Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill

I seek leave to present a legislative statement on the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill.

DEPUTY SPEAKER: Leave has been sought for that course of action. Is there any objection? There is none. That legislative statement is published under the authority of the House and can be found on the Parliament website.

Hon NICOLE McKEE: I move, That the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

I am pleased to bring this bill to its third reading. Today marks yet another important milestone in this Government’s ongoing commitment to reducing violent crime and restoring law and order. This bill is the first phase of my work programme to reform New Zealand’s outdated firearms law with the priority of keeping our community safe from the threat of illegally held firearms in the hands of gangs and other violent offenders. The bill was developed as part of the Government’s 100-day plan and gives police the tools that they need to keep firearms out of the hands of gangs and other high-risk offenders. It progresses the Government’s commitment to reduce violent crime, restore law and order, and keep our communities safe.

To recap for the House, firearms prohibition orders—or FPOs—are orders made by the court when offenders have committed serious violent offences. They are not granted lightly and, therefore, are in force for 10 years, prohibiting offenders from holding a firearms licence and from accessing firearms or even being around them. Breaching the conditions of an FPO is a criminal offence, and orders that willingly breach them can be liable for up to seven years in prison. This imprisonment term reflects how seriously we as a Government are taking the threat of violence with firearms in our communities.

The FPO regime has been in place since 2022 and this bill strengthens the existing regime. It provides police with a practical tool to enforce compliance, and it sends a strong message that the buck stops here because this Government is committed to addressing violent crime. This bill makes three key improvements to the existing FPO regime. First, the bill expands the qualifying criteria, which allows the court to make an FPO, with this expansion focused on targeting gang members who offend with illegally held firearms. It does this by specifying additional offences that mean a member or associate of a gang, if convicted, can be issued with an FPO. These offences are gang-related offences in the Crimes Act 1961, the Arms Act 1983, the Misuse of Drugs Act 1975, and the Psychoactive Substances Act 2013. These are offences like assault, robbery, illicit drug manufacture, unlawful possession of a firearm, and illegal supply of prohibited firearms. This change responds to concerns from the public about the risks posed by gang members and gang associates using firearms to inflict violence and intimidate New Zealand’s communities.

Secondly, the bill establishes a process by which an FPO may be varied, modified, or revoked. An individual is subject to an FPO for a considerable length of time, but we recognise that within this time these circumstances may change, and people can genuinely rehabilitate. If they achieve this, they may no longer pose a risk to public safety. To address this, the bill’s changes mean anybody with an FPO will be able to request the court to vary or revoke that FPO. They will be eligible to do this at the mid-point of the FPO, which is after five years have passed. Before varying a condition, the court must be satisfied the condition is no longer necessary to prevent the person from accessing, possessing, or using any firearms. Before revoking an FPO, the court must be satisfied that the FPO is no longer necessary, reasonable, and appropriate to assist in managing risks to public safety.

Thirdly, the bill gives police a new search power to monitor compliance with an FPO. Currently, police do not have any specific search powers for monitoring an individual’s compliance with an FPO. Police rely on general search powers associated with firearms set out in the Search and Surveillance Act 2012. The officer must suspect an offence involving a firearm has occurred. The bill amends the Search and Surveillance Act, giving police the ability to search to monitor compliance with an FPO. The officer must have reasonable grounds to believe that a person is subject to an FPO, and the search must only be conducted for the purpose of checking whether the person is complying with the conditions of that FPO, not to locate evidence of other offending. Misuse of this power, such as searching for an ulterior purpose, or excessively, or at unreasonable times could be found to be unreasonable under the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. This bespoke search power means police can proactively monitor compliance with FPOs to ensure those individuals who have been deemed a risk to public safety are not accessing firearms.

The bill comes into effect six months after it is passed, providing time to prepare guidance for police officers and court staff and to make necessary IT system changes. Together, the changes in the bill address the unacceptable levels of gang-related violence, public intimidation, and crimes involving firearms that have outraged New Zealanders. The changes keep firearms out of the hands of criminals, thereby reducing violent crime and ultimately restoring safety in our communities for the benefit of all New Zealanders.

I want to again thank the Justice Committee and this House for their thorough and mindful consideration of the bill, as well as the officials who have worked diligently on this bill. My thanks go to every member of the public who submitted on the bill. Their valuable input has fine-tuned this bill to ensure it best addresses the unacceptable levels of gang-related violence, intimidation and crimes involving firearms that are impacting our communities. By passing this bill, we are keeping our promise to all New Zealanders to restore law and order in this country and make sure criminals are held accountable for their offending. I commend this bill to the House.

The question is the motion be agreed.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s almost perplexing that we’ve got a Government who’s Minister for firearms, on the one hand, is talking about doing away with a firearms registry, and reintroducing military-style semi-automatic rifles, and then tweaking the firearms prohibition orders—the inconsistency of that does not escape me. We already have firearms prohibition orders. The last Government, the Labour Government, put those in place. We don’t see that this legislation is necessary. Those firearms prohibition orders, which are already set out in the Arms Act, have just been there—we haven’t had long enough to see them bed in. This would be window dressing were it not such an overreach.

I mean, this Government, is well used to overreach; they’re getting quite used to it. I mean, in the Gangs Legislation Amendment Bill, they slipped in at the last moment a prohibition on having gang patches in secret in your own home. Here, again, we’ve got a bill which has a very significant invasion of the home—and quite unnecessarily, quite gratuitously. I think we need to look very carefully not just at this particular overreach but the fact that this Government is eroding some pretty fundamental rights and doing it in quite invidious ways.

We’ve already got firearms protection orders. We want to see how they work; they might need some adjustments. I’ll tell you what they don’t need: they don’t need the kind of far-ranging warrantless search powers that this Government is giving to police. Whilst we accept that police officers, by and large, exercise their duties and responsibilities appropriately—

Sam Uffindell: Do you want the gangs to have more guns?

Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: —we know that there will be instances where there is overreach.

Hon Priyanca Radhakrishnan: That’s what you’ll be doing with semi-automatics.

Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: If you look—and you’re right, Priyanca Radhakrishnan; there they are, chipping away whilst they’re talking about reintroducing semi-automatic rifles. It’s an absolute outrage that flies in the face of the harm to some of our most vulnerable communities—it’s deeply, deeply offensive.

If we do look at the warrantless search power in new section 18AA, inserted by clause 14, the breadth of that search power simply makes no sense. The first thing to say is this, as the Associate Minister of Justice herself identified in the House—I think it was yesterday—there is already a right of a constable to enter someone’s home under the Arms Act to check compliance with the Arms Act. Now, that search power—and the Minister’s there; she knows the Arms Act. She was a gun lobbyist, so she knows it pretty well. If you look at that search power, it talks about entry at a reasonable time. Now, a warrantless search doesn’t talk about entry at a reasonable time. In fact, the very reason it’s warrantless is so that they can catch people off guard—these are people’s homes, right?

Now, the suggestion is that this is not a punitive power—the suggestion is that it’s protective of the public, but it’s hard to say that it’s not a little bit punitive when your house is busted into at 3 o’clock in the morning. Let’s not pretend that won’t happen, because if the police were going to have a look around—here’s the other thing, the trigger isn’t that they think there is a breach. They don’t have to even think there’s a breach of the firearms protection order, the wording is there in subsection (1): it’s “for the purpose of checking”. Just checking up. “Gidday. Oh, 3 a.m.? Sorry about that. Just want to check whether you’ve got a firearm around.” There doesn’t have to be any wrongdoing whatsoever. How many times can they do that? As often as they like. Sure, they’re not supposed to go in there and check whether there’s illicit drugs or whether there’s stolen property or whether any other criminal activity is going on, but when you have an absolutely unfettered right to pop in for a check at any time of the day or night, that is a recipe for overreach.

Our law assists that because of section 30 of the Evidence Act. Section 30 of the Evidence Act provides that if evidence is found as a result of an illegal search, then if it’s useful enough you’re still allowed to use it. Now, that’s problematic when you’ve got an ability to pop into someone’s house at any time just to have a look around, as long as they’ve got a firearms protection order.

Of course, the other thing is the scope of this power isn’t limited only to people’s homes; it can be other places where the person is present. So be careful who you invite over—

Hon Members: That’s the point!

Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: —because if they’ve got a firearms protection order, your house—no, I know you wouldn’t invite a gang member or a person with a firearm; they wouldn’t go either. The fact of the matter is that, if there’s a firearms protection order in place, the police can enter any premises at any time to check—not because they think offences are being committed, but just to have a check-up. That is highly invasive. What’s more: not just the part of the premises where the person is in control or is present, but any part of the premises. That third party’s home can be searched from top to bottom.

Tim Costley: Gang pad.

Hon Dr DUNCAN WEBB: No, not a gang member. It can be the gang member’s mum—and that’s the kind of thing we’ve got to think about: that these are other people’s homes. I’m sorry if you think that gang members’ mums need to be turned over by the police, but I don’t. I think that people should be free from unreasonable search and seizure. This is an extension—such an overreach that it is an unreasonable search and seizure.

Of course, then we’ve got vehicles that can be stopped—vehicles, again, for no purpose other than having a check. There has to be no suspicion that there’s a breach in a firearm protection order. Just see that person driving past. “Oh, yeah, we don’t particularly like that person. Let’s let them know we’ve got our eye on him. Stop them, get all the kids out of the car, get the groceries out of the car, give it a good working over.” That is a recipe for police overreach, so we need to be very, very cautious in that regard.

Of course, this is the other thing that really is the icing on the cake, and that is that even if the person doesn’t have a firearm protection order on them, as long as the officer reasonably believes they do—they don’t have to be sure—the search is legal; even if they reasonably believe. They don’t have to check it; they just have to have a reasonable belief that that’s the case. That’s not good enough. If someone is searched and they don’t have a firearm protection order on them, it should be an illegal search. There should be no authority to search that person.

This bill is one of many—the Minister in her speech made it clear that there’s a raft of legislation coming around firearms. We’ve seen a raft of legislation around other areas, and every time the New Zealand Bill of Rights—the ability to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, the freedom of association, the freedom of expression—is eroded.

On the other side of the House, they say, “Don’t worry, it’s just gang members.” You know what? That’s where it starts. If we don’t strike the right balance in respect of all members of our community, then ever so slowly the rights of all members of the community are eroded. It’s an unnecessary bill, it’s a bill that’s overreach, it’s a bill which won’t work, and it’s a bill which simply is window dressing in respect of firearms protection orders already in place.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Following on from what the Hon Dr Duncan Webb has mentioned, I would like to speak, too, on this particular bill, in the third reading. Now, first of all, I think when we were having the committee stage for this, it was one of the more unconventional experiences I’ve had when it comes to committee stage, and it was very interesting.

James Meager: What? It was a great time.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: It was a great time.

Tamatha Paul: He didn’t say it was bad.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: I didn’t say it was bad. But, in terms of the broader context of this, I think while we really appreciate what the Justice Committee has done here—as well as the way that the Minister at the committee stage answered the questions—there are a lot of concerns with this particular bill.

To provide a little bit of background/context, when the Labour Government introduced FPOs—the firearms prohibition orders—FPOs in general are a good thing. This is something that the Green Party agrees with. However, things that are in this bill are already prevalent and already exist within the current legislation, particularly when it comes to a high-risk person and their access to firearms. What we’re seeing here by extending it and, essentially, only targeting gangs is nothing short of virtue signalling, as we have seen from this Government.

The Hon Dr Duncan Webb has, before, mentioned a crucial element of this bill, which is around the introduction of clause 14, particularly when it comes to warrantless searches, new section 18AA under the Search and Surveillance Act. This is a really concerning bit, because although, rightfully, there’s been amendments and adjustments, firstly, when it comes to new section 18AA, it states, “If a constable has reasonable grounds to believe”—and, yes, from the Attorney-General’s perspective, this does satisfy some of the requirements around the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. However, one of the things here is: who then judges in terms of what is considered reasonable grounds? We have seen in reports lately of the systemic bias that our police force have towards members of certain communities. That is in the report.

Over here, when we see something like this and when any constable is able to act within reasonable ground, who is assessing that reasonable ground and what are some of the repercussions of that if that reasonable ground fails to meet the standard that is expected? Over here, the bottom line is that warrantless searches means that they can search any place, at any stage, listed in this particular section. We talked about the fact that they can go into anyone’s house, anyone who has an FPO, and then conduct a search. Yes, we have heard from the Minister that if they are looking for anything else other than what is required and what is for the consideration of FPO, that will be considered inadmissible. That is something they have to tread very carefully. Nevertheless, it does not fail to address the fact that they can go into these people’s homes at any stage.

That is the crux of the situation we’re talking about here, because when they do that, when you have people—and we talked about scenarios—going into your house, like many people here who talk about the harmfulness of gangs, who talk about the harmfulness of gang members, you would be horrified when the gang member comes to your house, wouldn’t you? Particularly when they have a firearm, how do you feel? What do you think about for those gang members when they have a police officer charging into their house by right of law at any stage, at any time, any time of the day? That is serious. That is serious for them. That is serious for their family. It is serious for their children.

Imagine the kind of trauma that that would create for children, and you—sorry, not you, Mr Speaker—people, and the Government in general, ask why we say that some people in some parts of our communities are more fearful of police than they are of gang members. This is one of the reasons why, because if you are a child of a gang member or a child of anyone who holds an FPO, or a child—like the Hon Dr Duncan Webb mentioned before—of a family who may have invited someone over to stay who has an FPO, the police could come and search you at any stage. That is serious—that is serious.

On top of that, there are other instances. It’s not just gang members, but there are other instances where this creates generational trauma. This creates trauma for those rangatahi and for those tamariki. Another good example of that is overstayers, in the context of the Dawn Raids. That’s another place where we have heard from those people that you had people who came in at 4 or 5 in the morning, knocking down their doors, searching for them—looking for overstayers. We’re looking at trying to create that balance. We’re looking at what it means for these people to experience that kind of trauma and looking at how we can minimise trauma. That’s what we’ve said we’re supposed to be doing while talking about keeping the public safe, not what this bill is doing here.

Lastly, another thing that we have asked, and which has not been addressed in this particular bill, is that, again, if we were there to really provide for public safety, why are we only targeting those who have been convicted on whom then will be placed an FPO? Why aren’t we talking about the broader context of gun violence in Aotearoa New Zealand? Why are we not talking about the fact that there are people who are harming our communities who are committing massacres with no track record, with no criminal record? They’re not on any form of watch-list, and they are harming and hurting our communities. That is important here, when we are talking about gun safety.

The Green Party does not support this bill, because of the fact that even though having FPOs is a good idea, the way that this legislation is laid out isn’t. The way that this targets specific parts of our community isn’t. We have seen this sort of legislation being introduced in this House over the last little while, and we have heard about the additional amendments and additional search powers it has introduced, and I, for one, am concerned for those tamariki and for those rangatahi who are in that environment where they are being searched unjustifiably because of legislation that this Government introduces and is trying to pass.

I’m concerned for those tamariki and rangatahi who feel like their Government has failed them and is creating even more distance and even more barriers for us to reach out to them. I am concerned for our migrant communities and for our Muslim whānau, who still, to this day, are asking the Government to recognise and to listen to their fears and concerns when it comes to terrorists and to terrorism activities from people who are not on any sort of watch-list. The Green Party does not support this bill. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Time to clear up a bit of confusion, because there’s been a large amount of confusion on this bill in the House over the past couple of days. The first bit of confusion is I’m confused that members opposite are taking very, very long calls, because last night they were desperate to shut down debate. They hate the bill so much that they were desperate to shut down debate, vote on it through committee stage, and see it here for third reading, and now here they are speaking at length about how much they continue to dislike the bill. Well, members opposite need to change their attitudes and change their minds and support this bill, because it is a good bill.

Last night, we had a history lesson from Arena Williams, a history lesson on the firearms prohibition orders—not protection orders; prohibition orders, to clear up another bit of confusion. Arena Williams correctly stated that these were introduced by Labour in the last Government. What she forgot to mention was that they were first proposed in 2017 by National. They were put up as members’ bills by National, voted down by Labour, and then surprise, surprise, as violent gun crime went up, as gang membership went up, Labour changed their tune and they put in firearms prohibition orders. Now the Green Party also think firearms prohibition orders are a good idea; they just don’t like the fact that we are strengthening them.

This is a good bill. It will strengthen the protections put in place by these firearms prohibition orders. The bill strikes the right balance between enhancing public safety and ensuring fair application of the law. I’m not going to criticise the contribution from Dr Duncan Webb. He has a lot of experience in this area as an advocate for people who are subject to these kinds of orders. I’m not going to criticise his lived experience in this area, but I am going to criticise his contribution to the House. It is wrong. He needs to change his mind and support the bill. I commend it to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak on the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill. This is another effort by the Government to give the tools to the police that they need to take care of serious crime.

New Zealand First fully supports this bill. It’s about protecting public safety, it’s about getting our communities safe, it’s about stopping violent crime and, unlike the Opposition who’s trying to protect their voter base—which I must say is getting smaller—it is about restoring law and order. It is about common sense.

New Zealand First supports this bill because it strikes the right balance between enhancing public safety and ensuring fairness in its application. The amendment recommended by the Justice Committee improved the bill by focusing its reach on those who it generally poses a risk to without overreaching into the lives of innocent individuals.

New Zealand First supports this bill because it is a necessary step in protecting New Zealanders from the threat of gun violence, particularly in the context of gang and organised crime. It is a sensible, focused, and balanced piece of legislation that New Zealand needs. It has contributed to what New Zealand First believes in, and I commend this bill to the House.

Five minutes—Fernando Hernandez.

Francisco Hernandez, Mr Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): Francisco Hernandez.

FRANCISCO HERNANDEZ: It’s all good. I’ve often been confused with my other colleagues, such as Ricardo Menéndez March and Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan, but I’m pleased to report that as they’re more handsome and better dressed than me, I’m not offended by any sorts of confusion between us.

I rise to take a call on the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill. I want to talk a little bit about the kind of genesis—

James Meager: Strong OUSA presence today.

FRANCISCO HERNANDEZ: That’s right—strong OUSA. Ha, ha! I want to talk a little bit about the genesis of this, and the genesis of this was, as Mr Meager alluded to, yes, it was talked about as a National member’s bill. But it was a tranche of legislation that was adopted by the then Labour Government following—and I’m sure all of us members in the House would agree—a very tragic and very senseless attack on 15 March. My colleague Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan rightfully pointed out that we do need to actually centre the voices of the people in this. We need to centre the voices of the people who’ve been affected by gun violence.

I think a lot of people have made a point and a lot of members opposite have kind of talked about a focus on the gangs, right? This bill does actually focus quite strongly on the gangs. A lot of the member’s contributions have been about the gangs, but if we’re serious about the gangs, how do we actually get rid of the gangs? Will we get rid of the gangs by creating jobs? Instead, this Government has pursued fiscal and monetary policies which have pushed unemployment up—4.6 percent; the highest it’s been. If we’re serious about getting rid of gangs, we have to invest in police. Instead, we’ve seen this Government making cuts to police.

This is a quote from the New Zealand Police Association about the cuts that are being made to the police—nearly 200 jobs—“We think this will be a scattergun headcount-reduction exercise made in a silo by people who don’t understand the work people do, who they do it for, and who also won’t personally be affected by the outcome of the [so-called] ‘realignment’ exercise.”, which is a euphemism of the cuts that are happening around the Police.

If we’re serious about actually taking action on guns, we have to create environments whereby social inclusion is fostered. This legislation does the opposite. It adds to the layer of stigmatisation of people who’ve already been through a lot. I mean we’ve heard a lot about the inquiry into State abuse about how people who’ve been abused by the State tend to turn to the gangs for comfort. I think we need to contend with these actual psychological realities. I mean some people do join gangs because they’re bad people—that’s absolutely true and we should make no excuses for the people who do join the gangs—but there are some people who’ve joined the gangs because of the trauma that they’ve experienced in their life. Further compounding trauma and further using the State to further abuse people isn’t what’s actually going to be a serious anti-crime or anti-gun thing.

We’ve talked a lot about the potential harassment, and Dr Duncan Webb has made substantial and quite informed and eloquent contributions about the potential for these warrantless searches to be used against the communities. I do think that’s definitely something that will further compound and further add to the layers of trauma that are already here. So my plea to the members opposite and my plea to all the members across this House, actually, is that rather than shouting slogans and actually saying, “Oh, well, we need to crack down on the gangs. We need to deploy the police on the street. We need to execute people.” or whatever, we actually look to see what’s worked overseas.

What’s worked is actually fostering inclusion. What’s worked is actually funding the police and funding people to do the jobs that need to be done so that we actually do make serious work on reducing gangs and reducing the harms that they do—we actually create jobs and employment opportunities. Instead, we’ve been going backwards—we’ve been going backwards under this Government. We’re seeing beneficiaries stigmatised, we’re seeing the overall employment rate cut, and it’s really quite sad.

I just want to conclude my speech by thanking the Minister for her substantial engagement during the committee of the whole House last night. I was able to take a call and my colleagues in the Greens were able to take calls, and she did answer our questions in a way that was quite direct and, I found, inclusive. So thank you.

There is a reason why gang members were campaigning against this Government last year. There is a reason why gang members were campaigning against the ACT Party, were campaigning against the National Party, and were campaigning against New Zealand First. Now we’ve got the unedifying sight of Labour, Te Pāti Māori, and the Greens vying for their votes in 2026. What we are seeing are apologists for gangs. What we are seeing are promoters of gangs, protectors of gangs, and defenders of gangs. The gangs know that this Government is going to make it easier to take the guns off them and we’re going to make it easier to search them. That’s exactly what this Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill does.

“Many New Zealanders”, was the quote from the Green Party a couple of weeks ago, “would rather find themselves down a dark alleyway with a patched gang member than a police officer.” Can I give that to you again? For those listening on “truth radio” and on Parliament TV, “Many New Zealanders would rather find themselves down a dark alley with a patched gang member than a police officer.” This is how deluded the Opposition is. This is how deluded they are and this is why they lost so badly at the last election. If they want to go out on a pro-gang mandate in 2026, well, this is the beginning of it. They are the apologists for gangs, they are the protectors of gangs, they are the defenders of gangs, and they are the promoters of gangs. I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I was going to start with proclaiming this to be a little bit of window dressing from the National Party, but my colleague Cameron Brewer just stood up and acted out the window dressing, so one doesn’t really need to spell that out any further. The dramatics and the scraping the bottom of the barrel to make some sort of vacuous point is a little bit silly.

Nevertheless, the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill is before us in this House today, and it is facing its third reading, which feels like a bit of a waste of time. Let’s begin by acknowledging the fact that the existing framework is in place—2021, the previous Government introduced legislation that, essentially, does this—and it hasn’t had enough time to actually bed in properly. We haven’t had enough time to evaluate it. We don’t know whether it’s working or not, but never miss an opportunity for the Government to go, “Let’s just pretend we can do something that says we’re tough on gangs; we’re tough on crime.” A little bit of window dressing; a little bit of nothing—that sounds good but does nothing. All talk, no trousers at the end of the day.

These orders that are already in place are a critical tool and they do do something. They’re a critical tool for the courts to prevent individuals—particularly those involved in criminal activities—from owning or using dangerous firearms. The current legislation, we believe, is comprehensive. It covers not only firearms but also ammunition. It covers restricted weapons and other related items.

To be going through this process now in the third reading to do something that makes it seem even more tough or strengthens it is a little bit silly. We don’t need to make the changes. We don’t support this piece of legislation. We think it has fish-hooks in it that create dangerous situations that have been well traversed by colleagues on this side of the House. We do not commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. This is the third reading of the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill. It’s really sad when we just think that in South Auckland, two weeks ago, there was a drive-by shooting in Papakura, at a gang pad; one month ago, a drive-by shooting in Māngere, South Auckland, at an alleged gang pad; early July, a home was shot at in Ōtara, South Auckland. The list goes on, and that’s only in the last month and a half. There’s a reason why we’re pushing ahead with this bill.

“Window dressing” is a term that is being thrown around a lot by the Opposition. In the Cambridge Dictionary: “a person or thing that is used to make an activity appear more important or attractive than it really is”. That is what the Opposition is saying we’re trying to do with this bill, but I know what we’re trying to do: we’re trying to protect families, we’re trying to protect rangatahi and tamariki. We commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I tell you what’s really sad about this bill is that what we’re seeing is a Government that is so divided and wants to sound like they’re tough on crime. On the one hand, National is trying to strengthen firearms prohibition orders (FPOs). On the other hand, the Minister Nicole McKee’s name is synonymous with the pro-gun lobby in New Zealand—everyone knows that—and they want to bring back military-style semi-automatic weapons. So which is it? Pick a lane. Just trying to sound tough on crime really isn’t cutting it, and I think people will start seeing through this pretty quickly.

I’ll be very quick, because my colleagues have traversed the reasons why we on this side oppose this piece of legislation, but the two points that I wanted to make really quickly are the fact that it’s, firstly, too soon. FPOs, as members opposite have also acknowledged, were brought into play in 2021, so whether they need to be strengthened to the level that we’re seeing in this proposed legislation remains to be seen. We don’t actually have the evidence. There’s been no evaluation that has been undertaken of the current legislation, let alone knowing whether widening the current police powers to such warrantless and causeless searches is even necessary. As my colleague Dr Duncan Webb has outlined, this is an unnecessary piece of legislation that’s occupying the House’s time.

The second point that he also made very clearly and I just wanted to highlight was the fact that these are warrantless, causeless searches that will come into play as a result of this legislation being passed. There is, of course, the potential to misuse this. It is incredibly broad, it is unwarranted, it is unnecessary, and for all those reasons I do not commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I rise to speak in support of this bill. Look, we’ve had far too much gang-related crime over the past six years, and we’ve seen it get out of control under a Labour Government that was soft on crime—very soft on crime. The good news for the people of New Zealand—and I can see people on the on the other side of the House smiling at the good news that the Comancheros are no longer in the South Island. That is because our Government has worked very hard to make sure that they know they’re not welcome any more. We’ve got a Government that is tackling them, and this Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill is another piece in that armoury to make sure that we can do what we need to do.

Look, there have been some concerns on the other side of the House about, you know, what this may do to those households where police do come in and go through and search, and concerns I heard from the Hon Dr Duncan Webb about it happening at any time of the day. I do understand where he’s coming from on that, but I don’t necessarily agree that it should prohibit them from being able to do that, because, at the end of the day, we are talking about gang members.

Now, look, I know people on the other side of the House tend to be a lot more sympathetic to gang members than we are over here on the Government benches, but at the end of the day, you have to have committed a crime to be admitted to a gang. These are not friendly people. Yes, they have often had a very hard upbringing and faced challenges, and there are a number of reasons that people do join gangs, so I’m not discounting that at all, but at the end of the day, gangs are out there peddling meth and peddling misery throughout New Zealand society, and it is often the most vulnerable members of New Zealand society that fall victim to gangs.

To take the cushy, soft approach that the previous Government took—look at what we saw. We saw an over 50 percent increase in gang numbers—an over 50 percent increase in gang numbers—over the previous Government. We are taking a different approach. We are saying, “Look, if you want to be part of a gang, you do that, but don’t expect any sympathy from us. We are going to come after you. We are going to take your firearms. We are going to take your patches. We are going to make sure that you cannot associate with other people who you are engaged in, or potentially engaged in, criminal activity with. You don’t have a place, operating like that in New Zealand—if you want to, we will hold you accountable.” That is what we are doing. We have already seen the Comancheros disappear—

Hon Scott Simpson: Bye-bye.

SAM UFFINDELL: —bye-bye—from the South Island. That is right, the Hon Scott Simpson, they are out of the South Island. I can see Duncan Webb trying to conceal a little grin over there.

Hon Scott Simpson: He’s thrilled.

SAM UFFINDELL: He’s thrilled. He’s going to have a beer at the airport after this, on his way back to a safer South Island.

Hon Dr Duncan Webb: It’s actually misleading to say that.

SAM UFFINDELL: Well, you can stand up and take a point of order if you would like, and you can do that. You can stand up and take an issue with it if you want, but I would like to think anyone in the South Island would be happy that the Comancheros are no longer there.

What a great appearance we have now—the Hon Mark Mitchell, the Minister of Police, coming in here. Well done, Minister—that is very good; we are very happy, over this side of the House.

We will continue the hard work we are doing in this place. We’ve seen a lot more police on the beat, contrary to what the spokesperson from the Labour Party said yesterday about that not being the case. That didn’t go well because the figures showed that there are more police on the beat. That side of the House can continue to live in that alternative reality that they often live in, but, here on this side of the House, we are a serious Government. We are dedicated to improving the safety and wellbeing of the people and communities around New Zealand. I commend this bill to the House.

Kia ora, Mr Speaker. It’s interesting to hear the previous National Party member, Sam Uffindell, speak in the way—

Hon Member: More interesting than this!

GLEN BENNETT: Gangs are a scourge on our society. Gangs are bad, and this side of the House is in complete agreement with that. What’s happened today in Christchurch—yeah, it’s good. But also that doesn’t mean that the gang is gone. The gang has been arrested, and that’s the thing: for us on this side of the House, it’s how do we deal with the causes of gangs? How do we deal with the causes of crime?

Rima Nakhle: What about the victims?

GLEN BENNETT: How do we get tough on the causes on crime? I hear from the other side, “What about the victims?”, and that is absolutely what we support as well. We look at this piece of legislation: is this victim-centred? I’m not sure. When I come from working in restorative justice, where it’s completely victim-focused and victim-centred, I know a little bit about that and want to make sure whatever we do from this side of the House is around supporting victims, which also is dealing with the causes of crime.

Now, the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill is something that we cannot support—whether it’s around the warrantless searches, whether it’s just around the fact this is the thin end of the wedge in terms of gun reform for us here. We need to look at a bigger picture. How do we change the way we engage not only with criminals, not only with gangs, but with looking at our young people, looking at our rangatahi, and looking at the ways that we can actually change the systems?

What was mentioned before was that we are sympathetic to gang members, and I take offence to that because we are not sympathetic at all. We are sympathetic to ensuring that New Zealand is a place where no one finds the need or desire to join a gang. We are going to work day and night as an Opposition and, then, as a Government to ensure that we can get tough on the causes of crime.

Now, we need to look at our gun reforms. We need to look at what we have done and what we are going to do. This isn’t it. This legislation isn’t going to fix the problem. Therefore, we cannot support this bill.

Look, I rise in support of the Firearms Prohibition Orders Legislation Amendment Bill, and it’s a real privilege to be the last speaker on this third reading today.

I’d firstly like to just commend the Justice Committee for their very hard work in navigating this bill through the select committee process and, of course, through the House, because we on this side of the House are about restoring law and order, keeping our communities safe, and cracking down on gangs. This is about ensuring we are keeping illegal firearms out of the hands of gangs.

Look, I come from a region, Hawke’s Bay, the East Coast, where we have a major gang problem and we have seen a huge increase in the number of gang members in the past six years. In fact, we have a ratio of 2.5 gang members to one police officer, which I understand is actually one of the highest in the country. That is why we need to crack down on the gangs, because it’s the gangs that are increasing crime. They are peddling meth and they are causing our communities to be unsafe; they are intimidating our communities.

Look, I am going to speak to an example of some gang members yesterday, actually, in Hawke’s Bay. It was an example, actually, of our Hawke’s Bay Regional Council—and I’m going to say it here in the House—not reading the room at all because they enabled a whole lot of patched gang members to come into the public space, into the council chamber, and interact with the council leaders which is absolutely beyond belief, to be honest, that we had our council leaders interacting with patched gang members when it is actually illegal to wear a gang patch in a public building, in our schools, and on our public transport.

On this side of the House, our Government has, obviously, already introduced legislation in our first 100 days to crack down on the gangs to ensure that we ban gang patches in public spaces, and this is a really, really powerful message that we’ve been sending to the gangs. It does really beggar belief that yesterday we did have our council leaders interacting with gang members in the council building, which is a public building and it is actually illegal for those gangs members to be wearing their patched gang memorabilia inside the council building.

I think that really was not reading the room which does lead me to talk about councils in general, actually, because—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): No, no, Ms Wedd. It leads you to talk about the bill. You’ve had a pretty good go for four minutes; now let’s lead you to talk about the bill.

CATHERINE WEDD: OK, yes, I’m coming back to that because I think that our focus—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): Oh yes you are.

CATHERINE WEDD: No, our focus, obviously, as central government and local government needs to be on getting the issues right, and that is restoring law and order and that is making sure that we have safer communities and that is what our ratepayers want to see.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): And now you tell us how you’re going to do that, Ms Wedd, or you’ll be sitting down. You are talking about the bill.

CATHERINE WEDD: Yeah, I’m talking about the bill. I am absolutely talking about the bill because this bill is about focusing on the issues that matter—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): No, you’re talking about what’s in the bill, actually, Ms Wedd.

CATHERINE WEDD: Yeah, that’s right—in this bill, because it does make three key changes to the firearms prohibition orders (FPO) regime and it specifies new qualifying offences for gang members who are convicted of these offences. It gives New Zealand Police additional search powers. That’s another thing, actually: police are really enjoying the fact that they’ve finally got a Government that is going to give them more tools in their kit to be able to crack down on crime.

I actually visited the Hawke’s Bay police station—quite a new police station in Hawke’s Bay—and I spoke with a lot of our amazing Hawke’s Bay police officers. I’d just like to congratulate our Hawke’s Bay police officers for all the hard work that they’re doing, because they are actually really respecting these laws that we are pushing through to ensure that they do have more tools to be able to do their job and ensure that we strike the right balance so that they, obviously, have that balance between being able to execute more powers to be able to crack down on crime and deal with the rise in crime that we have seen over the past six years and also the increase in the number of gang members who are also peddling a lot of crime.

During that week that I actually visited the Hawke’s Bay police station, I also visited the Hawke’s Bay Regional Prison—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): Right, and also it’s not a tourist—

Catherine Wedd: No, it’s not—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): Right, Ms Wedd, you have now not spoken about the bill for two minutes—

Catherine Wedd: That is right, but I am just going to come back to—

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): No, Ms Wedd. Sit down.

Catherine Wedd: OK. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Greg O’Connor): Ms Wedd, you’ve had three warnings now. If you want to continue, you speak about the bill and the bill only. It’s not a tour of the Hawke’s Bay or anywhere else.

CATHERINE WEDD: OK. Thank you, Mr Speaker. No, I appreciate that. So, if I am coming back to the bill, and obviously the key elements of the bill, which, of course, are about providing more police with the tools, as I’ve said, to ensure that they are able to have warrantless searches associated with the firearms prohibition orders—so it enables a constable who maybe had the reasonable grounds to suspect that a person was subject to an FPO, giving them the powers to execute those warrantless searches associated with FPOs.

Alongside that, that obviously enables them to get those illegal firearms out of the hands of gangs, which really is the objective of this, to create safer communities and make sure that we are reducing crime, which is what we’re all about on this side of the House—reducing crime, creating safer communities. Therefore, I would like to commend this bill to the House.

The House stands adjourned until 2 p.m. on Tuesday, 10 September 2024.

The House adjourned at 5.58 p.m.