National walks thin blue line on law and order
Parts of National's law and order policy are a clear nod to Act policy but the party's proposal on rehabilitation is a hat tip aimed at centrist voters
Mōrena and welcome to The Bulletin for Tuesday, June 27, by Anna Rawhiti-Connell. Presented in partnership with Z Energy.
In today’s edition: government reportedly set to announce bailout package for universities; how to sell New Zealand in 17 minutes; a lifeline for skifield and ski season but first, law and order policy in an election year
Cost of living in prison hasn't been accounted for
“This election is about law and order,” said National's campaign chair Chris Bishop at the party’s conference on Sunday. It is also about the cost of living according to the majority of headlines to date and a speech from National’s deputy leader Nicola Willis on Saturday. Ironically it is the cost of living in prison that hasn't been accounted for in National’s law and order policy. National’s policy proposes imposing a 40% limit on the reductions judges can apply to sentences. The policy came without costings and when asked what it cost to keep someone in prison in prison for a year, party leader Christopher Luxon deferred to justice spokesperson Paul Goldsmith who, as the Herald’s Simon Wilson reports (paywalled), “confidently told him it was $100k. As Wilson notes, the correct figure is $193k. National has since clarified that judges would be able to offer more than a 40% discount in some situations.
Virtue-signalling and penal populism
Business Desk’s Pattrick Smellie suggests (paywalled) that what National is proposing could be labelled as “virtue-signalling” as once again, we find ourselves circling the drain of election-year rhetoric. Smellie notes that the judiciary is prone to finding ways around these kinds of proposed mandates based on the simple fact that we would quickly run out of prison cells if acted on. That’s pragmatic but evidentially, most people now accept that prisons fail to reduce recidivism at best and at worst, operate as expensive crime universities that offer little hope of reform or rehabilitation. In 2018 the chief science advisor said that “prison growth has been driven largely by ‘tough on crime’ policies, from … both sides of the political spectrum” in a process known as “penal populism”.
Chasing the vote
Within National’s own broad church over the years prisons have been declared a moral and fiscal failure (by Bill English). The late Chester Borrows, the minister of courts under John Key’s government, went on to describe the “tough on crime” approach that originated out of New York in the 1980s and the subsequent police action as doing nothing but setting a new low. National have also said they will reintroduce the three strikes law which was repealed in 2022. That is a clear nod to Act and its supporters. Writing this morning on National’s bids to stare down Act, Toby Manhire notes that given the factors currently working against the government, National will hoping for a larger gap to open up between them and Labour in the next round of polling. “If not,” he says “National could be left to rue becoming preoccupied in a grizzly tug-of-war with Act that not only fails to grow their aggregate vote, but actively alienates those in the middle.”
Alignment on rehab but also uncosted
Newsroom Pro’s Jono Milne suggests there is political alignment (paywalled) near the centre with both Labour and National’s proposals to extend rehabilitation services to people on remand. National is proposing to extend a fuller suite of rehabilitation services to all those on remand. Minister for corrections Kelvin Davis has also introduced legislation to extend rehabilitation services for those on remand but not quite to the same extent as National. That might be viewed as a less generous embrace of its potential, but as deputy prime minister Carmel Sepuloni rightly noted in the post-cabinet press conference yesterday, there are some instances where people are in remand awaiting trial may not want to take up a rehabilitation programme lest it also somehow imply guilt. As Simon Wilson also notes, National’s rehabilitation policy is also uncosted.
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Government support coming for universities
Newshub’s Amelia Wade reports that the government will announce a major bailout package for universities today. Wade says the additional funding is aimed at tiding universities over while they recover from a drop in student numbers, both domestic and international. It’s understood the bailout will be reallocated from other spending and will be spread over two years and is designed to stabilise the sector. Yesterday, students protested the proposed cuts at Victoria University of Wellington as the university council met to discuss the findings of a recent review. Vice-chancellor Nic Smith said that what was proposed in the document would make the university financially sustainable, “but I have no doubt society will be poorer as a result.” Whatever is announced today will be a welcome interim measure. Education minister Jan Tinetti met with all university vice-chancellors last Thursday and her office is said to be taking advice on the need for major reform.
Can Chris Hipkins sell New Zealand in 17 minutes?
Spinoff editor Madeleine Chapman is in Beijing where temperatures have climbed above 40 degrees in the last few days. That hasn’t stopped prime minister Chris Hipkins from donning an apron to turn a few kebabs on a BBQ at an event titled Showcasing New Zealand, but it probably made the fake ski field set up at the event a more desirous prospect for those attending in dark suits. As Chapman reports in a blow-by-blow account, Hikpins embarked on a 17-minute sales pitch for New Zealand while we were sleeping, reiterating once again that New Zealand is open for business while posing with a fruit box, former international students, a skier, and many people. Time prevented him from posing with the plate of cooked kebabs. Geopolitically things have gotten more complicated overnight ahead of Hipkins’ meeting with Xi Jinping following a statement from Beijing supporting Russia after the shortlived but undoubtedly destabilising Wagner-led insurrection.
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I’ve never come across the word ‘recidivism’ before today
The Herald quotes one of its own flaming reporters:
"Paul Goldsmith who, as the Herald’s Simon Wilson reports “confidently told him it was $100k. As Wilson notes, the correct figure is $193k."