Decades of excusing crime is directly responsible for the high crime rate

“That government policies have an enormous effect on crime is shown clearly in the government’s own statistics” says Kevin Hicks of Sensible Sentencing Trust Auckland. “We have a high crime rate as a direct result of decades of governments experimenting with leniency and not taking crime seriously. The increasing crime rate has gone hand in hand with the increasingly liberal approach of excusing crime. In fact New Zealand has a very low imprisonment rate when it’s high crime rate is taken into account. In the 1950’s there were three people in prison for every 100 recorded crimes, but by the mid 1980’s it had fallen to less than 1 person in prison per 200 recorded crimes. The government’s long term data series clearly shows there is a very strong correlation – as you get more criminals in prison you get much less crime (See graph attached). After the early 1990’s crime started to go down as imprisonment started to go up again. But there is a big lag as Police Minister Judith Collins has said. “As a direct result of successive government’s liberal policies on crime we now have an enormous problem and must work even harder to get it back under control”.

“This government has made a start with 3 strikes and the drivers of crime conference but this was again dominated by organisations who excuse crime or are making money as the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff. More recently, it is heartening that our very high crime rate has been finally been acknowledged by those who seek to excuse criminals (eg at the Restorative Justice Aotearoa and Maxim Institute conferences). But government and bureaucracy must also acknowledge that prison’s primary role is to protect the public and stop spreading the myth that it is because New Zealanders have a punitive nature. A short term increase in imprisonment is inevitable to protect our most vulnerable citizens because of 50 or more years of excusing crime. But currently, the Justice Department’s so called “effective interventions strategy” is entirely aimed at reducing the prison population instead of reducing crime. This is, again, evident from the government’s report from its Ombudsman.”

“The government’s Crime and Victimisation Survey shows that the most vulnerable people in our society are at the most risk of crime”. Consequently there is an urgent need to take this problem seriously.” In addition to much longer prison sentences for serious violent offenders Kevin favours more emphasis on prevention – “neighbourhood support programs, prevention of teen parenthood, early family intervention as used to exist in our communities, as well as far more effort to stamp out organised crime which is a massive problem in New Zealand”. He also favours a multiparty accord as recently suggested by Labour’s Justice spokesperson Lianne Dalziel, “but it must start from a base of zero tolerance for crime and intimidation, since the lessons of history are clear – when the government rewards crime, by ignoring or excusing it, we get more”.

ENDS

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