The picture of a weeping grandmother apologising for her grandson's stupidity during a police pursuit that saw three people killed last week struck a chord for many.
The debate about whether or not New Zealand should follow Queensland's example of not having pursuits generally has been aired again.
In Queensland, we are told, there are 44,000 more people than New Zealand and in 2016, they had just 126 police pursuits and no deaths, compared to our 3323 pursuits and seven deaths.
In New Zealand in the past 10 years, the percentage of drivers refusing to stop has increased more than 500%, yet the percentages of this for Queensland have perhaps conveniently not been gathered or presented, so the yardstick has a proverbial hole in it.
According to police figures in 2010 (I haven't been able to source later ones - except the percentage of pursuits has risen exponentially since 2014), there were 2195 pursuits, of which 28% were abandoned. One in four resulted in a crash and seven died. This meant that 0.07 drivers caused 4.6% of the year's road toll at a cost of 45 million.
In 2015, harsher penalties to replace the wet bus ticket fines of $200-$300 (maximum being $10,000 but never used) were introduced. From that point on, these idiots would face a minimum of 12 months disqualification, possible confiscation of vehicle and fines. But despite police urging judges haven't been doing a great deal with the powers they are given in creating a judicial deterrent. One in four drivers facing the court under these charges were likely to get off without penalty in the past 10 years.
The most telling point is the steep increase over the past five years of people failing to stop for police.
Now, while we can all look at the percentages and numbers and cry foul for chasing twats that won't stop, I haven't heard anyone at all asking the most pertinent question. Why? Why will these morons not stop? They know the road rules - even if they don't have a license, they know they have to stop when the flashing lights go on behind them and the police car doesn't seem interested in passing them.
The biggest offenders are males in their 20's and under, although a few females who seem to have strapped on brains at hip point are creeping into the equation.
There are four reasons for why they come to police notice. The first is stolen cars; many of them are and are usually to be used in the future commission of other crimes. The second is speeding - they are already putting the public in danger. The third is driving erratically and the fourth is that is the car is being driven by someone police know to already be disqualified.
So, each and every one of these reasons are reasons for why these people should not be on the road in the first place. People can talk about Queensland's lack of deaths on the road caused by fleeing drivers all they like, but has anyone thought to correlate the amount of kiwis being flung back over the ditch lately from the same place? The point here is that you cannot use the mentality of the young in both of our countries as a common denominator - they are very different culture-wise. We have a lot of disenfranchised young here who believe they have a lot more rights than they actually do and are very quick to try it on from a legal perspective.
How has that happened? There is a whole generation of gravy-trainers out there who are inadvertently teaching their young that they are entitled to free passes to just about everything. We see this on our TV cop programmes, we see it in every day life and for someone like me who has listened to more police scanners through my work than most, I see and hear it all the time.
There is a wide-ranging belief from young ones of all walks of life who have never had to learn respect, to understand that for very action, there is a reaction (and one they have to live with).
To my mind, there is a double edged sword here that needs to be sharpened properly. The first side is judicial. Let's change the wording from police pursuit to fleeing driver and put the blame firmly where it belongs. Judges need to be seen to be using the tools they have at their disposal properly. None of this kowtowing to the millennial belief of self-entitlement as they so often do.
On the other side, AA and its ilk need to back down on their stance about abandoning police pursuits. Our roads are not the same as Queensland's generous, often straight wide open roadways. Their vehicles are not registered in the same manner ours are, (ours making it easier to use cars that should be off the road and that offenders don't care if they get pink stickered). Our roads are more dangerous and we do need to keep idiotic drivers off them. Police need to keep the public safe and this is simply another way in which this has to happen.
Lastly, we need to take some responsibility here. We do need parents putting the fear of God (or whoever else is at hand) into their young when it comes to using the road safely. As villagers, we need to remember it takes one to raise a child - and if the parents can't do it, the rest of us need to have the right to - and step up to the plate. It is most unfortunate that so many parents today are that in name only and have no knowledge of being able to teach respect, teach what is right and what is wrong and most of all, to teach that self-entitlement is a road with a dead end.
Pic 1: Otago Daily Times
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