David 'Farrar: Law Commission sees sense

The Law Commission has now done a final report into hate crime law, and their recommendations are not to try and criminalise more New Zealanders. Their recommendations include:

• better processes for recording if an offence includes a hostility of hate motivation (this is already a factor in sentencing)

• Sex is included as a a group characteristic along the existing ones of race, colour, nationality, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, or disability. Was bizarre that gender but not sex was listed, so a good fix.

• New Zealand Police should publish data on reported hate crimes annually.

• Ministry of Justice should publish court data on hate crime cases annually.

So rather than include a new category of crime, which could be quite subjective, they have just focused on improving the current law which already allows hatred of a group to be an aggravating factor at sentencing. A good outcome.

David Farrar runs Curia Market Research, a specialist opinion polling and research agency, and the popular Kiwiblog where this article was sourced. He previously worked in the Parliament for eight years, serving two National Party Prime Ministers and three Opposition Leaders