Next year the difference between a National-led government and a Labour-Green one will be stark if the Greens’ Police and Justice spokesperson has anything to do with their policy:
A Green MP is again under fire for comments made about the judicial system – this time for taking aim at beat cops during a university students’ panel discussion on “radical alternative to policing”.
Wellington Central MP Tamatha Paul told the event – hosted by the University of Canterbury’s Greens and Peace Action Ōtautahi – that she has heard “nothing but complaints” about police beat patrols across the country.
She also said it was “completely possible” to “set up institutions that can overtake lots of functions of the police”.
“Wellington people do not want to see police officers everywhere, and, for a lot of people, it makes them feel less safe. It’s that constant visual presence that tells you that you might not be safe there, if there’s heaps of cops,” she said. . .
As a law-abiding citizen I’d feel much safer with a police presence. I”m not alone:
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And the statistics back this up.
Those comments are being questioned by Police Minister Mark Mitchell, who labelled them “absolute nonsense”.
“The Community Beat Teams work, and we know that because where they’ve been deployed we have seen a larger decrease in violent crime than elsewhere,” Mitchell said.
The initiative, established last year, put a visible police presence in major cities in a bid to crack down on anti-social behaviour and curb retail crime.
Mitchell pointed to Wellington Central as an example of the success of beat policing.
“We’ve seen a 5.5% decrease in violent crime in the area that the Beat Team is deployed, compared to a 2% drop nationally,” the minister said.
He said the Greens “don’t believe in our police or prisons”. . .
The steep increase in crime, particularly violent offences, under the previous government’s policy of reducing the prison population without tackling the causes of, and reducing, offending showed what happens when victims and public safety aren’t prioritised.
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith puts the facts on crime and how the government is putting victims at the heart of the justice system:
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It’s not just on crime where the Greens are on a different planet, Question Time on Tuesday, showed they also have no idea about economics and business:
. . . Chlöe Swarbrick: Do the companies that the Prime Minister is asking to build our schools, roads, and hospitals want to make a profit?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Well, they may well do, and I would hope they would want to see a return. But what I’m excited about is that there is massive interest from investors who want to build public infrastructure in New Zealand, and the benefits to New Zealanders economically, socially, and environmentally are profound. If we can pull forward infrastructure development, get more roads built, more wind farms built, more energy delivered, that’s only good for New Zealand.
Chlöe Swarbrick: When our country has to pay for the profit of shareholders on top of the cost of building public infrastructure like our schools and hospitals, does that equation ultimately cost New Zealanders more or less?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: This is a strange line of questioning, and it just speaks to the degrowth agenda of the Green Party—the degrowth agenda of the Green Party. Not only do they want to abandon prisons but they now don’t want to grow the economy. To that member: we want investment in this country. It is capital thin. We need to get public infrastructure built. Iwi want to get on and actually get projects built, and private companies in our growth sectors need support too.
Chlöe Swarbrick: Will the profit that the private companies make through his Government’s intended public-private partnerships stay in Aotearoa New Zealand or go offshore?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Well, again, our focus is on attracting investment to New Zealand so we can get public infrastructure built. The member seems to be confused about how economics works. We want New Zealanders to get ahead. We need them with more money in their pockets. We want them to have higher standards of living. One of the ways we do that is we attract investment to New Zealand as well as use domestic pools of capital as well.
Hon Chris Bishop: Is it Government policy that profit is a good thing or a bad thing?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Profit is a good thing.
Chlöe Swarbrick: Does the Prime Minister accept that his plans for public-private partnerships will ultimately, then, cost New Zealanders more and send that profit offshore?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: No. We are looking at the right funding and financing tools and mechanisms to support the right infrastructure. We need to get a lot more infrastructure built in this country. The member may disagree with us, but we are going to grow New Zealand because it’s good for New Zealanders. And part of that is getting infrastructure built faster, quicker, and if we can do that in partnership with private capital, we will. [Interruption] . . .
Chlöe Swarbrick: Who can borrow money cheaper: the private companies that the Prime Minister wants to build our public infrastructure, or the Government?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Again, as I’ve said to that member, we’re going to find the right funding and financing mechanism that supports the right project. But I make no apologies for wanting to partner with private capital—international or domestic—to get things built for New Zealanders. You may disagree with us ideologically on that point, as a degrowth party, but we want growth in New Zealand, and that’s what we’re going to do. . .
. . . Chlöe Swarbrick: When the Prime Minister says, “Profit is a good thing.”, does he mean the $1 million in excess profits a day made by the supermarket duopoly, or the record billions in profits made by banks and the energy sector that a former National Government partially privatised, or something else?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I mean, I actually am stumped for words because the Green Party is a degrowth party and the thought, I think, in that question, of Chlöe Swarbrick ever being a finance Minister in a Labour-Greens future Government— . . .
Chlöe Swarbrick: How much private profit is he comfortable asking New Zealanders to fork out for his public-private partnerships because he refuses to unlock domestic capital by fixing our tax system, which currently incentivises unproductive speculative investment in housing, recommended by known degrowth institutions like the IMF?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Well, what I’m determined to do is to make sure that we actually build infrastructure in this country. This is a country—over many decades now—that has suffered from low economic productivity. It is a country that has suffered from capital thinness. Just look at our relative performance in the OECD at attracting foreign direct investment to New Zealand—and we have a major problem. So we make no apologies for accessing private capital—whether it’s overseas or domestic pools of capital—to get things built for New Zealanders. Because if we can build more roads, more hospitals, more schools, more wind farms, more renewable energy, that is a good thing for this country and that’s what we need to do.
Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can I ask the Prime Minister, has his Cabinet decided to review all over the world where Das Kapital still works, and do they as a Cabinet intend to take on those economic theories?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: It would be safe to say that we are not proponents of Das Kapital or Thomas Piketty.
Chlöe Swarbrick: How much private profit is he comfortable asking New Zealanders to fork out for his public-private partnerships because he refuses to fairly tax the wealthiest New Zealanders in this country, who currently pay an effective tax rate half that of our nurses, our teachers, and our firefighters?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I am determined to get things built in this country. If you ask the question, “What do we need to do to improve economic productivity and to lift the standard of living for all New Zealanders?”, there are five things. We have to have a world-class education system; we have to embrace more science, technology, and innovation; we have to have more modern, reliable infrastructure; get rid of the red tape; and embrace trade and investment. Those are the five things that are proven consistently to lift economic productivity and the standard of living for all Kiwis. That’s what we’re doing.
Chlöe Swarbrick: Why is the Government refusing to invest in publicly led, publicly funded, and publicly operated infrastructure, given that we all in this House know, given the reports, that private companies, when they get involved to make a profit—it costs more for New Zealanders in the long run?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Look, there are so many assumptions in that question, but I just would reassure the member that this is a Government spending a huge amount of money on capital investment. We are pummelling more money into health. We are putting more money into education. We are opening up and spending more monies on core infrastructure. But it’s an “and”—”and” we want to access capital so that we can actually get things built faster and quicker rather than just relying on our own balance sheet at this time in a country that is already capital thin. . .
Chlöe Swarbrick: Does he stand by his statement yesterday that “Profit is a good thing” in the context of public-private partnerships, and, if so, how much private profit is he comfortable with the people of this country forking out for, on top of the base cost of providing public services and infrastructure?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: In answer to the first part of the question, absolutely.
Chlöe Swarbrick: When the Prime Minister says, “Profit is a good thing.”, does he mean the $1 million in excess profits a day made by the supermarket duopoly, or the record billions in profits made by banks and the energy sector that a former National Government partially privatised, or something else?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I mean, I actually am stumped for words because the Green Party is a degrowth party and the thought, I think, in that question, of Chlöe Swarbrick ever being a finance Minister in a Labour-Greens future Government—
SPEAKER: No, no, that’s enough. Prime Minister—
Hon Member: Send him out!
SPEAKER: No, that’s not the case. Thank you for your advice. But what I will say is if you ask questions like that, you’ll get a political answer. And you may not think it’s a very political question, but it most certainly was. Now, please ask your next supplementary.
Chlöe Swarbrick: How much private profit is he comfortable asking New Zealanders to fork out for his public-private partnerships because he refuses to unlock domestic capital by fixing our tax system, which currently incentivises unproductive speculative investment in housing, recommended by known degrowth institutions like the IMF?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Well, what I’m determined to do is to make sure that we actually build infrastructure in this country. This is a country—over many decades now—that has suffered from low economic productivity. It is a country that has suffered from capital thinness. Just look at our relative performance in the OECD at attracting foreign direct investment to New Zealand—and we have a major problem. So we make no apologies for accessing private capital—whether it’s overseas or domestic pools of capital—to get things built for New Zealanders. Because if we can build more roads, more hospitals, more schools, more wind farms, more renewable energy, that is a good thing for this country and that’s what we need to do.
Rt Hon Winston Peters: Can I ask the Prime Minister, has his Cabinet decided to review all over the world where Das Kapital still works, and do they as a Cabinet intend to take on those economic theories?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: It would be safe to say that we are not proponents of Das Kapital or Thomas Piketty.
Chlöe Swarbrick: How much private profit is he comfortable asking New Zealanders to fork out for his public-private partnerships because he refuses to fairly tax the wealthiest New Zealanders in this country, who currently pay an effective tax rate half that of our nurses, our teachers, and our firefighters?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I am determined to get things built in this country. If you ask the question, “What do we need to do to improve economic productivity and to lift the standard of living for all New Zealanders?”, there are five things. We have to have a world-class education system; we have to embrace more science, technology, and innovation; we have to have more modern, reliable infrastructure; get rid of the red tape; and embrace trade and investment. Those are the five things that are proven consistently to lift economic productivity and the standard of living for all Kiwis. That’s what we’re doing.
Chlöe Swarbrick: Why is the Government refusing to invest in publicly led, publicly funded, and publicly operated infrastructure, given that we all in this House know, given the reports, that private companies, when they get involved to make a profit—it costs more for New Zealanders in the long run?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Look, there are so many assumptions in that question, but I just would reassure the member that this is a Government spending a huge amount of money on capital investment. We are pummelling more money into health. We are putting more money into education. We are opening up and spending more monies on core infrastructure. But it’s an “and”—”and” we want to access capital so that we can actually get things built faster and quicker rather than just relying on our own balance sheet at this time in a country that is already capital thin.
Hon Shane Jones: Prime Minister, is the Prime Minister aware that his Government inherited a green fund—the green fund hoped to find fellow investors who hoped to make a profit from clean green energy—and since the disappearance of James Shaw, what has changed about that group over there?
SPEAKER: No, no, the last part of that question is definitely not answerable, but you may answer the first part of the question.
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: It’s fair to say that we’ve got some serious concerns around the performance of the Green Investment Fund, and I’m sure we’ll have more to say about that shortly.
Hon Paul Goldsmith: To the Prime Minister, what’s his message to the tens of thousands of New Zealanders who own their own small businesses or are self-employed and get out every day to deliver good quality services to their customers and hope at the end of the day to make a profit in order to feed their family, today in this House?
Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Well, I want them to know that we appreciate them. They are people of ambition and aspiration. They take a risk, they use their own capital to go off and build a business, to employ thousands of people—that is a good thing. We want to reward that behaviour, we want to encourage it, we want to see a lot more of it—more entrepreneurship, more innovation, more investment. [Interruption] . .
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They don’t understand that we need growth, nor do they understand that growth is essential for sustainability – economic, environmental and social.
We can’t afford to let these people into government, especially when they’d be partnering the Labour and Māori Parties.
Ele Ludemann is a North Otago farmer and journalist, who blogs HERE - where this article was sourced.
8 comments:
There is a point to be made that the Ministry of Works and other publicly owned organisations were able to achieve more for less when compared with PPPs. However that was a different time when the public service wasn’t bloated with greedy bureaucrats. The failed spirituality of modernity would likely preclude such a result nowdays.
Imagine how bad it would be! It would make jacinda's govt look like baby facists compared to the level of evil that this lot would bring. Trouble is that many of the right voters have already left. Even labour ruling alone would be bad enough, without the gangs added on.
I didn't even need to read all of Chloe Swarbrik's questions to get the gist of what goes through her brain....any policy that doesn't support her preferred communist agenda is to be attacked as being bad for the country.
The idea that this idiot (or her equally idiot mate, Tamatha) could ever become decision makers for this country is a terrifying prospect indeed.
The Greens aren't just the degrowth party, they're the brainless communist party.
Maybe the greens and te pati maori could form a government together and NZ could become a racist communist dictatorship with no police, no electricity, and no food. And everything could be funded by the taxpayer....even though no one will have a job, so there will be no taxes paid, because all remaining profit making companies will have abandoned New Zimbabwe.
These two parties in charge, working together could achieve their dreams nearly overnight. (And let me guess NZ MSM probably has an article out today about Swarbrick or Paul lauding their righteous stances against police/ profit/ infrastructure.)
Chloe, are you and every Green MP, and every Green supporter prepared to be taxed highly for every cent they "earn" over the average wage ?
Re-read Animal Farm and draw the comparisons to your ambitions.
These militant cultural Marxists - unelected by voters but in powerful decision-making roles - epitomize the tragic state of NZ today with its brain-dead citizens who allow this "government by insanity" to continue unchallenged .
Those on the generally Green TPM Labour and Nat waverers are already well entrenched as local body officials, mayors and managers and among the ordinary staff.
I know many personally from my own background in media. Let alone several councillors who used to waver but have thrown their lot in with the Lab Green TPM and radicals for their own peace and quiet and maybe out of fear.
New Plymouth is a prime example. The mayor's views in the past few years are a marked contrast to many years ago and the kind of views he expressed when running the local midweek paper around 2000.
On the wider front, if you want to take over a country and enforce your views you do it by stealth, by infiltration, getting into positions and then appointing those of like mind under you. No point in head-on street clashes or even trying to win an election as the biggest party. Instead, operate like termites or white ants. MSM narratives control was a brilliant coup by stealth.
Also some of those with a wise eye to the future, like said mayor, who have many years of work ahead, have an eye on a change of govt in 2026 and it is prudent to position oneself for possible elevation into a new govt role. You want to survive not be cancelled. Never back youself into a corner too far, be a political chameleon or a political tranny....a transpolitical who can go either way.
Arnt the left just absolute nutters? If only the left voters suffered the consequences of the lunatic policies they voted for, they would switch to the centre very quickly. I just wish only left voters suffered crime and no cops went to their help....that's what they want.....
I notice that at least three times in the quoted exchange Luxon states he's going to waste our money on wind farms. He may as well just give it to the bloody green nutters and be done with it.
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