|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Prime Minister and Botany MP Christopher Luxon is among the politicians strongly criticising Green Party MP Tamatha Paul for saying police beat patrols make some Kiwis feel less safe.
“She can say what she likes, but she’s totally insane,” Luxon told reporters during a visit to the South Island today, March 27.
“The Green Party are in la-la-land on law and order.”
Paul, the MP for Wellington Central, has come under fire from across the political spectrum this week following her recent comments at a panel discussion at the University of Canterbury that she’d received “nothing but complaints” about police beat patrols.
She said the constant visual presence of police tells people they might not be safe and she’d been told police officers had thrown the possessions of homeless people into rubbish bins.
The coalition Government has been outspoken about its desire to increase police beat patrols in locations such as Auckland and Wellington CBD, saying they reduce crime and make people feel safer.
Among the politicians to criticise Paul’s claims are Luxon, Police Minister Mark Mitchell, ACT Party leader David Seymour, Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters and Labour Party leader and former Police Minister Chris Hipkins.
Hipkins said Paul’s comment were “ill-informed”, “unwise”, and “stupid”.
Paul has also been criticised for publicly saying a woman was imprisoned in New Zealand for having shoplifted items worth $12, without providing evidence to substantiate the allegation.
When told by reporters at Parliament today that Luxon had labelled her “totally insane”, Paul responded: “He’s entitled to his own views, but they [her comments] are legitimate.
“I’ve had a massive response in the last 24 hours of people saying the same thing.
“A lot of people do not feel safe or protected by the police.”
Mitchell says no one would be imprisoned in New Zealand for the theft of items worth $12.
