Wanganui District Council (Prohibition of Gang Insignia) Bill

My colleagues wish I had more than 2 minutes and 30 seconds to continue speaking about clause 5C, but I am sure that in my limited time I will be able to recap on this particular clause.

I remind members that this is the clause that covers the review of by-laws made under this legislation. It states: “The Council must review a bylaw made by it under section 5 no later than 5 years after the date on which the bylaw was made.” I think we have already traversed in this debate a number of concerns that this side of the Chamber has about this particular bill and why we feel that is quite likely a review will be needed significantly earlier than in 5 years. We have already heard about the problems with the definitions under clause 4 that create a situation where there will be a constant need for review, and, indeed, the potential for litigation.

Let us remind ourselves that clause 5 says the power to make by-laws is given to the council, and the council can designate any public place as a specified place for the purpose of the Act, and it is also the clause under which we identify who we think the gangs might be. This is the most problematic clause in this bill for members of the Labour caucus. We believe that clause 5C, which allows for review after 5 years, is, in fact, inadequate. It will be necessary to review this law significantly earlier than that.

We also know that under clause 5—members will remember this from when we discussed it earlier—the possibility of “identifying an organisation, association, or group of persons as a gang” is likely to be the subject of significant litigation. We have already seen earlier in the bill that a gang has been defined as “any other specified organisation, association, or group of persons identified in a bylaw made under section 5”. So effectively what we are saying is that we are giving carte blanche for the Wanganui District Council to decide what a gang may be. Gangs will then move to change their names and try to find other ways of getting around the definition of “gang”.

Once again, as we have said before, this bill is giving false hope to the people of Wanganui that the problem of gang intimidation can be dealt with by looking at what people wear rather than at what they do. The review clause, clause 5C, is simply saying that clause 5 is not adequate, because it does not allow for a quick enough review of what we believe to be a very difficult and very unfortunate set of rules and definitions in the bill.

The Wanganui District Council has, throughout this debate, called upon members of Parliament a number of times to look at their particular concerns. I reiterate, from the Labour side, that we understand the reasons why the people of Wanganui wanted this bill to come forward, and we do understand that Chester Borrows brought this bill forward because of those concerns. But, quite simply, the provisions in clause 5, which are to be reviewed under clause 5C, will not provide the people of Wanganui with that kind of assurance. It will, in fact, provide them with false hope, and we believe that clause 5C is one among many flawed clauses in this bill.

I move, That the question be now put.