Collins leaves police to fend for themselves
new-zealand-labour-party
Wed Jun 17 2009 12:00:00 GMT+1200 (New Zealand Standard Time)
Collins leaves police to fend for themselves
Wednesday, 17 June 2009, 2:10 pm
Press Release: New Zealand Labour Party
Hon Clayton Cosgrove
Law and Order spokesperson
17 June 2009 **Media Statement
**
Collins leaves police to fend for themselves
While Police Minister Judith Collins is running for cover and district police bosses are reluctant to cross the minister, frontline police are about to be denied the cars they need to do their jobs properly, says Labour law and order spokesperson Clayton Cosgrove.
“The news only leaked yesterday that the Government is demanding police axe 10 percent of their car fleet as part of a $21 million budget cut, but already the impact on smaller police stations is becoming apparent,” Clayton Cosgrove said.
“One police unit on the North Shore, which used to have two cars for its seven officers, will reportedly be cut back to one car, and the staff are worried how they can respond to the public promptly.
“This situation will be repeated all over the country,” Clayton Cosgrove said. “You can’t slash 300 cars from the police fleet without creating serious problems with response times and capabilities
“Ms Collins is treating the police and public as though they are stupid if she thinks they can’t work out that 300 fewer police cars around the country will mean tens of thousands of call-outs that aren’t responded to as promptly as they should be.
“It will be inevitable that cases will occur when police are called to a domestic violence incident, or to an address where a child is being maltreated, or to a dairy that is being held up, and they can’t find a car available. This is history repeating itself. It happened in the 1990s when the then National Government cut police resources.
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“The person who should be accountable is Judith Collins, but she is washing her hands of her Government’s budget cut by saying it’s an operational matter for police,” Clayton Cosgrove said.
“There is little value in National recruiting an extra 240 police over three years when it has already decided to take 300 vehicles away. There are very few if any police vehicles that do not have frontline uses. Judith Collins is stripping police and the public of vital resources in the struggle to make our communities safer.
“The hollowness of National’s so-called commitment to safer communities is becoming plainer and more alarming by the day.”
ENDS
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