The tragic event that took place in the Auckland CBD on Thursday morning was a stark reminder that new approaches are needed to stem the rise in serious crime in this country. Not just crime committed by adults, but also by school-age children. Obviously any new ideas cannot be a one size fits all approach: adults and children require different penalties and outcomes.
Before getting into what those penalties and outcomes might be, it’s worth taking a look at how we got to where we are now. Kerre Woodham made a good point on her ZB programme on Friday morning. She said she felt really sorry for the judges. My first reaction, and I suspect that of many listening, was to disagree. We so often blame the judges for giving perpetrators of crime light sentences.
However, Kerre’s point was that the judges were, in all probability, following guidance from the government, which campaigned on reducing the prison population. There appears to be a focus on mitigating factors when sentencing a person so that a probable term of imprisonment can be reduced to home detention. For the person involved in Thursday’s incident, this might have been the case.
According to a Stuff article, Matu Reid assaulted his partner by slapping, punching, kicking her in the stomach, knocking her to the ground and squeezing her throat, fracturing her neck. He also used scissors and a wine bottle in the attack. Reid ran away from home at an early age. He felt he wasn’t respected and was demoralised on a daily basis. A cultural report said he had ‘systematic deprivation’ and had grown away from his culture – if he was anywhere near it in the first place.
Let’s unpack that. Firstly, most people would agree Reid should have got a prison sentence. If he had, in all likelihood, Thursday’s tragedy would not have happened. Are the reasons given for his bad behaviour actually mitigating factors? In reality, no. In terms of trying to reduce the prison population, yes. His partner stuck by him as she didn’t want to see him in jail – effectively a second chance. She was told “You’ve no idea what I can do.” Very prophetic words, as it turned out.
He was given not only home detention but also an exemption to work. To be fair to the judge, he probably saw no reason not to grant that. The next question is, being unlicensed, how did he get to have a firearm in his possession? This makes a joke of all the government’s palaver of a firearms register.
All of the above brings me back to Kerre Woodham’s comment. Are judges simply following government guidelines? That is probably part of it but I’m also somewhat suspicious of the legal profession itself. Marie Dyhrberg KC, who spoke with Kerre, said nothing to allay my suspicions: in fact, she practically confirmed them. We also have the academics, psychologists, psychiatrists and psychoanalysts all in their ivory towers singing from the same song sheet, and you realise how we have got to where we are.
Then we come to youth crime: crime certainly, but a whole different ball game in terms of what is needed for good outcomes. Here we meet the Children’s Commissioner and a whole bunch of other ‘social dogooders’ including those mentioned above, who again state all the mitigating factors for a child’s behaviour: poverty, poor home environment, the need to understand their culture, etc. The problem is that their ideas for fixing the problems won’t work, because they are not solving why the children are in the predicament they find themselves.
Family conferences – what is the point when the family is most likely dysfunctional in the first place? Parents who don’t care if their child is out ram raiding at all hours of the night instead of at school. What these children need is to be taught self worth, given discipline and an education and put on the path to employment. These children obviously won’t get that at home or at Oranga Tamariki. Here is another example of giving a government department a Maori name being nothing more than a death wish as to its performance and excellence.
We need the equivalent of boarding schools to be built out of towns and cities, away from temptations, where the emphasis is on nurturing these children in a strict but humane environment. I would have Alwyn Poole, the brilliant initiator of charter schools, design and lead a curriculum suitable to the students, enabling them to achieve academically to the point where they are employable and can make a worthwhile contribution to society.
This government has made countless terrible decisions, but cancelling charter schools at the behest of their union masters was one of the worst. Maori students were achieving far more at these schools than in the state system. Vanguard Military, although currently absorbed into the state system, has a large Maori roll and is obviously still doing well and using a somewhat different curriculum. Cancelling charter schools simply illustrated that neither the government nor the teachers union give a damn about Maori education. Willie Jackson and Kelvin Davis did, but both folded like tents in a gale under union threats. Thankfully National and ACT will reinstate them.
On balance, the government is to blame for a situation where both the judiciary and police are operating with one hand tied behind their backs. Police apprehend children committing crimes only to see them out again the next night. In my view both departments have been politicised by this government’s desire to be soft on crime. Employing 1800 more police does not make us feel safer, any more than giving judges the licence to let serious offenders back out on the streets.
The government’s recent announcements in this area have only come about because an election is around the corner. They don’t believe in them and, even if they did, the Greens and the Maori Party would ensure they weren’t implemented. A change of tack is needed. That will only come with a change of government.