Police head still hanging onto a long gone innocence?
So our new Police Commissioner Peter Marshall 'hasn't seen any evidence' that our police force front liners need to be armed. The on-average, 2500 assaults on police every year obviously don't matter that much. What are you trying to say Mr Commissioner - that your boys and girls in blue all have thick heads?
I find this really quite strange - every year the stats for police assaulted in keeping Joe and Joanne Public safe are increasing - and not only increasing, they are becoming more violent in terms of weapons used.
The MOTH, when watching the news tonight about the jailing of the toerag that attacked Bruce Mellor came out with the startling pronouncement that Senior Constable Mellor should not have been out there on his own and more fool him. I looked at the MOTH in genuine amazement. Did the MOTH not know that the said constable was in a rural town which the decision makers often didn't believe required or could afford a second officer? Not SC Mellor's fault he has penny pinching bosses. The minute he started his patrol that night, all he had was a shoulder radio to make the "10-10, 10-10" call signalling that an officer was down. If the machete had smashed that - what then?
The MOTH decided it was perhaps prudent to find out a bit more about that before passing judgement - and it's something I wish the rest of the do-gooders who are bleating about arming our police would do as well.
Throwing the odd punch isn't as de rigeur now as pulling out a machete, a hammer, a knife or a gun. The shock the nation used to go into when a police officer got shot would reverberate for months around the hills, but these days it's become just another shake-the-head occurrence. And I'm sorry, but I just don't believe it should be that way. Australian police are fully armed and have been since 1995 after the murder of two constables in Crescent Heads. Their Police Federation CEO says their police officers would not go to work if they weren't. Furthermore, he also noted in a TV3 interview a year or so ago that New Zealand's stats for shot police officers far outstrip the Australian stats.
It appeared that while former Police Commissioner Howard Broad was looking positively at the potential of arming police by the end of this year - and that Police Minister Judith Collins was also sympathetic to it. Indeed, even the slowly grinding mills of government have before them this week a bill designed to enforce judges to utilise the fact that in sentencing, if the offender has assaulted a police officer, then it becomes an aggravating feature in the sentence handed out - in other words, they get a much harsher sentence. Although why judges have to be forced into doing this, as this bill will make them do, I don't know - they already have the ability to use the law, up until now it has been preference whether they do or not.
But with Commissioner Marshall, new brooms being what they are, the latest reports are coming through that in less than a week since he took over the role, Commissioner Marshall is not in agreeance with this.
One has to ask why not? What "evidence" does he need? Putting a gun or taser, the latter method which he seems to prefer, in a locked space in a locked car was never going to help those shot by Jan Molenaar in Hastings.
Today's criminals seem to be different from those of yesteryear. Last century, last millenium for that matter, there appeared to be some kind of code of honour that no longer exists today. Every man, woman and dog is out for themselves and if you get in the way, you either better have the wherewithal to stop what's bearing down on you, or you will end up flattened. Whatever innocence as a nation that New Zealand had, whatever it was that made a caught criminal sigh and put their hands up when cornered by police, has gone. Between 1890 and 2000, just 19 police officers were shot while on duty - four of them in one event. Since 2000, there have been three - one sixth the total amount of the previous 110 years in just a decade.
The amount of young kids who are creating pursuits in cars and who then, when cornered, take to police with hammers or machetes or whatever is hugely increasing. These young mongrels know that these officers are NOT armed - so there is no respect and they will turn like the little ferals they are.
Most of us need to remember that our police do the job they do because they believe they can make a difference in the community they live, work and play in. We need to be a bit more thankful there are enough out there who choose to put their lives on the line every day - who have families who take deep breaths and try to keep silent the wee voice that hopes the start of the shift will not be the last time they see their loved ones.
It's time our police were armed - there is no reason for them not to be.
My message to the Commissioner is to ask whether or not, at 57 years of age, your best years are in last century. Because if they are and if you cannot keep abreast of the changing times and the very real need to protect those you represent at the head of the pack, then stand aside and let someone who can, do the job.
I find this really quite strange - every year the stats for police assaulted in keeping Joe and Joanne Public safe are increasing - and not only increasing, they are becoming more violent in terms of weapons used.
The MOTH, when watching the news tonight about the jailing of the toerag that attacked Bruce Mellor came out with the startling pronouncement that Senior Constable Mellor should not have been out there on his own and more fool him. I looked at the MOTH in genuine amazement. Did the MOTH not know that the said constable was in a rural town which the decision makers often didn't believe required or could afford a second officer? Not SC Mellor's fault he has penny pinching bosses. The minute he started his patrol that night, all he had was a shoulder radio to make the "10-10, 10-10" call signalling that an officer was down. If the machete had smashed that - what then?
The MOTH decided it was perhaps prudent to find out a bit more about that before passing judgement - and it's something I wish the rest of the do-gooders who are bleating about arming our police would do as well.
Throwing the odd punch isn't as de rigeur now as pulling out a machete, a hammer, a knife or a gun. The shock the nation used to go into when a police officer got shot would reverberate for months around the hills, but these days it's become just another shake-the-head occurrence. And I'm sorry, but I just don't believe it should be that way. Australian police are fully armed and have been since 1995 after the murder of two constables in Crescent Heads. Their Police Federation CEO says their police officers would not go to work if they weren't. Furthermore, he also noted in a TV3 interview a year or so ago that New Zealand's stats for shot police officers far outstrip the Australian stats.
It appeared that while former Police Commissioner Howard Broad was looking positively at the potential of arming police by the end of this year - and that Police Minister Judith Collins was also sympathetic to it. Indeed, even the slowly grinding mills of government have before them this week a bill designed to enforce judges to utilise the fact that in sentencing, if the offender has assaulted a police officer, then it becomes an aggravating feature in the sentence handed out - in other words, they get a much harsher sentence. Although why judges have to be forced into doing this, as this bill will make them do, I don't know - they already have the ability to use the law, up until now it has been preference whether they do or not.
But with Commissioner Marshall, new brooms being what they are, the latest reports are coming through that in less than a week since he took over the role, Commissioner Marshall is not in agreeance with this.
One has to ask why not? What "evidence" does he need? Putting a gun or taser, the latter method which he seems to prefer, in a locked space in a locked car was never going to help those shot by Jan Molenaar in Hastings.
Today's criminals seem to be different from those of yesteryear. Last century, last millenium for that matter, there appeared to be some kind of code of honour that no longer exists today. Every man, woman and dog is out for themselves and if you get in the way, you either better have the wherewithal to stop what's bearing down on you, or you will end up flattened. Whatever innocence as a nation that New Zealand had, whatever it was that made a caught criminal sigh and put their hands up when cornered by police, has gone. Between 1890 and 2000, just 19 police officers were shot while on duty - four of them in one event. Since 2000, there have been three - one sixth the total amount of the previous 110 years in just a decade.
The amount of young kids who are creating pursuits in cars and who then, when cornered, take to police with hammers or machetes or whatever is hugely increasing. These young mongrels know that these officers are NOT armed - so there is no respect and they will turn like the little ferals they are.
Most of us need to remember that our police do the job they do because they believe they can make a difference in the community they live, work and play in. We need to be a bit more thankful there are enough out there who choose to put their lives on the line every day - who have families who take deep breaths and try to keep silent the wee voice that hopes the start of the shift will not be the last time they see their loved ones.
It's time our police were armed - there is no reason for them not to be.
My message to the Commissioner is to ask whether or not, at 57 years of age, your best years are in last century. Because if they are and if you cannot keep abreast of the changing times and the very real need to protect those you represent at the head of the pack, then stand aside and let someone who can, do the job.
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