to see central government agencies become interested in making our roads safe for cyclists and pedestrians. If we want to improve safety on our roads, of course, it would also be great to move freight off the roads. Instead, this Government’s priority is to move freight on to the roads. So if road safety really were a central concern of the Government, it would address those issues, not to mention that it would invest heavily in public transport so that we can reduce the number of cars on our roads in the first place.

None the less, in spite of the weaknesses in and absences from this bill, the Green Party will be supporting it, and we commend it to the House.

Garrett DAVID GARRETT (ACT) Link to this

It is always a great pleasure to rise and find things to support in speeches from the opposite side. In this case I was glad I was sitting down, because I thought for a while there I would have to agree with everything that Dr Norman said. The first part of his speech was extremely sensible. He said he would support the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill, and made some very sensible comments. Then, sadly, he departed a wee bit and provided me with something to act as a foil, which was the idea that these guys and girls are basically just sad youths who really need facilities to be provided for them. It is the idea that if we provide burnout pads, they will all happily pour their diesel there in a paddock somewhere, surrounded by hurricane wire fencing, and everything will be fine. Well—

Norman Dr Russel Norman Link to this

Not from the libertarian wing of the ACT Party, are you, David—not from the freedom-loving wing?

I will come to that, I tell Dr Norman; I will address that in a moment, but I was obliged to respond to the points he made earlier. It is the same as the phenomenon of skateboard parks. Every time I am driven to the airport when going home from here, I pass a large skateboard park down by the supermarket in Chaffers Street. I think the most skateboarders I have ever seen there would be two. But that does not stop them from going down Molesworth Street, frightening pedestrians, going up walls, and on to fences, because part of being a young punk—as many of us were—is breaking the rules and causing trouble. I tell Dr Norman that I am sorry but the idea that all we need to do is to provide them with alternative outlets and everything will be fine is very naive. Again—

Hear, hear!

Good God! I am glad I am propping myself up, because Mr Cosgrove is agreeing with me, and that is a rarity. Dr Norman said quite rightly that the ACT Party was the party of freedom, and for that very reason there have probably been more debates on this among members of our caucus than there have been in the Greens’ caucus, and that is amusing—

More than the gang patches bill?

Henare Hon Tau Henare Link to this

At least as much! The question is the balance between the rights of people to do as they wish, which some people say is classical liberalism—I do not quite agree—and the rights of others to enjoy their lives without their rights being infringed. That is the balance. Doing what we like regardless of infringing others’ rights is not liberalism. With the limited amount of political philosophy I know, I believe that that is anarchism, and we are not the party of the anarchists. Liberalism means freedom to act without State interference or interference by others as long as one does not interfere with others. All the speakers from Labour and National, as well as Dr Norman, have pointed out that this bill is about stopping those people who are causing sleepless nights, anguish, and distress to people who are going about their lawful business. It is about people being able to enjoy a balmy evening barbecue in Christchurch without having a bunch of clowns driving up and down the street with their large-bore exhausts, which substitute for other things. It is about having a balance.

The Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill is not a perfect bill. It would not be here at all if Mr Cosgrove’s measures had worked. They were a good effort, a good try. He tried to make the measures work, but this bill is necessary because those guys, as is the nature of the beast, have found ways round the legislation.

People sometimes say that these things have always been with us, and that nothing has changed since the internal combustion engine was invented. I am someone who is, sadly, in the upper quartile of the age range in this House—or beyond the middle, anyway—and I can say that in my lifetime hot-rodders—as they used to be called—have always been with us. But there is a difference. I remember seeing a chap on the telly the other day talking about traffic cops in Auckland. He was about 65, and he said that a particular cop was probably still looking for him, and everyone laughed. It was a game, but people knew the rules. If people went hooning down Queen Street and got caught, they took their medicine and paid their fine; or, in those days, if they did not pay their fine they did 14 days in jail.

As other speakers have said—Ms Beaumont, for example—we have a generation today who know, because they are very skilled-up on their rights but not on their responsibilities, that fines do not matter. Fines are essentially a voluntary thing in this country, and are paid only by the middle classes. Someone can rack up 30 grand in fines, and eventually some silly judge will say that that person will never be able to pay that amount, and the judge will waive the fine. These guys know that. This bill attempts to take a different tack in the realisation that fines are not working. It recognises two things that those guys value: their car and their licence. It moves away from the focus on fines and towards demerit points, leading to a loss of licence. That is sensible because the fine approach has not worked.

It comes back to rights, which are competing rights. No one has the right to race up and down suburban streets with big-bore exhausts, causing upset to others. It is as simple as that. If people want to do that on their own property or on daddy’s property, that is fine; they can do what they like. I personally believe that they can kill themselves if they like; I do not really care. But if they want to race up and down Moorhouse Avenue or Harper Avenue in Christchurch, or wherever the spots are in South Auckland, and disturb people going about their lawful business, then we need to find ways of curbing them.

The legislation that has gone before has not worked, so this bill is an attempt to have another go at it. We can laugh about the limitations of the definition of “cruising”, and everyone has been very careful not to extend the analogy too far, but it will be shaken out and we will see whether it works. Some members of our party have said—as I have admitted freely, there has been considerable debate in our caucus and among our membership—we do not need this law, because the problem seems to be solved in Auckland. I met with the police up there, and the problem is not solved.

Come out west!

Exactly. The police target a particular area. The boy racers—for want of a better term—decide it is not worth the hassle, so they lie low for 3 weeks, then turn up out west. So the problem is not solved.

The other sinister thing is a significant difference between the Christchurch problem and the Auckland problem. Whereas the Auckland boy-racers are predominantly working class, mixed race, and from the lower socio-economic group, the Christchurch group are predominantly white, middle class, relatively well-educated—especially about their rights; they know all about rights but not about responsibilities—and include a significant number of white racists.

Are you out of touch completely?

Carter Hon David Carter Link to this

No, not at all, I say to Mr Cosgrove. I am probably more in touch than him. I bothered to turn up yesterday to the Crimestoppers launch, which he was invited to, but was too busy to attend.

This law is necessary because previous attempts have not worked. It is not perfect. We may well amend it next year or the year after, but it is another attempt to ensure that people’s lawful enjoyment of their lives is not interfered with by those who simply wish to disrupt them. Thank you.

Bennett DAVID BENNETT (National—Hamilton East) Link to this

It is a great pleasure to speak on the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill. This legislation has been canvassed widely in the public eye and also in this Parliament. When we think about the bill we think of the terminology “boy racers”, which is convenient in the public eye, but with this bill National has shown an ability to listen and to deliver to people, especially in the great city of Christchurch, where boy racing is a huge issue. We went there and heard from the council and many individuals in that area. When we heard some of the stories, many of us could not believe that people had to deal with antisocial behaviour on such a scale, which we would not expect to result from this kind of activity. I think we need to pay tribute to the National Government for actually delivering to the people of Christchurch, because they have waited long and hard for this to happen. Members on the other side of the House have been saying that other cities are affected as well as Christchurch, and it is true that other cities have had to deal with this issue as well, partly through a combination of the use of legislation and police powers, and what others intend to do in a particular city.

I say boy racing is problem, and it is problem that we intend to deal with. The previous Government had a chance to do so; it had 9 years, and it did not deliver for the residents of our major cities who wanted to have some peace and quiet, or for the businesses in our major cities that wanted to be able to carry on operating hotels and other businesses. National has delivered; it has listened and delivered.

They did a lot of talking about it.

Bennett DAVID BENNETT Link to this

Exactly. The previous Government talked about it; we have delivered. The people of this country know that, and they will be thankful to National for doing that. It was a great pleasure to put this bill forward. Thank you.

Mackey MOANA MACKEY (Labour) Link to this

It was hard to believe that the previous speech was from the chair of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee. One would have thought that the chair of the select committee might have had a little bit more to say about legislation that he thinks is so great than 30 seconds of random comments and rhetoric strung together. David Bennett will be able to add to his resume “random rhetoric generator” when he leaves this place, because he is capable of delivering speeches that go for 10 minutes and saying absolutely nothing. I pay tribute to him for that skill; it is very difficult to speak for 10 minutes and say absolutely nothing. This time, fortunately, he spoke for 30 seconds and said absolutely nothing.

One thing he said was that this Government is delivering to the people of Christchurch. They are going to pass legislation that does nothing more than the legislation that Labour passed when we were in Government; it does nothing more than the legislation that my colleague Clayton Cosgrove put through when we were in Government, and he is a Christchurch member of Parliament who knows the reality of what people in Christchurch are having to deal with. I do not know whether David Bennett just did not read his research notes properly or whether, once again, we have National trying to rewrite history. But the fact is that while Labour will support this bill because it backs up what we did when we were in Government—

Carter Hon David Carter Link to this

Huh!

Henare Hon Tau Henare Link to this

—we have serious concerns, I say to Mr Carter, about whether it will do anything. We support any moves to enhance the power of the police to deal with illegal street racing and with the antisocial behaviour that goes along with it, and we know how terrifying this behaviour can be for many members of our community who have to deal with it. The noise is very intimidating and people are scared to go out on the streets at night, particularly if they live on a main drag. I myself live in a cul-de-sac but it is a cul-de-sac that is nice and long—

What sort of sack?

Bennett David Bennett Link to this

Watch it! It is a long cul-de-sac and we have a lot of boy racers who love to whizz up and down it. One night, it would have been about—

I hope we are not paying for the bridge.

I am sorry?

Get the breathalyser out.

Hayes John Hayes Link to this

I know. The member’s interjections are just as incomprehensible as his speeches. One night, it would have been about midnight, I was sitting in the front room of our house. We know when we hear that boy-racer sound coming down the street, and then hear the terrifying noise of a car skidding out of control and just wait for the crash. Well, the crash came, and thankfully the car took out a tree on my front lawn, which I was quite fond of, and did not take out the front room of our house. If the tree had not been there, there is absolutely no doubt that that car would have come straight through the front room of our house.

What’s that got to do with the legislation?

Grant Robertson Link to this

It was a boy racer, I say to Mr Hayes. He might want to listen, instead of interjecting the whole way through my speech.

So I understand how terrifying this can be. I went outside and found the boy racer backing away hurriedly, but fortunately he left his front bumper behind with his licence plate number on it, which made it a lot easier for the police to trace him. I can absolutely testify to the fact that it is terrifying when it happens. When it happens on a main drag, when there are a lot more boy racers than just the one or two I get every Friday and Saturday night, it is a problem that needs to be dealt with.

My question is whether this bill will actually do that. I have serious doubts that it will. There has been a lot of talking up of this legislation. As I said, Labour will support it, because we do not think it does any harm, but we need to make sure there are the police resources behind this bill, to make sure they can police it. There is no point in having laws if we do not have the police resources to back them up. On Friday and Saturday nights that is a real issue. But it is good that this law is being updated. As I think Mr Garrett said, times do change, and laws do need to be updated to reflect the reality of what we are dealing with. When I was at high school, only one of my friends had a car. It was a Morris Minor, and if it went above 75 kilometres per hour, bits started to drop off it. One day the gearbox dropped out in the middle of the intersection of Lytton Road and Gladstone Road, and that was the end of the car.

If one goes to a high school now, one cannot get a park because of all the students’ cars parked there. The fact is that more young people have cars nowadays, the cars are more powerful and more expensive, and the laws need to be updated to reflect this reality.

It is important that this bill differentiates between those who are causing a serious problem and those who are acting legally—those who are law abiding. There is nothing wrong with having a car, and there is nothing wrong with enjoying having a car and taking pride in it. If a young person gets a part-time job and saves up to invest in a vehicle and work on it, and takes pride in it, that is a good thing. One of the problems we have is that it is difficult for the police to differentiate between those young people who are law abiding, who are acting responsibly, who just want to be able to enjoy their vehicle without causing problems, without being antisocial, and without scaring and intimidating people, and the ones who are causing all the problems that we are trying to deal with in this legislation—the ones who want to act illegally, the ones who want to act dangerously, the ones who put people’s lives at risk, the ones who terrify our elderly people, terrify our families, and the ones who keep our families off the roads on Friday and Saturday nights. That is one of the most important things that this legislation can do.

I am a member of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, but I was not on it for most of the deliberations, because I was on the ridiculous Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee, which was a waste of time. But I understand that there were a number of submissions on the bill. There are a large number of young people out there who hate this problem as well, for the reasons I have outlined. They do not want to be targeted for what their peers are doing. They do not want to be targeted when they are acting legally and responsibly, because of the actions of a few idiots who come alongside them. I think they probably have a better idea than we do of what would work to stop those people. We come from a completely different generation. Tau Henare probably acted up by listening to rock and roll music—

On his crystal set.

Hayes John Hayes Link to this

That is right; on his crystal set. There are a lot of young people out there who would tell us what we can do to knuckle down on these young people and make it difficult for them to act in the way they do. We should engage those young people who want to be part of the solution, and then we can help to deal with the young people who are the problem that we all want to solve.

I shall talk about police resourcing. This bill will not work if we do not have police resourcing. I know that Government members do not want to hear about police resourcing; they are out there, taking police cars off the roads, and closing police stations. As any of us who have been out with our local police on a Friday or Saturday night know, the police can be overwhelmed by the sheer number of people whom they have to deal with, particularly when it comes to illegal street racing. The police need to be in a million places at once. The police also have to deal with the serious problems of domestic violence in this country, which often come up on Friday and Saturday nights when people have been out to the pub or have been drinking at home. When the police get a call to say that there is an illegal street race occurring, there are often not enough police officers out on patrol on Friday and Saturday nights to be able to get over to the other side of town or out to the rural areas where a lot of this activity happens. These people know that the police cannot get out to those areas fast enough. They know that the police will be tied up in town with the liquor bans and with all the issues that occur in the cities.

If we really want to crack this problem, we need to drastically increase our police numbers, and we need to drastically increase their resources so that they are able to deal with this problem. [Interruption] I say to Mr Woodhouse that we can pass all the laws in the world, but if we do not have the police numbers to enforce them, they will not make a blind bit of difference. I think it is a very good idea to allow our local communities to make by-laws relating to this issue. They know where the problems are, they know what will work, and it is much better than having a top-down approach from central government, where we decide what will happen. The local people can make that decision. I hope this bill works.

Boring.

I say to Mr Hayes that I think he is boring, so there we go; we are equal. I hope this bill does make a difference. I seriously doubt that it will, but, as I said, it will not cause any harm.

The confusion around the definition of “cruising” just highlights how difficult it is to legislate in this area, and how much easier it would be if we gave the police more resources to deal with the problem that we have and to use the laws that we already have. I remind this House that Clayton Cosgrove’s legislation already allows for the permanent confiscation of cars, yet the courts are not enforcing it. Once again, if we do not have the police resources to back up this legislation, it will not work. If the courts are not prepared to back up Parliament’s intention, which was to allow for the permanent confiscation of vehicles where there is a serious recidivist problem, then we will never get on top of this problem, as my colleague Lianne Dalziel said. We need to make very clear Parliament’s intentions in the event that the courts do what they did with Clayton Cosgrove’s legislation, which was to have such a low rate of confiscation as to render it ineffective compared with what it could be if they followed Parliament’s intentions.

The definition of “cruising” is difficult, and we will trust the police to use their discretion—that they will know that an ACT Party cavalcade is not cruising, and that illegal street racing is cruising. Once again, this is another law and order bill that is all public relations and no substance. As we say, it does not do a lot of harm. Government members will go out there and crow about it, but the reality is that it is not a lot different from the present legislation. I look forward to the next piece of legislation and the support of this House for Labour’s amendments that will toughen it up and make it easier to enforce.

Henare Hon TAU HENARE (National) Link to this

We have just listened to 10 minutes of diatribe from Moana Mackey. We have just listened for 10 minutes to a person who had the gall to accuse the chairman of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, Mr David Bennett, of having no substance. She said that his speech was only 2 minutes long and there was nothing in it. I have been in this place for a wee while. I have listened to some good speeches, and I have listened to some bad ones. The point made by Moana Mackey at the end of her speech, which was the best part, was that the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill was “all public relations and no substance.” That speech was 10 minutes’ worth of public relations and no substance.

Most people in this House will support the bill. There was nothing in what that member said or, for that matter, what anybody from Labour said, including Darien Fenton, who went on about the bus strike, for goodness’ sake! She went on about the bus strike. Her speech had nothing to do with the legislation before the House. All she did was prattle on about the poor people in Auckland, because some bus drivers and a bus company cannot get their a. into g. That is all she prattled on about.

This is a serious bill. It is about mayhem on our streets. It is about people who do not care about the community. Yes, there are people in west Auckland who have to sit by their windows and listen to the boy racers as they go up and down. Let me tell the House something. More important, let me tell the boy racers—and I hate using the words “boy racers”—

Henare Hon TAU HENARE Link to this

Hanging on every word.

I am sure they will be. They will be lined up on the four avenues right at this point in time, and they will be listening. I tell them that when they have five children, and three under the age of 5, and they are trying to get them off to sleep at night, and some hoon is going up and down past their window, they will be on the verge of nuttiness, as most people in this country are when they have been not only attacked by—and I mean attacked by—noise, but also—

Hayes John Hayes Link to this

Assaulted.

Henare Hon TAU HENARE Link to this

—assaulted by antisocial behaviour.

Fenton Darien Fenton Link to this

Try getting three over 5-year-olds to school with no buses.

Henare Hon TAU HENARE Link to this

What? Oh, now that member is on the buses again. I am dumbfounded, and all I can do for the House in response to that member is to say thanks very much, and sit down.

Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour—Waimakariri) Link to this

Tonight we have heard an interesting debate and a bit of jocularity, which I suppose is not unhelpful in these circumstances, but I will bring us back to earth a little bit by quoting the Police Association, which made a submission on the Land Transport (Enforcement Powers) Amendment Bill. I agree with one thing that the previous genius of a speaker, Tau Henare, said; this is a serious issue, even though he behaved like the local court jester. When making a submission before the select committee, the Police Association said that between 2004 and 2008 illegal street racing was implicated in the following figures: 49 fatal crashes, 160 serious-injury crashes, and 376 minor-injury crashes, resulting in 56 fatalities, 247 serious injuries, and 762 minor injuries.

I note that when I introduced a bill on this issue, Mr Garrett and his party dealt with their principles, as that party always does—I think there was one other party, but I particularly remember Mr Garrett’s party—and vehemently voted against it. As the debate goes on I will quote to him his former colleague Sandra Goudie, but I will not waste a lot of time on that party. Its principles wave in the breeze like a piece of dry straw. I will say that I struggled with trying to assess the mentality of those people. One would think that after so many times of going out on a Friday night and coming back less one friend because he or she is dead, or having lost a mate or mates because they are dead, the average human being under normal circumstances would say, as young people generally did with drunk-driving through Students Against Drunk Driving: “We’ve had a gutsful. This is silly. We’re losing too many friends.” At a very basic level, one would think that that is what some of those people would do.

I have heard people talk about civil liberties, and I have heard the old tried-and-true arguments rolled out. Having been directly on the sharp end of behaviour by these people, I say that in my view they do not reflect 95 or 99 percent of young people. They are a small but growing group who are intimidatory. Many of them like a bit of violence. I remember doing a live TV interview with a young guy called Hemi, who was beatified by the Christchurch Press because he wrote a few slick letters to the editor and everybody thought this young fellow was a genius. I believe that he was then done for violent crime. The police told me his rap sheet, but he behaved as if he did not give a damn about anybody else, including his mates. He took the view, as many of these people do—reflecting badly therefore on young people per se—that it would not matter what we did, whether by giving him facilities for free or passing any laws, because he did not give a damn.

In my own electorate, Waimakariri, I attended a meeting out at Mandeville with a really good group of people. Out there they had had 400 boy-racers or girl-racers, call them what you will, leering it up. A police senior sergeant, Peter Cooper, a fine gentleman, was there, and there were a couple of the hoons. They were two thugs. I was publicly criticised for calling them thugs. Well, to hell with that; they were thugs, and they are. A woman stood up and said that the night those guys came around—and they mostly were guys—leering it up, kicking the letterboxes over, and creating merry hell, she was nursing her mum, who has since died of cancer. That is a factual story. This woman asked this young guy a reasonable question. I paraphrase, but she basically said “Come on, mate, fair go.” She said that it was a terrible night for her and that she did not need the leer up—I am using my words, not hers—and she asked him what he thought of that. I will not repeat the four-letter word that was used in response to that, but let me put it in more parliamentary language. He said “Well, I don’t really give a damn.”

If we think about the person we might hate in our lives the most or the person we think might be most disreputable in our lives, I suspect even that person may have had a pang of guilt or compassion in that situation. But I have to say that some of these people do not. They are intimidators. They are violent. Some people call them hot-rodders and some call them hoons and say that we all did it, generation to generation. Maybe that is true, but these people are not car enthusiasts. I support car enthusiasts. Young people who were car enthusiasts came to me. They act legally, putting a lot of dough into their cars—some people collect stamps. I do not have a problem with that. They act legally, showing off to their mates and parking the car across the road, but acting legally. I support them in their hobby; it is a good thing. But let us be very, very clear that people have died, violent acts have occurred as perpetrated against the police and innocent folk, and we in the Opposition support acts by this Government against that behaviour.

I will show the Government the same courtesy that some of its members showed me—I think Gerry Brownlee was one—when I tried to do my bit. I said it was not a utopia and that the legislation I was introducing was not a silver bullet, but I was the only person in this House, including members of the Opposition of the time, who brought legislation on this, as a private member, to this Chamber in 9 years. Members opposite criticised me for years after, but they never got up and brought legislation as a member’s bill. Of course, Stephen Joyce was not in the House then, but neither the current Minister of Police nor others got up and said “Cosgrove, we do not think it is working, we will put our own legislation up.” They never did that. In this robust way, I ask them to reflect on some of those issues.

We will not vote against this bill. We will show the same courtesy that I was shown, but I say to the Opposition—

We are not the Opposition. We are the Government.

I say to the Government, that is, and I will say it in greater terms in the debate on the companion legislation, that although Government members are concerned about the parliamentary niceties, people out there are concerned about the substance.

I say to Government members that I do not think this bill will have the effect they intend. If the Government had brought this bill and the companion legislation in a mild way to this House and said that in its best endeavours it wanted to do something, then, OK, we would have had a closer look at it. There has been a lot of hot air. I am not allowed to use the word “crusher” in conjunction with the name of a member of this House, so I will not. Although the testosterone has flowed, although it will be all on once these bills are passed, and although a certain Minister considers this legislation a cause celebre for her, we will see.

There are problems in respect of the definition of “cruising”. I know some commentators have said that cruising is called “trying to find a park in Christchurch”. Looking at the definition, we could argue that it defines a vintage car club. I do not know how the police will enforce that, and I suspect that a boy or girl racer may well test that particular definition in a court, and a court, through case law, will be required to rule on it. When I passed my bill I thought that some little smart person would have a go—

You didn’t pass your bill; Parliament did.

—my Government passed it, I say to the Minister—test the law, and a judge would weaken it. I was thankful that they did not.

We helped you.

Now the Minister is taking credit for our legislation, as well. That Minister is good, I must say.

I know she is.

“I know she is.”, the Minister says. That woman is a legend in her own lifetime. She is so good. What is the old saying that Shane Jones says? A kumara does not say how sweet it is. Well, my word, that Minister says she is full of sugar; she is full of it. We know that. I look forward to the next bill, but I say that we will allow this bill to go through because we believe it is worth a crack to try to sort this issue out.

Looking at what has been put up, I say that I like the demerit point stuff. I think that has merit—excuse the pun. There are a number of provisions that are catered for in existing legislation, but we will not stand in the way of those who wish to pass the legislation. I argue that this bill and the companion legislation are more about sloganeering, about being seen to be tough, and about winning a headline than they are about the substance of the issue. That is less so in the case of this bill than in the next bill, the Vehicle Confiscation and Seizure Bill, that we will address. It is less about substance and more about desperation on the part of a certain Minister to be seen as “tougher than tough”, as I think she said in the article in North and South. I invite members to read it.

Oh, you’ve read it!