Is NZ still tough on crime?
As the Government gears up for a major justice system overhaul, it seems the winds of public support may have changed. Justice Minister Andrew Little and Corrections Minister Kelvin Davis have promised to reduce the prison population by 30 per cent in 15 years, as the number of people in New Zealand jails blows out to more than 10,500.
But getting public support for widereaching reforms – what’s needed to significantly reduce the number of prisoners – will be no mean feat.
Historically, being ‘‘tough on crime’’ has been a vote-winner, and the National Party is attempting to use this issue to gain popularity, and drive a wedge between Labour and its coalition partner, NZ First.
This seemed to be working when NZ First refused to support Little’s planned repeal of the hardline three strikes law.
And Little’s chances of achieving his grand plan were looking bleak.
But recent changes of attitude by some in the criminal justice space suggest the Labour-led Government’s grand plan for the biggest criminal justice overhaul in 30 years just might be achievable.
A former Labour Party president, now head of penal reform group the Howard League, says the ‘‘lock ‘em up and throw away the key brigade’’ isn’t as big or as powerful as it once was. And key figures, including the founder of the hardline crime lobby group Sensible Sentencing Trust, have stepped down.
Meanwhile, NZ First’s justice spokesman, Darroch Ball, says his party – also historically known for its hardline law and order approach – is committed to making changes that will help fix the prison population problem and reduce reoffending.
Being tough on crime means holding people to account and keeping the community safe, but that doesn’t mean being dumb on sentencing, Ball said.
NZ First and Labour were different parties, with different views, and that meant there would be a lot of discussion and collaboration on any changes.
But both parties agreed there needed to be ‘‘real change’’ in the justice system.
Ball called National’s attempt to win votes by talking about being ‘‘tough on crime’’ as ‘‘tired, old rhetoric’’ and ‘‘basic in the extreme’’.
Kiwis’ attitudes were changing when it came to law and order.
‘‘The wider public now realise there needs to be a change in New Zealand’s criminal justice system,’’ he said.
That realisation, or change in attitude, had only come about in the past year, largely in response to overflowing prisons. ‘‘If that’s not a sign of a failed system, then I don’t know what is.’’
It’s hard to gauge the level of public support for criminal justice reforms.
The last widespread survey was a citizens-initiated referendum in 1999, where New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted in support of ‘‘imposing minimum sentences and hard labour for all serious violent offences’’.
Although it was non-binding, with 92 per cent support its message was heard loud and clear by politicians who spent the next 14 years enacting harsher sentencing, parole and bail laws – and building more and more prisons.
Each year the Ministry of Justice conducts a public perception survey on crime and safety. The results show people are less worried about crime than they used to be. However, they also had distorted perceptions of the level of lawlessness, compared to actual statistics.
In 2013, the survey found more than half the population thought crime was on the rise, despite crime rates being at a 33-year low. Those who had the least to fear – older women in rural areas – were the most concerned.
The public perception survey from 2016 found 35 per cent of people over 65 feel unsafe in their neighbourhood after dark. That’s compared with 28 per cent of the total population, and 22 per cent of those aged 15-19.
Labour’s Little said he did not know where the public opinion sat when it came to ‘‘tough on crime’’.
Regardless, politicians were obliged to act once they became aware of issues like problems with the prison system and population, and reoffending rates.
‘‘Obviously, we want to engage with the public on everything we do, but public opinion surveys aren’t an answer to the problems that we’ve got,’’ he said.
‘‘A lot of people I speak to are very disturbed. We seem to be locking up a lot more people, locking them away for longer, and yet our reoffending rate is unchanged, compared with 15 or 20 years ago. And people want to see a lot better.’’ Earlier this month, Little announced a new advisory group, tasked with finding solutions to the ‘‘broken’’ criminal justice system.
The Government has faced criticism for outsourcing policy development to reviews and working groups. But at the time the group was announced, Little said it was crucial to have a public debate about the underlying issues leading to crime.
Former National MP and courts minister Chester Borrows is heading the group. He’s also an ex-police officer and lawyer. Ex-Sensible Sentencing Trust representative Ruth Money, gang expert Jarrod Gilbert and JustSpeak’s Julia Whaipooti will join the panel.
Former chief science adviser Sir Peter Gluckman released a report in March which said public perceptions about crime could be ‘‘disproportionately magnified by advocacy groups, media and political agendas’’. ‘‘Policy responses are often viewed in binary terms: tough or soft on crime.
‘‘This simplistic duality has long had political resonance, but its impact on our prison system is a major concern,’’ Gluckman’s report stated.
‘‘Successive governments of different political orientations have supported a progressively retributive rather than a restorative approach to crime with unsupported claims that prisons can solve the problems of crime. As a result, the costs of prisons far exceed those justified by the need to protect the public.
‘‘We keep imprisoning more people in response to dogma not data, responding to shifting policies and media panics, instead of evidence-based approaches to prevention, intervention, imprisonment and rehabilitation.’’
Gluckman did say this did not diminish the importance of incarceration for a subset of individuals in order to protect the public.
One of New Zealand’s most vocal law and order lobby groups is the Sensible Sentencing Trust, but the trust has increasingly lost traction over recent months, with members of the trust being called ‘‘loopy’’ and ‘‘callous’’ by Little.
A former senior member of the Sensible Sentencing Trust, Scott Guthrie, has set up his own organisation, saying the trust had not achieved the results it had promised.
Guthrie, now co-founder of new justice lobby group Transforming Justice Foundation, said he believed those in prison needed to be there, but there were better ways to rehabilitate and support those people, to help lower reoffending.
Guthrie said it was time for a new approach, and he backed Little’s plans for justice system reform.
‘‘I’m sick of our country paying billions of dollars a year to keep prisoners locked up.
‘‘Labour is looking at it from a different perspective.’’
He referred to Little’s plan to reduce the prison population as ‘‘common sense political thinking’’.
The reasons for Guthrie’s departure from the trust are disputed and murky, with the trust claiming it had sacked him due to his personal financial situation, but Guthrie saying he parted amicably after losing faith in the organisation’s mission and results.
Meanwhile, Sensible Sentencing Trust founder Garth McVicar, and his wife Anne, have since stepped down from the trust.
McVicar said the organisation had gone as far as it could with him at the helm. After 18 years, he was stepping down, saying the organisation needed fresh perspectives, and he needed more time to spend with his family and enjoying hobbies, like flying.