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MP Tamotha Paul came under fire this week. You'd be hard pushed pushed to have missed that story after comments about beat patrol police. She said a lot of people feel less safe with the increase of police on the beat and claimed that these officers had even been throwing away the belongings of homeless people. She made some other strange ones about people being locked in prison for twelve dollars thefts and things like that, and she was in a discussion about what steps could be taken to achieve
radical police abolition and alternatives to the police as an organization. Wow, anyway, Lance Burdette, he's a former police negotiator and he's with me now. Lance, Good afternoon.
Hi Sam here, you're going good.
What was your reaction to all of this?
Yeah, I was a little bit set me down, actually, to be honest, have you I guess if you had to take out the politics of it all, and maybe that's it, but everybody has said different opinion about police and government departments, and it depends on our perception and our perspective. So if we want to remove the perception
part of it. We use research, right, so what's the reality of the situation, And the reality of the situation is around sixty nine percent of people view police back on the beat as making them feel safe and secure. But that's it, and we know also that in the research that it has around it between three weeks and three months to have a positive impact and it reduces crime, and then we must bring in other things like different ways of patrolling, etc. So that's that part of it.
But perspective is more difficult to change. We all see things differently and it depends on our experiences, our background, our social viewpoint, media, and a whole range of things that we've interacted with. And if we've had a bad interaction with an organization or heard some bad feedback, then our perspective will be changed negatively, and so that's harder to change. We have to keep bringing back reality.
Is in a case of there still being a stigma around the presence of police in some communities or is it more individual?
I think that's probably the case in this one. Absolutely, there's some communities that I go into and do working and there's quite a negative perception still of police and it depends on what's happened. There are some historical things that have happened to some communities, and when it's broadcast what more widely, that does affect some parts of the population more than others.
Do you think that her views are kind of I mean, I heard Chloe Swarbrick saying she's just reflecting views of some constituents, which she could use to defend all sorts of views. But do you think that it's is she sort of is it almost like an out of date view of the police, like police who might look back to the days of the Red Squad and during the Springbok two and still be hanging on to that sort of stigma.
Yeah.
Look, I think we do need to have some pushback on anything we do. If we don't have a leveler in all of our roles, I mean, you'd be the same. Look at your job, for example, if you don't get some negative feedback which you reflect on and you think, oh, I might just moderate what I said there. That's how we keep things on a level plan Ayngfield. So, but probably not to the extreme that I've just seen. I mean, police thing's never been outdated. I don't know if any
other way of keeping the population safe and secure. We need to have an organization that's able to do that. And we keep that organization and check by having a number of functions through the media, through the Independent Police Conduct Authority, and a number of other and in fact themselves.
I actually investigated police for a long time. Yeah, and I'll tell you what, no stones left unto them when that happens, because we all want to see a good police and part of if you're part of that organization, in fact, you have a higher bar. Well I did. Any way, when we're looking at what went wrong?
Does I mean there are some people who say that people like some of the ball don't belong in parliament, But that's up to the voters, of course. But do you think in a way that it's actually not a bad thing to have people sort of challenging these things, no matter how potty or lalla they sound.
It's absolutely one hundred percent. I mean, I think it was Steve Job said diamonds come from rubbing to rocks together, and so we do need to have somebody to have a contrary view and that keeps us all in check. But also out of that conversation, a look at the conversation that's happened since that comment was said. We're getting some great viewpoints of some different ways of things things and that's how we stay modernized. I guess that's how we develop as a society.
Just what I mean. Look, it seems her comments around police abolition and all that sort of stuff to me just barking mad. Are there any other models around New Zealand around the world where there's something that isn't a police force that sort of works, because is it just a you know, something.
It's called military.
See, I don't think.
That that's the only one that I've seen that actually works or you know, and that's either from dictatorships, and we don't want to have that. So in a democracy there is there is I have not seen. There has to be policed, right, So we've seen all these utopian societies where people there is no police and we all live in harmony. But at some point when somebody steps wrong, there has to be a committee. You've gone before, so it just doesn't work.
Just the people talk about the Marray Wardens and the
role that they play in other community organizations. Can you just give a description of I don't mean, what's wrong with that idea, but the limits of that because I think that would be to try and place the role of beat police with mary Warden's would be putting a hell of a lot on mary Wardens, wouldn't it, Because they can ran, they can be a range of ages and all sorts of physical competencies as well, despite the fact they might be great people.
Yeah, I've seen it work, and I've seen it work very very successfully, and it works in other countries. We've got quite a in New Zealand. We should be very proud with having out mary Wardens because they have the ability and even look the cool of the older ones that get in there and with these young people and they you know, are able to sort of speak since
because they've been around and they have the respect. So and we had it when I was first on the beat, and that was a long time ago to thirty years ago. We would have that we would meet up with the Marley Wardens on a night shift and we'd work from the same office as us and we'd all go out and you know, and they were able to get into into homes and into places that police would not ever get.
So having those sorts of things and having and there's a range of then there's the community patrols as well. Having range of those is how we do it. We police ourselves in supporting one organization, I think.
And just finally, do these sort of comments bother police particularly? And how would you judge the morale of the police because we have a new police commissioner and everyone seems that inside the force morale's pretty good, isn't it?
Oh, morales through the roof?
Really?
In fact, yeah, I've just been I've been Willington just for the last two weeks and you can see heads up and I'm loving seeing an Auckland City police on the beat. You know, two people walking together. Look, you could put any amount of ambassadors and street patrols, et cetera. But when you see two police officers walking down the street, that has that whole different feeling. That's the feeling of I'm safe. And so yeah, look, I think comments like
that have been made. I'm not sure. I'd love to see the research of how we could police without police.
I don't think we're really seriously exploring that. Just one last question. So I said the last one was the last, but I've got one more. Why is police? What is the change that has made police morale so high, because it's my outsider's view is simply they love the new police commissioner, the tools that they've been given as well, and they're cracking.
On That's exactly it. So when you get some additional tools to help deal with gettings for example, or any you know, I'm not just picking on we're talking on organized criminal gangs. Were not talking gangs and gang patches. But when you have new tools, a new commissioner who I have worked with, he's a practical guy and he's going to he's already made some change at the top. Is that going on and they've got some new yep. Absolutely,
Mark Mitchell great minister to have there. You know, you see him out there doing push up and all sorts of things with them. So having that sort of yeah, they they're really in a much better place than they were. They're still getting poached from overseas from Australia, but that's always been going on. It's been going on for years. But with this new drive, I'm happy that there's a whole lot of new younger police officers coming in to take the place of the ones. At least good stuff.
Hey, Lance really appreciate your time this opening. Thank you so much.
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