6. SIMON POWER (National—Rangitikei) Link to this
to the Minister of Police
Can she confirm that violent offences have increased by 32 percent since 1999-2000, and is she satisfied that the Police have the capacity to address this?
Hon ANNETTE KING (Minister of Police) Link to this
Violent crime in New Zealand, as in other countries, has been increasing year on year for a number of years. However, the rate of the most violent offence of homicide remains relatively consistent over the period. Since 1999-2000 the increase in recorded violent offences per head of population has been 22 percent, or around 2.7 percent on average each year. A large driver of recorded violence has been the increased recording of domestic violence offences. For example, between 2005-06 and 2006-07 domestic violence offences increased by 11.2 percent while non - domestic violence offences increased by 0.6 percent. I am satisfied that the police have the capacity to address violent offences, as evidenced by the increase in the resolution rate of violent crime. That rate went from 77.3 percent in 1999-2000 to 81.2 percent in 2006-07.
How can the Minister continue to claim that increased reporting of domestic violence explains the increase in violent crime when offences have increased across all categories of violent crime, including those violent offences that are not normally domestic in nature, such as the 55 percent increase in robberies and the 64 percent increase in group assembly violent crimes?
I make no excuses for the increase in violent crime in New Zealand. As I said, violent crime has been increasing in this country for many years. I make no excuse for that, but I do applaud the fact that we have more women in particular who are prepared to report domestic violence than we have ever seen before. In fact, the number of recorded offences of domestic violence has more than doubled over the last decade, and so has the number of the prosecutions for domestic violence over the last decade. I would hope that members of this House would welcome that. I am concerned—as every member of this House should be—about the increases in non-domestic violence—public violence. Violence is everyone’s issue. It is not just a police issue. One of the issues that comes up when we look at those statistics is the involvement of alcohol in most violent crimes. That is an issue that this House ought to consider very seriously, because it is not one that the police have a lot of control over. It is something that we as a community certainly have attitudes about.
Does the Minister stand by Labour’s 1999 pledge card promise to “crack down on youth crime” in light of the fact that violent offences by 14 to 16-year-olds have increased by 47 percent since 1999, including a 40 percent increase in serious assaults and a staggering 143 percent increase in grievous assaults?
Cracking down means that we actually go out and police youth crime—we go out and police youth crime. If we go out and police youth crime, we are likely to catch the young criminals. I can only assume that the member is saying: “Don’t catch them. Therefore you don’t know what the level is. Therefore it’s OK.”.
Jill PettisWhat impact would reducing the number of police by up to 500 have on their ability to address violence in the community?
It would have a considerable impact, and it was National’s proposed answer to violence in 1999. It would have represented a decrease of 7 percent in the number of front-line officers. This Government has increased sworn police numbers by 1,154 between November 1999 and the end of September 2007. That is a 16 percent increase in police officers. Between now and June 2009, when the full effect of the arrangement between New Zealand First and Labour comes into effect, the New Zealand Police will have grown by in excess of a further 500 police officers—a total increase of 23 percent in terms of police officers in this country. I would put that record alongside anything that the National Party could offer.
Does the Minister stand by her claims that increases in violent offences are due to an increase in reporting, when her predecessor, George Hawkins, stated in 2005 that claims of under-reporting were intemperate, misleading, and just plain wrong; and if crime rates ever fall, will she decry the decline in reporting?
I say to the member that he should go back and look at his question. It was so stupid. Crimes have to be reported—so we know we have them.
Has the Minister read the report by Dave George into the standards of police recruits, which was due at the end of last month and which has a major bearing on the capacity of police to bring the crime rate down—
Rt Hon Winston Peters—wake up—if so, do the results of that report suggest that the answers the Prime Minister gave to the House on 25 June, to the effect that new recruits did better on mental ability tests than serving officers, were based on inaccurate information from police human resources manager Wayne Annan?