Fashion laws to combat violence
Should gang patches be allowed to be worn in public? Wanagnui Mayor Michael Laws doesn’t think so and he’s co-opted the help of National MP and former policeman Chester Borrows.
Green MP and legal eagle Metiria Turei has an opinion on this move.
Michael Laws’ latest prank to get the National MP Chester Borrows to promote a local bill to make the wearing of gang patches and insignia illegal is another foolish example of easy politicking for no real gain.
This morning on Newstalk, Borrows said that a ban on patches and insignia will mean that people walking the street won’t be scared. But looking scary is entirely subjective and shouldn’t be a crime. (There may well be some people for whom the sight of Borrows or Laws coming their way might prompt them to cross the road). Scary behaviour, however is intimidation, which is a crime and the cops can deal with that.
A law against someone’s view of scariness won’t stop the violent behaviour that actually causes damage to people and property.
The proposed ban will simply turn our cops into real Fashion Police, but wont stop the majority of ‘gang’ violence that happens in our towns.
Patch wearers may be more visible but what about skinhead gangs whose ‘insignia’ is a shaved head and steel capped boots? What about the small gangs who roam around all our towns rolling people for their wallet and phone? And what about the nightly gaggle of drunks, who, when together, develop a gang mentality and beat each other and smash shop windows?
How exactly will a ban on patches and insignia deal with this behaviour? It won’t.
How ironic that the man (Borrows) who wants the law to state how we can beat our children now wants a law to stop grown ups from being scared! Where are the man’s priorities?!
Just another pathetic idea from a local body politician desperate for re-election.
March 6th, 2007 at 2:25 pm
Given the recent police rape trials and the comments of Clint Rickards, I think people have a right to argue that police uniforms are scary and intimidating. So, will the police be banned from Wanganui unless wearing (non-scary) plainclothes?
March 6th, 2007 at 2:44 pm
But looking scary is entirely subjective and shouldn’t be a crime.
I would have thought it is learned (and earned, in this case).
jh
March 6th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
How ironic that the man (Borrows) who wants the law to state how we can beat our children[inflammatory language] now wants a law to stop grown ups from being scared!
When will we learn to discuss things with intellectual honesty?
March 6th, 2007 at 2:49 pm
When will we learn to discuss things with intellectual honesty/objectivity/rhetoric?
jh
March 6th, 2007 at 2:53 pm
I don’t support this bill as it does not go far enough.
These gangs should be outlawed immediately, while the hand wringers and do gooders try and make excuses for these scum bags they are selling P to our kids and terrorising our citizens.
It is about time the Police and the government dealt with the gang problem in NZ.
March 6th, 2007 at 3:43 pm
“How ironic that the man (Borrows) who wants the law to state how we can beat our children now wants a law to stop grown ups from being scared! Where are the man’s priorities?”
You may be aware that local MPs have all but a obligation to promote local legislation - “promote” in an exceptionally narrow sense of the word. Promote in terms of be the person who tables the bill for introduction.
I’m not saying it’s necessarily the case in this instance, but when the council of provincial city wants certain legislation looked at it seems reasonable for Parliament to consider the matter (and perhaps for the public at large as well), Borrows may merely be the conduit through which the Wanganui Council expresses itself (as George Hawkins was with the recent Manakau local bills which Labour won’t/didn’t support beyond select committee) - you’re not suggesting a change to standing orders to enable councils to place their own bills on the order paper, are you?
March 6th, 2007 at 6:04 pm
What’s wrong with mambers of criminal gangs wearing patches?
The world would be a safer place if all Al Qaeda members wore patches so you could tell who they were and avoid getting on public transport with them. Enforcing the wearing of identifying clothing would be a potential civil liberties minefield, but if the gangs choose to do so voluntarily we should make the most of it.
March 6th, 2007 at 6:44 pm
kahikatea
Thinking about this a little more I tend now to agree with you, as long as we outlaw the gangs but do not ban patches it will make them a lot easier to find.
Hopefully most will resist arrest when approached by the police, the police could then use the patch as a target.
March 7th, 2007 at 9:40 am
Agreed, kahikatea. Banning gangs or banning gang patches won’t work - any more than banning the IRA worked or banning Al Qaeda works. It just drives people underground and makes them more dangerous.
Personally, if a guy is a gang member, I’d rather see him patched up so I know he’s a gang member and can decide to have as little to do with him as possible.
March 7th, 2007 at 9:45 am
Toad
So how do we fix the gang problem Toad?
March 7th, 2007 at 10:48 am
So how do we fix the gang problem Toad?
I’d start by decriminalising (not legalising) drugs. Drugs are the financial lifeblood of the gangs. If people who wanted to smoke cannabis could grow their own, and those who are addicted to more dangerous drugs could register as addicts and be supplied with sufficient for their personal use, much of the financial advantages of being associated with gangs would largely disappear. Without the fear of being banged up for drug possession, addicts would likely be much more amenable to seeking rehabilitative treatment.
I’d reinstate Detached Youth Workers to work directly with the young people in or associated with gangs, and reinstate the work schemes (for wages - not work-for-dole) that were targeted to gangs in the early 1980s. There’s not much that I’ll give Rob Muldoon any credit for, but I think this is one area where he got it right. If likely offenders have employment, earn a wage, and have support workers they can trust, they are much less likely to offend.
I would also ensure that any gang member who is imprisoned or on the dole is required to undertake education or training to improve their employment prospects. Gangs are the refuge of those with little education - if gang members can learn the skills to be employed and independent they are more likely to move on.
BTW - just because I’m a Green, don’t take my position on drugs to be the Green Party one - I would actually go much further down the decriminalisation path than Green policy does.
March 7th, 2007 at 10:57 am
Muldoon did a pretty good job of reducing gang crime by setting up work schemes and other subsidies. Bribery is usually the way capitalism keeps people sweet - tax cuts, wage rises, government contracts, plum jobs, social welfare, subsidised mortages etc. have all done a good job in buying the support of their particular target markets.
Gangs are basically businesses - treat them as such and the violence will largely disappear.
March 7th, 2007 at 11:02 am
Toad
I asked you a serious question, I expected a serious answer.
Do you really expect me to take anything you say seriously when you begin with “Id Start by decriminalising drugs”
And you people claim to be the ones who are concerned about our children’s welfare.
March 7th, 2007 at 11:04 am
so why not legalize them?
anyway, if people could have all the pot & coke they could handle, nobody would care for meth & other more destructive drugs
March 7th, 2007 at 11:07 am
Sam
The police need to be given sweeping powers to smash the gangs, they are effectively home grown terrorists and should be treated as such.
All you do by giving them hand outs is encourage their way of life, our government needs to declare war on these low life.
March 7th, 2007 at 11:58 am
BB said: The police need to be given sweeping powers to smash the gangs, they are effectively home grown terrorists and should be treated as such.
Just like Bush gave himself sweeping powers to smash terrorism, and see where it has got him. His sweeping powers have made the world a far more dangerous place, have fostered, rather than countered, terrorism, and have turned the United States itself into a terrorist state.
The “sweeping powers” you propose for the police will likely similarly turn them into the biggest gang of them all - hundreds of Brad Shiptons and Bob Schollums abusing their power and accountable to no-one.
Both terrorism and gangs need to be addressed by addressing the grievances that cause them - suppressing them by brute force only makes their behaviour more extreme.
And, for the record, my suggestion about decriminalising drugs was a serious answer to your question. Perhaps I shouldn’t have put it at the top of the list, but if it is legal to possess drugs for personal use, but not sell them, there’s no profit motive in dealing in them anymore. Gang members can then be encouraged into more wholesome ways of earning a living.
March 7th, 2007 at 12:48 pm
Toad
Your naivety is breathtaking.
The Gang situation in NZ is nothing like the Iraq war, to suggest otherwise is just silly.
The Police in NZ have never had the resources to attack the gangs, what we need is a law very similar to RICCO that was used in New York to smash the Mafia.
I do find your comments about Shipton and co to be disturbing, It sounds like you have a hatred of the NZ police and will use these two men as an excuse to attack them at any time.
Finally your last paragraph is laughable, you will never convince the people of NZ that drug use should be legalised.
March 7th, 2007 at 12:49 pm
Toad
One more thing….Do you seriously think you can “encourage” gang members into a more wholesome way of living?
I would pay to watch that
March 7th, 2007 at 2:05 pm
BB: The Gang situation in NZ is nothing like the Iraq war, to suggest otherwise is just silly.
I didn’t say it was.
BB: The Police in NZ have never had the resources to attack the gangs, what we need is a law very similar to RICCO that was used in New York to smash the Mafia.
Aside from the aggressive language (attack the gangs … smash the Mafia), I actually agree that the Police have been under-resourced to deal with gang criminal activity. But what they need is more numbers, funding and physical resources, not draconian laws that breach the fundamental human rights of freedom of expression and association. I’m all for tougher policing of gang crime - just think how many police officers could be freed up to do this if they weren’t wasting their time running prosecutions for possession of a couple of bullets of cannabis.
BB: I do find your comments about Shipton and co to be disturbing, It sounds like you have a hatred of the NZ police and will use these two men as an excuse to attack them at any time.
Not at all. I suspect the vast majority of police officers find Shipton’s & Schollum’s behavior as despicable as I do. I’m coming from the position that all power corrupts and that absolute power corrupts absolutely. Giving “sweeping powers” to the Police that infringe on freedom of expression and freedom of association only makes it easier police corruption to become endemic.
BB: Do you seriously think you can “encourage� gang members into a more wholesome way of living?
As Sam said above, Muldoon did a reasonable job at this in the early 1980s. When the work schemes were canned by the Labour government later in the 1980s, gang members went increasingly back to crime.
March 7th, 2007 at 3:11 pm
Cor blimey Big Bruv! How on earth do you find the time to earn all that money to fuel up the hummer when you spend so much of your working day skiving off here provoking the nice greenie peoples?
Seriously tho, Toad has some very valid points to make. The thing that scares the bejesus out of me over the last few decades is to see our homegrown NZ gangs start to organise themselves in a business sense in ways that are starting to rival the Triad gangs who now exist in our country.
If you want to cut the balls off the beast then the most effective way to do that is to target their source of income - some of which is from theft crimes, but the bulk of which is from the drug trade. And believe me BB, as an ex-drug-addict myself I could tell you a few stories about that!
People are going to use drugs (or make moonshine during a prohibition) whether it is legal for them to do so or not and in my rather vast personal experience of this issue the fact it is illegal or socially unacceptable makes such things even more appealing to the typically rebellious youth.
Even tho I have been drug-free for a decade myself, am anti-drug-use and believe that drug dealers are the scum of the earth, it still my firm opinion that cannabis should be legalised to grow for personal use even if only because it will strip the bulk of income from all gangs in this country.
It is one of my worst fears that this country should start to become a cesspool of organised crime and I think the USA system of dealing with such things has well and truly proved itself to be an unsuccessful approach.
As my old pal Albert said, “The problems that exist in the world today cannot be solved by the level of thinking that created them.”
This is not be being “weak on crime” or anti-american - this is me just stating a well-researched fact Bro.
March 7th, 2007 at 4:53 pm
Gang members themselves have talked about their patch as an area or place and the territorial aspect to gangs and their confrontations with each other. Such could develop in South Auckland on American precedent.
Also this is not exactly just about 1970’s 1980’s management or urban drift by Maori and the PEP for pre urban trust era gangs. It’s now about long term organised crime across generations.
Where a gang has sufficient criminal involvement that it’s patch as a symbol of organised crime, it should be banned. If they dont like that they can clean up their act and or ditch the criminal subculture within from their gang.
March 7th, 2007 at 6:25 pm
Big Bruv said: “Do you really expect me to take anything you say seriously when you begin with “Id Start by decriminalising drugsâ€?
I think legalising (not just decriminalising) marijuana would help.
If marijuana were sold by legal businesses that were audited (not just financially, but also audited to make sure they weren’t spiking the product, and to make sure they weren’t selling to children), the criminal gangs would probably lose most of the marijuana market to the legal businesses (because the gangs are well adapted to doing businesses in illegal markets, and poorly adapted to legal ones). This would cut off the single largest source of income to criminal gangs, and remove the opportunity to encourage marijuana buyers to buy harder drugs.
It’s not the full answer to the gang problem, but it would help.
March 7th, 2007 at 7:21 pm
Toad
You find that language agressive?..dear me, do the greens have plans to control the way we speak as well?
I laughed when I read the bit about freeing up the police, if you think the the public in NZ will ever accept the legalisation of drugs then you must be smoking some serious weed yourself.
As I said in another thread I cannot work out how a party that claims to be protecting children wants to legalise harmful drugs, this only heightens my suspicions about the real intentions of Comrade Bradford’s bill.
Why are you so concerned about the rights of criminals?, these low life scum do not respect your rights or the rights of your kids when they sell them drugs, as far as I am concerned gang members forfeit any rights they may have had when they join a gang.
We can smash the gangs and the gang culture, it has been done overseas and it could be done here, all we need are politicians who are brave enough to start the ball rolling, by making excuses for them you are only getting in the way of those of us who want to fix the problem.
March 7th, 2007 at 7:25 pm
Zan
“Cor blimey Big Bruv! How on earth do you find the time to earn all that money to fuel up the hummer when you spend so much of your working day skiving off here provoking the nice greenie peoples?”
It’s called time management, of course I did not learn that at University but i did read all about it in a book.
You would be surprised what I can achieve in a day….actaully you would more than likely be shocked at the amount of carbon I burn but then I don’t care about that.
March 7th, 2007 at 7:54 pm
hey hey BB, the public in NZ will accept the legalisation of cannabis … once all the old fuddy duddys have died off and the younger generation (which support legalisation 3 to 1) come through.
last opinion poll I saw had a majority of NZ public in favour of decriminalisation and a healthy third of the populatiion in favour of legalisation. Sorry mate, but people with your views are not the majority, you need to accept the fact that your views are not mainstream!
ask anyone with any knowledge of the justice system, there is a huge backlog in the courts purely because of drug cases. At some point the unthinkable will have to be accepted.
If stoners ever got their act together and reported themselves on mass, the justice system would fall over.
March 7th, 2007 at 8:19 pm
hey listen everyone..!
let’s bury this myth once and for all..
big bruv is not a hummer-driving/carbon-emmitting business-behemoth..
he is a skinny/pimply 19 year old first year commerce student wannabe..(at unitech..)
and he drives an old/early diahatsu charade..
and he wears white trainers..or boat shoes..
and is flirting with the idea of becoming an ‘emo’..
but dosen’t want to have to ‘lose’ his beloved boat shoes..
and about the only emmitting he does..
is flatulence from having eaten just too many tins of baked beans..
(and he is thinking about moving back home..cos’ he’s finding managing in his first flat a’little difficult’…
and mum would make him cut sandwiches to take to unitech..eh..?
in his diahatsu..(it’s colour that pale-green ‘aunty’ shade..)
(and he’s really really hoping to lose his virginity..before he turns twenty..)
so..just fix those images in your mind..
and next time he comes around here..spouting his drivel…
just laugh him out of the room..eh..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
March 7th, 2007 at 9:06 pm
Stuey
What poll was that?..one run by the Greens?
You are seriously deluded if you think that NZ will ever legalise drugs.
Here is an idea Stuey, make it the corner stone of the next election for the Greens, last time out you gave nothing but bland and false answers as to what your policy would be on drug use…make it one of your major electioneering platforms in 2008 and watch your support disappear.
March 7th, 2007 at 9:25 pm
I appear to have overstated my case somewhat. Sorry. It all depends on how the researchers frame the question of course, but polls clearly DO show a majority favour law reform, it is just that they balk at the words “decriminalisation” and “legalisation”.
A pre-election poll in the Sunday Star-Times on September 4th, 2005 showed 37% support for “decriminalisation” of cannabis, and 55% opposition. Among the new generation of Kiwis - voters aged under 30 - support was at 45%.
A UMR Insight poll of 750 people aged over 18 published in The Dominion in August 2000 found sixty per cent of New Zealanders favour law reform. 41 per cent want to stop criminalising cannabis users, and an additional 19 per cent want cannabis legalised.
A One News/Colmar Brunton poll in April 2000 also found support for decriminalising cannabis had grown since their last poll. Of those surveyed 55% approved law changes, while 40% were opposed.
A TV3/CM Research poll in 1996 found that 88% favoured introducing instant fines for small-scale cannabis use, 65% favoured “decriminalisation” and 35% supported “legalisation”.
March 7th, 2007 at 9:35 pm
Stuey
Fair enough….make it a BIG part of the next election campaign then…hell, it would be nice to see at least one policy in detail.
March 7th, 2007 at 9:35 pm
BB says “watch your support dissappear” if the Greens support cannabis law reform.
well actually BB, since only 5% of people voted green, and lets say a third of NZers support legalisation, that would mean that rather than seeing our vote share drop, it should actually rise if people’s voting was decided on the single issue of cannabis law reform.
March 7th, 2007 at 9:36 pm
oh-ho, so BB, which political party has policies that are more detailed than ours?
http://www.greens.org.nz/docs/policy/
March 7th, 2007 at 9:56 pm
Big Bruv,
Please keep your language civil. It is not nice to read such personal attacks such as you said to Toad “Your naivety is breathtaking…. And to Stuey: You are seriously deluded….
Everyone has the right to express an opinion without such “flaming� just because you do not agree with them!
March 7th, 2007 at 10:03 pm
hear hear OB. But I don’t expect BB to listen. Using such language is the only way he can get attention, he certainly can’t get it with the quality of his argument.
March 7th, 2007 at 10:16 pm
Stuey,
BB can provide some very constructive input when he decides to put his mature cap on. But such unwarranted personal attacks and labels he puts on people whom he disagrees with are totally inappropriate and unacceptable.
March 8th, 2007 at 8:50 am
“Please keep your language civil. It is not nice to read such personal attack”
vs
“How ironic that the man (Borrows) who wants the law to state how we can beat our children”
Hypocrisy, no?
March 9th, 2007 at 6:44 pm
We need to protect kids from the hypocrisy and bull-shit and SOCIAL INJUSTICE of prohibition/criminalisation particularly of cannabis.
there are too many alienated people in NZ - and this vile law has a lot to answer for in that regard, and gives the gangs a moral reason to be staunchly anti-authority, and accounts for alot of the disrespect amongst kiwi youth (eg look at the gross double standards alongside tobacco and alcohol)
re: the argument about the public of NZ never going for legalisation(decrim) - there is support as stuey points out, but even if a majority says ‘no’ that does not make criminalsation a good, effective, fair or legitimate law.
Labour copped out on its pot law review earlier this decade because it was too weak and cowardly to advocate the arguments it heard at the select committee - Clark had to call an early election in 2002 to avoid completing due process on their review/inquiry into the legal status.
I recall the Maori Council ten years or so ago making a submission on policy to ‘tackle gangs’ (harassment and criminal associations bill). Their starting point was, you guessed it, ‘decriminalisation’ of cannabis.
regards
March 9th, 2007 at 11:04 pm
Drug law reform is a ‘conservative policy framework’ that were ACT, NATS and others less blinkered than even the GREENS on this matter we would see for thirty two years since the MUD Act, New Zealand drug policy has produced the very results that it set out to avoid.
Prohibition was the radical option. Anyone who has any doubt at all of the coorelelation between gang patches and all that the L.A. bling bling to street/rap culture we have imported stands for, and NZ drug policy, needs to broaden their reading.
CConsider this from today’s [UK] Telegraph:
Britain’s drug policy is “not fit for purpose” and is failing to cut
addiction or drug-related crime, an influential study will conclude today.
Current policy is driven by “moral panic” and is ineffective, with huge
amounts of money being wasted on “futile” attempts to get drugs off the
streets.
The system, it says, is “crude, ineffective, riddled with anomalies and
open to political manipulation”, while existing drugs education is often
“inconsistent, irrelevant, disorganised” and “delivered by people without
adequate training”.
Problems are so acute that the Home Office should lose its lead in dealing
with drug treatment and enforcement, according to the panel of academics,
drug workers and a senior police officer.
The RSA Commission report, which will seek to influence Government policy next year, will prove controversial in some of its findings.
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It recommends the introduction of “shooting galleries,” where heroin
addicts can go to take drugs and receive supervision and help.
It also says that only the worst drug offenders be jailed and that drug
misuse should be treated as a social problem rather than a crime.
Among its other recommendations are that the focus of drug education
should switch from secondary schools to primary schools in order to better
stop children falling into substance misuse.
The focus of enforcement and treatment should also shift, away from
illegal drugs - many of which are often “harmless” - and towards alcohol
and tobacco - which are the most damaging drugs of all.
Professor Anthony King of Essex University was commission chairman for the RSA, the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce.
Recognising that the report would prove controversial, Prof King insisted
that a radical shake up of Britain’s drugs laws is essential. “Current
policy is broke and needs to be fixed,” he said.
“The idea of a drugs-free world, or even of a drugs-free Britain, is
almost certainly a chimera.”
He continued: “The use of illegal drugs is by no means always harmful any
more than alcohol use is always harmful.
“The evidence suggests that a majority of people who use drugs are able to
use them without harming themselves or others.
“They are able, in that sense, to ‘manage’ their drug use… The harmless
use of illegal drugs is thus possible, indeed common.”
Calling for the concept of drugs to be extended to take in alcohol and
tobacco, the report says: “Unlike most other such substances, however,
illegal drugs have been demonised - by politicians, by the media and to
some extent by the general public.”
The report says that “in an ideal world” drug production, importation and
use would be stopped altogether.
“None of these things, however, is possible and at the moment large
amounts of money are wasted in attempting to achieve the impossible,” the
report says. “The law as it stands is not fit for purpose.”
Describing the Misuse of Drugs Act as unwieldy and inflexible, the report
recommends it be scrapped in favour of a wider-ranging Misuse of
Substances Act abandoning the current ABC classification system and
introducing an “index of harms”.
….. ends…..
Where the rules are the same, the shite is the same.