Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill

It is once again my duty to rise and talk on this completely ridiculous piece of legislation, the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill, which ought to be an embarrassment not only to the member in the chair, Mark Mitchell, but, in fact, to the Committee.

I just want to draw the Committee’s attention to a very simple remedy to the problem, because here we are spending the Committee’s time, taxpayers’ money, looking at a piece of legislation that will deal with one iota of the problem, when the rest of the problem is out there—the problem about which the Government said: “Well, we have people turning up to the Government offices and some of them are wearing their gang patches. So we need to pass a law to stop them doing that.” Well, you do not have to look too far past today’s New Zealand Herald—usually a very good newspaper, usually accurate in its reporting, at least on general stories—and here on page 8 is a very fine photograph of the Napier District courthouse. Here we have a photo of a chap leaving the courthouse.

I want to draw the Committee’s attention to a little sign on the doorway of the Napier courthouse. On the sign on the doorway it says: “No Gang Patches or Insignia”. Apparently the Napier District Court can do it, but everybody else needs this House to pass a law. I do not know of any report of any problems with gangs turning up to the Napier District courthouse and causing a problem. The registrar at the District Court—probably a couple of judges, too, maybe even some sensible people at the Ministry of Justice, maybe some sensible people at the Sensible Sentencing Trust; I do not know, but maybe somebody—had this brilliant idea that they would put a sign on the door because they wanted to stop people from turning up to the Napier District courthouse in their gang patches. In fact, I can report to this Committee that they are not alone.

There are some other Government premises, the managers of which have had the brilliant idea to deal with this nefarious problem, which has burgeoned across the country, of people in gang patches turning up to Government premises, and they have put notices on the door. And do you know that there has not been a single report in the newspapers of good repute—sadly, Truth has now met its demise, and that might say something about the reputation of that paper, or at least its editor, the most recent one anyway. There has never been a report in a newspaper of good repute that has reported on trouble with gang members with gang patches and insignia turning up to those public buildings.

So the question has to be asked: why is it—how is it—that we have to detain all the members of this House, and use the House’s very precious time, to consider this piece of legislation, knowing that it is confined to Government buildings? These are the very buildings whose occupants have the power—and they have demonstrated that they use it—to put up little signs saying: “No one with gang patches here”. That is unlike the proprietors of children’s playgrounds, unlike those who are the custodians of beaches and other public places without any structures, who will have no power to give notice, even under this legislation, to those who would wear their gang patches and insignia and turn up and maraud across the innocent citizens and the burghers of those places where those beaches and children’s playgrounds are.

Why do we waste our time on legislation like this? This is window dressing; it is not substantial. It will not make a blind bit of difference, as the good people of Whanganui found out. All they did was shift the problem somewhere else, and that is what this piece of legislation will do. If this Government is serious about dealing with the problem of gangs, let us see a law that deals with the gang problem. Let us see a law that gives people the ability and the power and the rights to stop gangs and their criminal enterprises in their tracks. Let us assist the police with their powers to do that. But let us not pretend that dumb legislation like this is going to make a blind bit of difference when all the evidence—the evidence on the record and in reputable publications like the New Zealand Herald—shows us that a little notice on the door is all that is needed to deter the evil, nefarious gang patch and insignia wearers from doing their dirty business.

This bill is wasting our time, and that is why on this point, with this bill, knowing that it will achieve nothing, knowing that it will do nothing, we will continue to oppose it and wait for this Government to do something sensible and meaningful about the real problem, which is about the criminal nature of gangs and the criminal enterprises that they undertake.

Um—I call the honourable member Mike Sabin. I had to think for a while, mind.

I could not possibly comment on your choice there, but thank you very much for the privilege and opportunity. The member Andrew Little, unfortunately, takes after his name in the sense that he has tried to belittle the issue of criminal gangs, of organised crime in this country. There is nothing more certain in my mind than that the proliferation of gangs and the drugs that they peddle, the money-laundering, and the crime and misery that they have wrought on New Zealand society are nothing more than an out and out disgrace. Every single effort that we can actually put forward that undermines their ability to perpetuate the intimidation, the crime, and the misery that they bring to New Zealand society is a positive thing.

Mr Little seems to suggest that courthouses have little signs and therefore all other Government buildings can have little signs as well. If Mr Little had spent a little bit of time in the real world, he would have actually seen the challenges of gangs, and the one area that is dealing with them more than any other Government department, of course, is courthouses. There have been stabbings, shootings, beatings, and the like in courthouses—inside the courthouses, outside of the courthouses—and for a long time they have had rules on the wearing of gang patches. The rules are not always because of the fact that the gangs are actually beating up innocent members of the public who may be waiting in the gallery or may be waiting outside the courtroom. They are beating up fellow gang members from opposing gangs, because that is what gang members do.

What happens is that the violence is created because of the fact that when a gang member wears a gang patch, it is about identity, it is about mana. To them it is everything. It encapsulates everything that they are as human beings. That patch is so important to them. So courts have long decided that to avoid that sort of confrontation they would have a “no gang patch” requirement inside courthouses.

The big difference between a courthouse and a primary school, Mr Little, is that in a courthouse they have court security. There are plenty of people who, with a few seconds’ notice, can respond to the outbreak of violence. The difference is, Mr Little, when we see the ability of a courthouse to enforce the rules—and, trust me, they cannot always enforce them. I have been called to the courthouse on numerous occasions to remove gang members who are wearing patches, taken their patches off, put them back in the cells, and put them back upstairs.

💬 Chris Hipkins: So who’s going to enforce it in a primary school?

Well, the police can enforce it, because obviously when gang members wear patches in there, according to this bill—and it is a very good question, Mr Hipkins—the police will be able to respond very promptly and will be able to come in there with the power of arrest that this bill will provide and take care of that. But the point I want to make here, Mr Hipkins, is the difference between how a courthouse tries to operate and is dealing with it, compared with the many other Government departments or Government buildings that this bill will actually give effect to. The difference is quite significant.

The idea, though, that in the local Inland Revenue Department office, or at Mangonui Primary School, or at Kaitāia Intermediate School a teacher can wander up to a patched-up gang member and say “Oh no, you must remove that.” and they will say “Certainly, ma’am. I will comply with that order immediately.” is just ridiculous. It just does not happen. It just does not happen.

💬 Andrew Little: But if she turns up with the bill in her hand she’ll be fine.

I have some respect for Mr Little, because he does actually make some learned comments at times. But I am afraid that on this occasion Mr Little has gone right off tangent. This is really what we see in this bill—the fact that the Labour Party has gone right off tangent. Its members are out of touch with what New Zealand society is saying.

I am very interested to hear what the member Louisa Wall will say about this, because she is making a big stand on party pills and recreational drugs. But, of course, what gangs do is deal in illicit drugs. So I am sure that member will be wanting to make some very strong comments about gang members and the proliferation of gang members in her electorate and the significance of the gang patch to the gang member. I would ask that member to tell us what she believes the importance of a gang patch is to a gang member. I would welcome that call from the member.

When we look at the problem of gangs in New Zealand there is nothing that will convince me otherwise than that this bill is going to have a positive effect.

It is my pleasure to take a first call in Part 1 of the Committee stage of the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill. It is a member’s bill. My contribution to the discussion will very much be about looking at what this piece of legislation is trying to achieve, which is to prohibit gang insignia on these premises: Public Service departments, the police, Crown entities, local authorities, and through the select committee process the committee members added schools, because they deemed schools to be part of the State sector.

In responding to the previous speaker, Mike Sabin, I would like to talk about what he talked about, which was about eradicating gangs. This is not a purpose of this bill, in fact. Nowhere in this bill do we talk about eradicating gangs or why gangs were created in the first place. He made a very good point about why people end up choosing to be in gangs. People choose to be in gangs—according to people like Kim Workman, who has worked in this area for a long time—because they are isolated. They have been, for want of a better word, dislocated from their families and dislocated from their communities. So whether we like it or not, gangs have served to fill a collective identity that some people, yes, take pride in.

We on this side of the Chamber are very aware of what gangs do. We do not support the activities of gangs—absolutely not—

💬 Mike Sabin: Clearly, the member does.

No, I do not, actually, but I have a bit of recognition about why they exist in the first place. So if we are going to analyse how they were created, that is one thing. But if you were really interested in the issues about gangs, then why is there not a purpose in clause 3 in this part about eradicating gangs, and addressing some of the fundamental issues about people who end up in gangs because they come from abusive backgrounds? Why are we not talking about staircasing people from prison into vocations, into housing, into a better and more productive lifestyle? That has got nothing to do with this piece of legislation. All you want to do in this piece of legislation—

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Order!

All this piece of legislation wants to do—sorry, Mr Chair—is to say that if you are wearing an insignia, then we are going to fine you $2,000. What a wonderful solution that is! How many of those people do we think will actually pay $2,000? When you look at the whole bill, it is not very big at all. This is it. So someone with an insignia who is in these public places is going to be fined. Big deal. What does that mean, then, in terms of trying to assist people who find themselves in circumstances, as I have just said, where gang affiliation has become a normal way of life for them?

The other point I wanted to make clear in my contribution was that the commentary we made on this particular piece of legislation is very clear that the Government already has the tools to address this issue. My colleague Andrew Little made that clear by showing you—even today, in the New Zealand Herald—a sign that courts can put up that prohibits the wearing of gang insignia. What we were really clear about is that under the Summary Offences Act of 1981, section 3 makes threatening behaviour an imprisonable offence, section 4 makes offensive behaviour a criminal offence, and section 21 states that people cannot intimidate anybody. So we do have tools within the current legislation to deal with this issue. I think that is our major reason for opposing this piece of legislation, because it is not needed.

So if the member in the chair, Mark Mitchell, wants to get up and talk about the rationale for this bill, where did it come from? Who asked for it? Why have we got this piece of legislation before the House? Surely there is some evidence about the need for it. The only evidence that I have heard from my colleague Moana Mackey in reference to some of the conversations in Whanganui is that now there are a whole lot of gangs that want to be added to the list that is in this bill.

💬 Darien Fenton: Because it’s cool.

Yes, because it is cool for gangs to be listed in a piece of legislation. Well, if that is one of the outcomes of this, then, actually, that is pathetic. That is a pathetic rationale for this bill—that we can have gangs that want to add their names to this piece of legislation. Obviously, that is Part 2 of the bill, where there are going to be certain powers—

I will take a call now just so that I can address a couple of the issues that have been raised. But before I get started I would like to refer to an article written by Anna Williams. It is in relation to an interview that she did with the Mayor of Marlborough District, Mr Sowman. He said that “five people had reported seeing patched”—this relates to last week—“Mongrel Mob members in public, including at a netball game at Horton Park, in Blenheim, and in supermarkets. … ‘The community needs to combine together with police to make them unwelcome to ensure there isn’t illegal activity in Marlborough,’ he said. ‘There’s an old saying if you take away the oxygen from the flame, it goes out and that’s what we need to do. … These people who wear patches, they won’t give them up easily,’ he said. ‘The patch gives them identity and they won’t want to lose that. I have no sympathy for them.’ He planned to talk to the Marlborough police area commander to make sure everything was being done to ensure gangs did not thrive in the region.” So this is an issue that does affect our communities.

I would just also like to briefly mention that in my speech in the second reading of this Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill—and, of course, I acknowledge the Hon Todd McClay, who brought this bill to the House—I spoke about an incident that I had to deal with personally when I was down in Rotorua. It involved two young girls who had been attacked by prospect Mongrel Mob gang members and patched gang members as well. That is going back 12 years ago. Some people would say to me: “Well, you know, we have moved on. Is this really still an issue?”. Yet I was sad to read in the media, reported through the The Daily Post in Rotorua 2 weeks ago, of a young girl who was attacked by four Mongrel Mob prospects walking through the grounds of a school. She was raped, pretty savagely attacked, and physically damaged. Of course, she will be emotionally and psychologically damaged as well. So this is still a real clear and present problem that as a country we have to face.

In terms of whether there is current legislation in place that can deal with this—no, there is not. The legislation that is in place at the moment—and Miss Wall made a very good point on this—however, requires an action. It requires gang members to actually do something to meet the elements of the offence, whereas what this bill does is allow the police to come in and take action purely off the fact that a gang member is wearing his patch. I would like to bring us back again and remind us all in this Committee actually what that patch signifies. The patch signifies that someone has got into a gang—and gangs, unfortunately, use our youth; they are recruiting from our youth. Sadly, the youth see this as a way of identification, the camaraderie, and the rest of it—that sort of collectiveness that you were talking about. It would be much nicer if they could get that through a sports group, through a sports club, or through a community group rather than a gang. I come back to what that patch means. What the patch means is that they have to have achieved a pathway of committing crimes, and normally violent crimes, against our communities to get themselves to the status where they are awarded a patch and they become a patched gang member.

For some reason in this country over the years—I do not know whether we have become desensitised to it or whether we have just learnt to live with it—we have actually allowed these people to walk around with patches on, which clearly say to the rest of us: “Hey, we have committed offences against you.” I think it is time as a country, as we say, that we use every chance that we have to say: “You know what? We are not going to accept that any more. You are not going to wear patches around. You are not going to”—

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Order!

Sorry, Mr Chairperson. I think these are the important points we really need to think about when we are talking about this bill.

The other thing that I just wanted to point out very quickly is that we had a very good trip, the Law and Order Committee, down to Christchurch recently. Kris Faafoi was with us. We were talking to the police there, and they spoke about—I think they are called—the domestic protection orders. Do not quote me on that; I am pretty sure that is what they call them. What they allow police to do is go to a violent domestic and they can remove the offender without actually having to rely on, or have a complaint generated from, the victim or the complainant. So they remove the onus, and they remove the stress of the complainant or the victim having to make the complaint. The police can just go in there and remove them under these domestic protection orders. And actually, Kris thought that was a great idea.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Order!

Sorry. Mr Faafoi thought that was a great idea. Well, actually, this bill is exactly the same principle, as it removes the onus of a member of the public, someone working in a Work and Income, an administrator or a receptionist at a school, or a teacher at a school from having to actually generate a complaint. They do not have to do that. [Bell rung] The minute a gang member walks on to a school—

Order! Is the member seeking another call?

💬 Mark Mitchell: No, it is fine. No, Mr Chair.

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Well, the member has to sit down. Thank you.

Kia ora, Mr Chairperson. Thank you for the opportunity to make a contribution at this Committee stage of this Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill. It is really unfortunate that we are wasting parliamentary time and resources on this really redundant piece of legislation, because the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill is a totally ridiculous piece of legislation. It is unnecessary. These situations are already covered by existing laws. So it really is a waste of time. It is actually quite an embarrassment, really, that the Government has put this member’s bill up to occupy parliamentary time that we would much rather spend on more productive things for our country.

I want to start off by saying that I do a lot of work. Obviously, I have got a very big patch down there in the South Island. My good colleague there Mr Mitchell was referring to Marlborough, the great region of Marlborough and Te Tau Ihu, the top of the south, which is not exactly known as the most racially harmonious region of New Zealand, what with the Marlborough Express cartoons of recent times.

I wanted to take this opportunity to display some people that I know. I know that it probably will not be able to be viewed by the people at large, but here is a Māori man. He is Māori. He is wearing a motorcycle jacket. There are all sorts of insignias and other badges on this jacket. Oh! There is even a tino rangatiratanga badge on there. If you saw this gentleman in an emergency room of a public hospital or maybe in the grounds of courts or justice buildings, potentially this gentleman here could trigger the provisions of the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill. He could activate the powers of the State to call in the police constable to come and assess whether this gentleman here is part of an organisation or a gang that is listed in the appropriate section with specified gangs that are all listed there in the relevant sections. This is an example, I guess, of what the Government would like to prevent.

I will show another one. Let me pick this one here. I am very good friends with this gentleman here. Again, he is Māori, wearing a motorcycle jacket, he is part of a chapter, and he has even got an Arab-looking scarf wrapped around his neck. That could have very negative connotations.

💬 Mike Sabin: What’s his gang?

Oh! It is very intimidatory—very intimidatory.

The gang that this man belongs to, Mr Sabin, is Rangitāne ki Wairau in the Marlborough Sounds. He is the chief. He is an iwi leader. He is an iwi leader of Rangitāne ki Wairau ki Te Tau Ihu o Te Waka—an upstanding citizen. The other gentleman whom I mentioned is a highly decorated—a highly decorated—soldier who has served our country—

💬 Mike Sabin: That’s fine. Is he wearing a gang patch or not?

Absolutely, on the face of it. What would a member of the public think? Perhaps—

💬 Mike Sabin: Not on the face of it. Is he wearing a gang patch? Has it got gang insignia on it?

It fits the profile, Mr Sabin. It fits the profile. It just makes a mockery of this ridiculous piece of legislation. I could display a lot of pictures. But the thing is, these gentlemen are part of the chapter of the Patriots Defence Force Motorcycle Club.

💬 Mike Sabin: Are they listed in the bill?

They fit the profile. They would activate the suspicion, potentially, of this ridiculous piece of legislation.

💬 Hon Dr Jonathan Coleman: No, they wouldn’t.

Oh yes, they would. The thing is that those gentlemen, those upstanding citizens, actually do a tremendous amount of work on their Harley-Davidsons, on their revved-up, scary-looking, big, burly bikes, up and down the country every November for White Ribbon month, spreading the message that violence against women is a terrible thing and that we have got to stamp it out—

💬 Mike Sabin: Are they listed in there?

It does not matter that they are not listed in the bill, Mr Sabin. Do you think that everything has to be prescribed—that you can cover every situation, every gang situation, because it is set out in the definition of “gang”? It is ludicrous. There is always the catch-all or other provisions to catch others. But I am saying that these people are upstanding citizens. They love to congregate and associate with others in their motorcycle club. They visit schools. They are welcomed into schools. In fact, I welcomed a whole big group of the South Island tour going into a public hospital. Far from having people actually thinking that these people were intimidating—there were a lot of Māoris with big leather jackets and big insignia on them—they were welcomed and they were treated as real heroes because they are doing good work.

All I am saying is that that makes a mockery of this piece of legislation. The fact that a big Māori man, and he may even have a tā moko—he may even have a tā moko—is wearing a leather jacket with insignias and writing all over it saying “motorcycle club chapter” from wherever part or region he comes from means he automatically comes within the profile and the ambit of this legislation, of this ridiculous bill.

💬 Richard Prosser: Not if they’re not on the list.

They do. It does not matter that they are not on the list; they potentially fall within the ambit of a person, a member of the public. And it would be a waste of time, it would be an absolute waste of taxpayers’ money and time, for the police to be called up, to rush along to the hospital or school where this chapter of this motorcycle club is revving up its engines. Then they would have to say: “Well, is this so-called group within the definition of ‘gang’ within this prohibition of gang insignia legislation? If so, we will have to require those gentlemen or those thugs on those motorbikes to remove their jackets and any other memorabilia that they have.” It is absolutely ridiculous. It is an absolutely stupid piece of legislation because this is already covered by existing provisions elsewhere.

The other thing—I just want to make my concluding remarks—is that this legislation is already dealt with—[Interruption]

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Order! Order! I have people on my right and my left who are interjecting on each other. It is not permitted. If they want to take a call, they are welcome to.

I am just completing my speech. I am looking at the so-called list of prescribed gangs here, and I do not see “Bloods” or “Crips” here. I mean, the Bloods and the Crips are the two most sort of—I was not a wayward person, but the Bloods and Crips are not even mentioned—[Interruption]

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Order! I have just cautioned the House.

They are not even mentioned in this bill. So how comprehensive is it? You cannot prescribe all those situations, but you can include a whole bunch of innocent, upstanding, absolutely heroic people who are doing a lot of good work, and who like to associate and ride motorbikes, wear their insignias, and do good things in the community. Potentially, they are impacted by this bill.

Lastly, I just want to make this point. If you go into a doctor’s surgery and you see a young whānau with a Mongrel Mob man—and how do you know that? He is wearing his red T-shirt and he has got his gang insignia stamped on his face. How can you tell that person to remove himself because his gang insignia is tattooed on to his face? That happens to a high proportion of gang members. What is the situation there? Do they have to remove themselves? Do they have to cover themselves while they are tending to their sick children waiting in the doctor’s surgery so they can actually get their child tended to? It is a ridiculous piece of legislation. I regret that it is having to waste parliamentary time and resources, and I definitely oppose it.

I cannot believe what I have just been listening to. Clearly, the member Rino Tirikatene could not support the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill, because he has not read it. I find it extraordinary, and the members of Rangitāne in my electorate will find it extraordinary, to think that they could be called up as gang members. I just do not believe what I have been hearing.

Anyway, aside from that, I want to make a couple of other points because there has been some interesting stuff talked about in the last few minutes. During the course of the select committee process, both Labour and the Greens talked a lot about what was not in this bill. They did not bring one single thing that could have been added to it, or add one piece of value to it in the course of that discussion. Really, they suffer from what I would term the “do little syndrome”. They get up here and criticise the bill because it does not deal with what they perceive to be a gang problem, but it certainly deals with a portion of the gang problem. It deals with the intimidation part, where in public buildings and public places these gang members can intimidate people who are, ordinarily, serving them along with other members of the public. I think it does a great job in that area. So that is the first thing I want to question.

The second thing is that Louisa Wall talked about the eradication of gangs. This bill was never designed to eradicate gangs; this bill was designed to deal with gang patches. This Government, of course, is dealing with a number of other issues that will help in the eradication of gangs. The record this Government has around crime is a significant deterrent to people who want to join gangs. In other words, the less crime we have in this country, the less likely we are to have people encouraged to join gangs. Certainly, our retraining and reintegration of reoffending prisoners will make gangs less attractive places for them. The Government, along with its economic policies, where it is driving job growth and the opportunity for people to work, will certainly also discourage people from wanting to join gangs. So we can certainly answer the Opposition queries in respect of that. I think the Government is certainly working towards helping with gangs.

I want to make just one final point on that. If you think about—and I think I might have used this point before—the banning of cigarette advertising is very similar to the banning of gang patches in public places. Really, that is the gangs’ mode of advertising, I guess, for want of a better word.

The promoter of this bill, Mark Mitchell, who received it through attrition from the Hon Todd McClay, made reference to the Law and Order Committee’s visit to the Christchurch prisons a few weeks ago. For most prisons throughout New Zealand we have an average of around 30 percent of their total tally of prisoners being gang members. So anything we can do as a Government or as a Parliament to lessen the number of gang members is certainly going to make quite a contribution to lessening the number of people in our prisons. I think there are some very good initiatives in this bill. I think it will help to achieve the purpose it set out to achieve, which is to lessen the intimidation of people serving in our public areas.

I want to make one final observation from my own electorate, where I have a large number of schools, a number of which have had problems over time with gang insignia on the grounds of those schools. In many instances—in fact, I think in all instances—the principals of those schools have asked the gangs to remove themselves from the schools, and they have done it. But that does not mean that we do not need legislation like this, because although my schools might have the cooperation of the gang members concerned, there are many schools in New Zealand that do not. So I think this is a very good piece of legislation, and that is my lot on this part of it.

It is my pleasure to take a call on Part 1 of this bill, the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill. I think sometimes it is important with these sorts of bills to find where there might be some commonality across the House. There is absolutely no doubt that across this House there is absolutely no one whom I have heard yet who is condoning the activity—and, in particular, the criminal activity—that often coincides with the existence of gangs. Absolutely not. There is also no one in this House who is applauding in any sense the intimidation that comes with the strong presence of gangs in our communities. Absolutely, there is agreement that this is a problem, particularly in some of our most deprived communities, and, as Louisa Wall has pointed out, there is a message in that.

Where there is disagreement, however—which I would like to talk about specifically in relation to Part 1—is whether or not this bill will have an effect on those critical issues. What Labour is saying is that it is our concern that it will not have an effect, and if it will not have an effect, does it, in fact, have the chance in some cases to make things worse, or make things potentially farcical in some cases? Will it increase the sense of intimidation for some people who will be required to try to enforce this bill? Additionally, underneath all of that, are we therefore wasting our money and time when there are other, alternative routes that we should, or could, be taking? So that is where our objection squarely lies.

I do want to go back to the beginning of Part 1 because Part 1 sets out the purpose of the bill. It says: “The purpose of this Act is to prohibit the display of gang insignia on premises of departments of the Public Service, the Police, Crown entities, local authorities, and schools.” I think that is an acknowledgment that the areas in which something like this can be enforced are relatively constrained, and they are constrained to areas where any Government of the day can express some enforcement, because, obviously, there are issues with general bans of insignia in this way. That does mean that you are going to have an ad hoc situation where—if, as we have said, we are concerned about intimidation and with criminal activity—someone who displays their gang insignia can simply wear it in transit between all of these places in which it has otherwise been banned. Does that, overall, change a situation? We fear, of course, that it does not.

Secondly, it is constrained around what it defines gang insignia as, and I do not think it recognises that the way in which gangs identify is not solely down to a symbol. Let us just go over the definition of gang insignia. It is set out in the definition of “gang insignia” in paragraph (a) of clause 4. It says: “gang insignia—(a) means a sign, symbol, or representation commonly displayed to denote membership of, an affiliation with, or support for a gang, not being a tattoo;”—obviously recognising that it is hard to forcibly remove a tattoo. But, as my colleague Rino Tirikatene has pointed—

💬 Mike Sabin: It can cause a little discomfort.

As Mr Sabin points out, it could cause discomfort, obviously. But, as Rino Tirikatene has pointed out, some gang members do display their gang symbol in that way permanently on themselves. The definition “(b) includes any item of clothing to which a sign, symbol, or representation referred to in paragraph (a) is attached”. Of course, then it lists gangs that will therefore be covered by that definition of gang insignia.

There are two issues in that definition and the way that it is set out. First of all, it requires a gang to be listed within the bill. One thing I wanted to clarify was that if a gang is not listed and the Crown decides that it wants that gang to be inserted in the list, is that simply changed through regulation? I am assuming that it is, except that it is embedded, it seems, in the primary legislation, rather than in regulations. So I would appreciate hearing from the member in the chair, Mark Mitchell—and excuse me for not determining this yet—whether it is via Order in Council that an additional gang must be added. That would be a useful clarification.

But first, of course, you must be listed, and then you must fall under the criteria of a particular gang insignia. As my colleague Rino Tirikatene has pointed out, not every gang uses explicit gang insignia. He has asked, for instance, why the Bloods and the Crips are not listed here. The response from across the Chamber from the member Mike Sabin was that the Bloods and the Crips do not have an insignia, but, as the member will know, they certainly have a colour.

💬 Mike Sabin: They have colours.

They have colours—yes, they do have colours. Actually, they also have hand signals and, in the United States especially, they identify not only with colours but with certain sporting codes and teams. That is how they represent their gang.

Walking around some of our streets where you know that these gangs are particularly prevalent—and I have certainly campaigned across areas like that in my time—you know when you see a group of young men who belong to one of these gangs. They are not wearing insignia, but you know. Again, this points out how this legislation is so flawed. You do not have to wear a gang patch to be a member of a gang—clearly not you, Mr Chair. I see that you are in a red tie. I have not interpreted that to be membership of the Bloods, but that points out the flaw in this bill, which is that not every gang member wears a patch or insignia, and, indeed, not everyone who wears a patch or insignia is a member of a gang—as Rino Tirikatene pointed out with his example, where someone was wearing insignia that someone may interpret to be a gang affiliation when, clearly, it was not. So therein lies the second problem. I have already talked about the first problem, which is that this bill will not actually get to the heart of the issue that the Government proclaims that it is about. But, secondly, in and of itself, it is extremely difficult to enforce, and it would be flawed in the way that it would be enforced, given the way that different gangs identify themselves.

I want to come on to the second purpose of the bill, and that is what the Government has said around the intimidation of gangs. I have grown up in communities where there is a strong presence of gangs. You know, obviously, when gang members wear their patch, they are identifying very strongly with a brand that denotes a sense of intimidation to some members of the community. There is no doubt about that. But I would question whether empowering those who work in Crown entities—I mean, those who work in a hospital or those who work in a Work and Income office, who are already often working in very fraught and tense situations—and saying to them that they should now feel empowered by the fact that they can have someone’s gang insignia removed every time they deal with them enhances their feeling of safety. I ask whether that lessens that sense of intimidation or, actually, whether or not it will ever be enforced by those individuals. I would be interested in the member in the chair’s view on whether the Law and Order Committee heard any submissions from those who are working in those fields—particularly hospitals, where often the staff will be dealing with critical situations, and particularly with schools—to see whether or not they expressed a concern that, actually, they are unlikely to enforce the provisions of this bill, because of that power dynamic and because of that relationship.

One final thought I would like to leave members with is that I think it is important that we think about the practical nature of these bills. You know, Muldoon was known for his engagement with gangs, with Black Power. You know—

💬 Richard Prosser: One time.

Yes, one time. It is a lasting legacy. I believe that it might still put the National Party’s hoardings up, does it not? That was, I think, a long time ago, an acknowledgment of the presence of those gangs in communities and an attempt by a political leader to engage. People have views on that, absolutely, but I think that we need to keep in mind that whilst we sit here and pontificate about these issues, the reality is that, day to day, there are front-line workers who are engaging with gang members and their families. A specific case that I have heard of was in a hospital situation where a patched gang member took in their child because they had injured themselves. The immediate thought was that they would be immediately questioned as to whether or not they had been the one who had perpetrated violence against that child. Those are very delicately balanced situations, where, of course, we do not want to stop anyone from coming in and bringing in their child for care based on the way that they might be then treated in that situation—in a hospital context, for instance. That is a difficult situation. If a health worker comes in and the first thing they say is: “Remove your insignia.”, are we always going to guarantee the safety of that child and the ability for them to be cared for because we have suddenly prioritised what is going on with the adult over the child’s well-being? Those are the kinds of issues I think about.

I call the honourable member Mark Sabin.

Sorry, Mr Chair?

The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson): Oh, sorry, Mike.

We are both former police officers. We obviously both cut a fairly fine jib. It is easy to see how one could get confused with these things. I trifle with the Committee.

I just want to touch on a couple of points that have been raised. The member Rino Tirikatene raised what I think was a bizarre contribution. It was a long 10 minutes. Basically, he showed a couple of pictures of some friends who were wearing dark clothing. He suggested—which I think was right on the limit—that because they were Māori that somehow would have some impact on what the police may or may not be doing. I strongly hope that the member was not going down that path, but it seemed to me that he was. But he suggested, because they were Māori, because they had a black jacket on, because they had some tattoos, and because they ride a motorbike, that suddenly they would be captured in this bill, the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill, that they are intimidatory, that he cannot understand it, and that it is all bizarre and confusing, much like his speech was.

Well, here is a little something for the Committee to consider. I am Māori. I have tattoos—in fact, quite a few of them. I ride a motorbike—not well, I admit, and generally I like them to have four wheels, not two, because I find I can stay on them more stably that way. I have also got a leather jacket that happens to be black. So would I be captured in this bill? That is the question I would like to ask the member. Does that then mean that I will be getting the once-over from the local constabulary because of that? Can the member answer that?

💬 Rino Tirikatene: You could be.

I could be, and I do not look a shred intimidatory. I am sure the member Jacinda Ardern will agree that I am a very gentile member of this House—very gentile. [Interruption] What is it I hear coming from the cross benches? I posed a question on this bill: what would the police say?

💬 Hon David Cunliffe: Tell us about the Judaeo-Christian tradition.

Well, it just so happens—there is the next leader of the Labour Party. He is wanting to get in before he gets his call.

💬 Tim Macindoe: Andrew or David? Which one?

Oh, well, true—there are more Davids than we can shake a stick at to choose from, but I am backing that one.

💬 Tim Macindoe: I wouldn’t choose that one.

You would not choose that one?

💬 Tim Macindoe: No.

No—wrong horse. Right, so I will get back to this. The police would rightfully have a view on this. As a former police officer working in the area of organised crime for a number of years, and in particular working with the gang situation, I think I can probably share a perspective from the police. I wonder what they would have to say. Clearly, the Police Association wholeheartedly endorses this. The police are saying that this is a good thing. It is not the panacea and there is nothing to suggest that what this bill is about is solving the gang problems, because, actually, the gang problem is a reflection of many other societal issues and many other problems and areas, which I will touch on, that we are addressing. But removing gang insignia, and this bill itself, is not about getting rid of the gangs, per se. The police say it is a very good tool.

What I would say to members on the other side is that even at its worst—if they think this will have little or no impact—it will certainly do no harm. I, for the life of me—[Interruption] Oh no, it is very harmful when we lock up a gang member for intimidating others by wearing his big mobster patch! That is a shocking thing to do! I question why it is that on that basis, even if we argue that it has little benefit and it would do no harm, they would not support it. It just shows that those members are disengaged with the views of New Zealanders, because there are no New Zealanders who actually think going anywhere in the area of being soft on gangs or soft on crime or anything—the Labour Party says no, it is not doing that. But what does this bill actually say? Because if it is actually not doing anything other than giving the police the ability to arrest people when they think that they can intimidate others, they can patch up, and they can gangster their way around town—and that happens frequently in my electorate, and I am sure many electorate MPs here have had that issue in their constituency and would attest to that. It does pose that question.

I just want to touch on the other point that has been raised: “Oh, if they were serious about gangs, they would”—

The member who has just resumed his seat, Mike Sabin, came out with the brilliant thought that just because this bill, the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill, does no harm, Parliament should pass it. What an amazing precedent to set! Do you know how much it costs to run this House? It costs $7,500 a minute. That member just took $35,000 worth of taxpayers’ money to tell the Committee to do it because it does no harm—do it because it does no harm. How about solving the problem? How about being tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime? The Labour Opposition does not want tokenism; it wants solutions. It does not want half the country growing up in poverty and the other half sheltering behind razor wire. A divided society is a society that ultimately will be an unhappy and unhealthy society—[Interruption]—a society where no one, Mr Macindoe, wins. No one wins.

There have been some great studies that show that more equal societies do better. They do better economically. They do better socially. People live longer. They are healthier. They are happier. All the statistics go in the right direction. To get that boat turned in the right direction, what do you need? You need housing. You need health care. You need good policing. You need a growing economy. You need jobs. You need all those things, which the National Government cannot deliver. So what is its smokescreen? I know: we are going to ban gang patches because it “does no harm”, even though it costs $7,500 a minute to waste Parliament’s time—to waste Parliament’s time—and to waste the public’s time.

We all know that the magnet of gangs is there because there are disaffected youth looking for a home, looking for a whānau, looking for role models, and looking for male role models in particular. Gangs are a symptom of societal breakdown. And, to be fair, sometimes they can be the cause. We have no sympathy for gangs, but what we are not going to pretend is that the clothing on someone’s back determines the outcome of our society. If the National Government was serious about fighting crime, it would be serious about fighting unemployment. It would be reducing unemployment by growing jobs. It would put people back to productive work. It would work with our police to intervene before gangs were a problem.

The member who just reduced his seat—when he sits down, he does reduce the seat. That is just the thing. The member who just resumed his seat is a disappointment to the New Zealand Police Force today, because the New Zealand bobby on the beat knows that the gang problem is a complicated problem, and changing the colour of the shirt on your back or the patch on your jacket is not going to solve it. It is not going to solve the problem.

What the Labour Opposition stands for is end-to-end solutions. We are going to follow the lessons of a “King Dick” Seddon or a “Mickey” Savage. We are going to have opportunities from the cradle to the grave, and we are going to make sure we build a good society. We are not going to waste Parliament’s time by worrying about the gang patch on somebody’s back. Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime—that is the Labour philosophy. Let us get a real strategy, not something that, in the words of the member opposite, will simply “do no harm”. Thank you.

I will just take this opportunity to respond to some of the issues that have been raised by the Opposition. I want to come back to Mr Tirikatene’s speech and state very clearly—and I share my colleague Mike Sabin’s concern—that I think Kiwis are all a bit over having race introduced into these types of arguments. This bill, the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill, relates to Asian Triads, it relates to the Mongrel Mob, and it relates to the Hell’s Angels. If your friends want to wear leather jackets—I enjoy, and I am sure all of us in this House sometimes enjoy, going biking, like Mr Sabin was saying, and wearing a leather jacket—there is nothing wrong with that, Mr Tirikatene. They can do that. But if they choose to put a Mongrel Mob patch or a Black Power patch on it, they are going to have to remove it, take it off, when they go into a school or a Government building. It is as simple as that.

How do people qualify? How do people get membership to this club? If its members, associates, or supporters, individually or collectively, promote, encourage, or engage in criminal activity, then they will find that they have their gang patches registered on the schedule. That is how you get membership.

In terms of police leadership, and whether or not this bill is actually going to have a real effect and give the police another effective tool to use in their fight against organised crime and gangs, the clear answer to that is yes. The great thing to see about our police service at the moment is that it has got very strong leadership in the Police Commissioner, Peter Marshall, and his two deputies, Mike Bush and Viv Rickard. Sadly, for a long time, in my own personal opinion, I feel that our police service lacked some strong leadership. Thankfully, now they have it.

The feedback from the Police Association and the police is that this is a very good bill, and it is going to provide them with a very effective tool to be able to take action and apply pressure, put pressure, on the gangs in New Zealand.

It is not a waste of time. I am a bit disappointed to hear Mr Cunliffe say that. In fact, most of New Zealand really does not know at the moment what the Labour Party stands for, and this is a great opportunity for those members to put a stake in the ground and say: “You know what? We are going to be strong on law and order, and we are going to support this bill.” Wishful thinking. I do not think we are going to see that happen.

Mr Cunliffe said that Mr Sabin stood up and wasted $35,000 of taxpayers’ money. Actually, he has every right to get up and speak in this House. That is why he was elected as the representative for Northland in 2011. He has a big history in having to deal with and see the carnage, and the victims associated with gangs. He was recognised by the Sir Peter Blake Trust for providing leadership in this area, so he knows what he is talking about. My point there is this: Mr Cunliffe talked about $35,000. Do you know what? That pales in comparison with what gangs and gang activity, and criminals and organised crime sponsored by gangs, cost the taxpayer and cost this country every year. I want everyone to think about that and reflect on that as well.

He is right. This bill is not the panacea, and I have said myself that this is not the panacea, but this is one very important part of giving our police a tool to be able to take action against gangs. Are the nurses in the accident and emergency departments going to want to be too bothered about having to ask gang members to remove their gang patches? I visited North Shore Hospital recently, and I can assure you that the nursing staff there, the sisters, and the doctors are certainly no shrinking violets. They are more than happy to do whatever they have to do to provide a good environment for the patients and the people in their care. But the beauty of this bill is that they do not have to tell a gang member to remove a patch. This bill allows for the police to come in and do that, and remove any tension that may be created between nursing staff or medical staff and a gang-patched member bringing in a child for treatment. That really is in response to the issue that Miss Ardern raised. I hope that that has clarified some of the points that have been raised by the Opposition. Thank you.

It is a pleasure to take a call on this bill, the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill. I am going to be a bit kinder than my colleagues. First of all I congratulate the member who originally brought the bill. Members’ bills are a big thing for individual members, so I congratulate Todd McClay, and also Mark Mitchell, who I think did a good job at the Back Bencher the other night, explaining this bill. I think it is very well intentioned. I do not doubt that it is well meaning, and that members genuinely believe that this bill will make a difference.

I was not on the Law and Order Committee so I do not have the benefit of the experience, but I have listened very carefully to my colleagues and I have come to the conclusion that this is window dressing—this is window dressing. I think the member over there, Mike Sabin, actually confirmed it. What he said is: “Even if it won’t work, passing this bill will do no harm.”

💬 Mike Sabin: That’s not what I said.

That is what he said. I wrote it down as you said it, Mr Sabin: “Even if it won’t work, passing a bill will do no harm.”

As I have looked through this bill and looked at what the select committee said about it, particularly our members and the Green Party members, I can see that the committee members really struggled with definitions in this bill. They struggled with the definition of what is a public place, or what is a public service, “department”, “Crown entity”, “local authority”, and so on. There are still the unanswered questions, and perhaps the member in the chair, Mark Mitchell, can take a call and answer the questions that I have about this. What it seems to do is to create a situation where you can have anomalies. You can have, for example, someone wearing a patch in a bus shelter and that is prohibited because the bus shelter belongs to the local council, but they are allowed to stand on the footpath outside. You can have the same kind of intimidation outside a school, because it is not public property, as you are not allowed to have in the school. I can see that gang members can be just as intimidating, if not more so, if they can stand outside public premises, outside a hospital, and so on.

The other thing I think about this bill, too, is that if I were a gang member I would be deeply disappointed if my gang was not mentioned in this list in the bill. I would make it a matter of pride to get my name mentioned in legislation. Who has their gang mentioned in legislation? Where else would you be able to have such a badge of honour as to have your gang mentioned in legislation? There are bound to be gangs that have been missed out. There are bound to be problems with identifying who the gangs are. What the members opposite have been saying is that—although they were arguing about the speech of my colleague Mr Tirikatene, and saying that the people he was describing were not covered by the bill—this bill expects public servants, such as teachers and nurses, to be able to identify what is a gang patch, covered under clause 4, “Interpretation”, in Part 1, and whether it is actually covered by this bill and the long, long list of the various gangs. I think what Rino Tirikatene was trying to describe is how easily people could be confused, and what a waste of police time that could be.

One of the things I have been following recently is the National Front. Have you seen the insignia of the National Front? It is not covered by this bill, but it is just as intimidating as that of many of the gangs that are mentioned here in this bill. How would a nurse or a teacher know the difference between a member of “Hu-Hu MC”, or “Lone Legion MC”, or “Mothers MC”, or “Nomads”? How would they know that? The fact they are listed in this bill—

💬 Mike Sabin: I realise that. I’m astonished that the member is even suggesting that they’re unknown.

Well, they are unknown. I would not know who they are. I am sorry, I have not been a policeman like that member. The arrogance of the policeman on that side of the Chamber is really getting a big boring, to be honest. Look, I am a lay member of the public. I am putting myself in the shoes of ordinary, hard-working public servants, such as teachers and nurses, and asking a genuine question about how on earth they are supposed to be able to identify the gangs that are covered by this bill.

Are they supposed to carry this legislation around with them? When someone comes into the hospital or the school, wearing an insignia—and, as I said, there are many types of insignia; it is not just gang insignia—are they supposed to go up to them and say: “Are you a member of the Bandidos MC? Is that a gang, under clause 4 of the bill?”. Are they supposed to have a list on the wall? These are people who are trying to teach our kids at school. These are the nurses who are trying to deal with the injured who are coming through the door. Then they are supposed to ring the cops if they think that those people are covered by this bill, and then they have got to wait for a policeman. The poor policemen have already had their resources cut under this Government. What this is going to do is add more pressure on cops, who actually should be solving the crimes of ordinary people who are having their houses burgled, and other things, not wasting time.

The Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill is a very good bill, and it just amazes me that the Labour Party—I know it is the Opposition—could be opposing it, because this is common sense. If you go out there and speak to any New Zealander in the street and you say: “Should gang members be able to come into a school or a hospital or a WINZ office with a gang patch on? Should they be allowed to?”, people will say: “No, of course they shouldn’t.” The fact that the Labour Party is arguing against this bill just shows how completely out of touch it is. This is actually the problem that the Labour Party has got—that it will oppose legislation like this.

💬 Andrew Little: Why would he say something that is not even being argued? This is how desperate his Government has become.

Andrew Little is going ballistic over there because he is losing control. He is losing his grip on the prize of the Labour leadership. I would like to hear him get up and argue against a very common-sense bill.

This is the difference, you see, between people like the National members and, on this occasion, I believe, our colleagues in New Zealand First, and the totally out-of-touch people representing Labour. Just like with the man ban, they will argue in favour of something that makes absolutely no sense to the average New Zealander in the street. This is why those people over there are going to be in Opposition for a long, long time to come.

David Cunliffe got up and he said: “Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime.” Everyone at home would think “Well, that sounds very good.” until they actually realised that that is a line directly plagiarised from Tony Blair’s 1997 UK “New Labour” manifesto. That shows what the problem is with these people. There is no substance there. There is absolutely no common sense. Who would say that the Mongrel Mob should be able to go into a hospital wearing gang patches? I tell you, I have worked in hospital accident and emergency departments, and it is not very nice for the staff and the rest of the public when these people come in wearing their gang patches and intimidating people.

This bill sends a very good signal to gangs that, yes, you might be able to wear your red T-shirt or you might be able to have your facial tattoo, but, actually, we are going to make it inconvenient for you if you want to come into a hospital, a Work and Income New Zealand department, or a primary school and try to intimidate excellent public servants going about their daily tasks, scare kids, cause inconvenience, and, basically, try to be macho. Supporting this bill shows that we are not going to tolerate gangs and their activities in New Zealand, but, of course, the Labour Party thinks it is fine.

That is the problem with Labour. Labour members talk a big game, but in the end they are prepared to tolerate all sorts of unacceptable behaviour because, actually, the Labour Party lacks any form of common sense on just about any issue, whether it is the man ban, whether it is gang insignia, or whether it is power prices. If you want a really stupid solution, ask this current crop of Labour MPs. They will be losing touch with the blokes out there who drive the white vans, the guys on the building sites, and the people who, basically, have walked away from Labour in droves because constantly it comes up with stupid positions on common-sense issues. Even a schoolkid could look at this and say it is a very good idea to ban gang insignia in our schools, in our hospitals, and in the Work and Income New Zealand offices.

So I say to the Labour member Andrew Little, if you get your crack at the leadership, try to turn those people round. We want some decent Opposition. National and the country deserve a good Opposition. We are not getting it from that party over there at the moment, because it is not connecting with New Zealanders. There is a total lack of common sense from the Labour Party, and it is exemplified by the fact that it would oppose this excellent bill that Todd McClay and now Mark Mitchell have brought before the House. I want to commend them for their very good, sensible work. The National Party wholeheartedly supports this bill. Thank you.

It is a pleasure to take what will now be my final call on this part of the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill. I just want to respond to some comments made by Dr Coleman, the previous speaker. You see, here is the thing: no one on this side of the Chamber has argued, nor would we argue, that gangs should have some sort of free rein over schools or hospitals or any other Government office. No one has argued that. We do not need to argue that.

If he wants arguments about sensible solutions to real problems, then Dr Coleman could do a lot worse than actually sitting there listening to us for a moment and hearing what the real problem is. The real problem is not the presence of gang patches and gang insignia; it is the fact that we have criminal enterprises, some of them tied up with gangs. Their members wear whatever garments they wear—some of them do not wear any gang patches—but they are still tied up with groups, and they are still involved in criminal enterprises. If we had a Government that was genuinely interested in dealing with the issues of crime and bringing to justice those who would commit crimes against those in our communities, then it would not be wasting its time, our time, and the time of this Committee on legislation like this. It would be addressing the real issues, the real drivers of crime. It would be dealing with the people who bring to their activities bad motives, poor motives, evil motives, and it would be addressing those issues. It would be looking at those people who are driven into the gangs through poverty, through hardship, or through whatever misguided sense of membership or belonging that they have or want to have, and it would address those issues. But this is not a Government that wants to do that. This is a Government that is about blaming others, blaming people, blaming everybody else rather than taking the time and the effort to come up with real solutions.

If I were in business driving a white van around the streets, I would want to know that I was driving through safe communities and safe streets. I would want to know that I had a Government in charge that was committed to dealing with those issues and putting in place those measures that were genuinely about dealing with issues of crime and ensuring that those who commit crime are properly brought to justice. I would be equally concerned about making sure that those who are brought to justice are then handled through our criminal justice system in a way that actually has a better chance of fixing the problem.

That is not what this bill does. This is about cosmetics. As everything about this bill—which is about gang insignia and gang patches—suggests, it is just cosmetics. It is not about dealing with people and it is not about dealing with the issue, and that is why we are opposed to it. That is why we will continue to oppose silly measures proposing silly solutions to problems that do not exist.

If we want to deal with people who are on premises and should not be there, we already have the means to deal with that, as the Napier District Court has shown, and as many public organisations are showing. But if we wanted to stop criminal elements turning up in public places, we would not be stopping at public buildings or Government buildings; we would be dealing with criminal elements turning up to playgrounds, turning up to beaches, turning up to barbecue places, and turning up on our streets. We will deal with that in the next part, and we will deal with the measures that are there for police to chase these people. We will be dealing with real measures to stop this. This bill does not do that. That is why we are opposed to it.

I know that Dr Coleman has listened intently to this, and I see now the look on his face. He now realises, of course, that this legislation does not go anywhere near the sorts of problems that he spelt out and that we need to have fixed. I know he understands that no one in this Committee is arguing that we want to have gang members marauding around our schools and our hospitals. I know he understands that we are all opposed to that, and I know now that he understands that we want real measures to deal with the real problems, not just window dressing.

I just want to pick up on a few points that Mr Little has actually raised there. He made comments to the effect that, basically, what we should be doing is removing the attractiveness of gangs. I could not agree more with the member in that regard. And, actually, it is interesting to note that the police in their submission to the Law and Order Committee on the Prohibition of Gang Insignia in Government Premises Bill also agreed with Mr Little’s sentiments. They said: “The bill is welcome in that it provides recognition in principle of the seriousness of New Zealand’s gang problem. The provisions will be of some assistance in reducing the attractions of gang membership and the intimidation felt by members of the public and government employees.” So, actually, the point that Andrew Little raises is a very good one. It is just that, for some reason, Labour members cannot find it in themselves philosophically to actually vote for the bill; they are struggling to find the arguments to vote against it.

I want to pick up on some comments that Darien Fenton mentioned about gangs wanting to get on this list in the bill—that that would be some sort of badge of honour. That actually goes to the heart of what a gang patch is all about. What do people have to do to earn a patch? Well, they can start at the lower end with an aggravated robbery or some grievous bodily harm. They can move their way up the scale with a pack rape or something of that nature. If they want to get an instant patch, it is with a homicide—it is with a murder. And they will do their lag. They will plead guilty, they will do their lag, and they will earn their patch, because, of course, prisons in New Zealand have often been seen as almost some sort of learning institution for the gang fraternity. Inside those walls, that is actually what they do: they practise their gang skills and their networking and so forth. It is good to see some great leadership from Minister Tolley in terms of making it a lot less comfortable for gang members to perpetuate their functions from inside the walls of prison.

The point I want to make here is that, in terms of earning a gang patch, that means the world to them. And as a police officer, removing a gang patch from a gang member, taking that away—generally, of course, that can be done only if it was used in the commission of an offence in some way, and it becomes evidence. But this bill will give the police the ability to take it away just for the fact that it has been worn in Government premises or in local authority premises.

The significance of a patch should not be understated. Gang members would rather die than give up their patch. Indeed, there are gangs that will kill rather than let someone de-patch, which gives some indication of how important it is to have that. The point that Darien Fenton was raising actually works against her own argument, because what it says is that gang patches are very important, therefore it is very important to make sure that the New Zealand Government and the New Zealand public deny gang members every opportunity to wear that patch and intimidate.

Darien Fenton went on to say: “Oh, they can’t wear it inside the building but they can wear it on the footpath outside the building.” If Darien Fenton took a little bit of time to have a wander through the Crimes Act 1961, she would actually find that there are all manner of offences that rely on proximity as an ingredient of the offence. They have to be on public property, but if they step inside the house, immediately they are not committing an offence, because they are one step removed from that public place. This bill is no different, so I am baffled as to why she is trying to raise the idea that inside the building it is an offence but outside the building it is not. There are plenty of other tools that the police can use if they want to remove a gang patch in terms of criminal offending, because, in my experience, when you see one or two gang members hanging around, generally they are committing offences, and it is just a case of finding out which one it is and locking them up for it.

It seems to me that what we have got here is a Labour Party struggling to find reasons to vote against this. Labour members have also talked about the idea that we should be doing other things—we should be building houses, we should be growing the economy. Why do those members vote against every effort we make to do that, and then come in here and disingenuously say: “Oh, if they were serious about it, they would do something about jobs and houses.”? Stop voting against our efforts, then. New Zealanders have so woken up to that approach. The only people who will be supporting this Labour Party will be gangs. How ironic.

The question was put that the amendment set out on Supplementary Order Paper 253 in the name of Richard Prosser to clause 4 be agreed to.