Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
With me right now. We've got Mark Mitchell and Ginny
Anderson for politics Wednesday.
Speaker 2 (00:03):
Hell, are you too good money?
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Mitch? I'm supposed you're not on holiday. Everybody's on holiday,
Luxeon's on holiday, Mike's holiday.
Speaker 3 (00:12):
I'm the emergency management minister and we've got heaps of
weather hitping around the country at the moment.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
What happens to you? Actually do you think? Do you
say I'm going to go on holiday and then sort
of some bad weather hits and then your holidays off
and and your fiance still heads off to Barley by herself.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
Yeah, that's happened last time. So but you know, like
I take the role seriously and when we have these
big weather events coming through, the potential there to have
a massive need of impact on people is there the
whole time, And so I like to be available. I'll
actually like to get on the ground and see what
we need to do and what decisions need to be.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
What you intel on where Lucky I've heard Luckson's gone
on Hollybop's to Hawaii with John John Key. Is that
what's happened.
Speaker 3 (00:53):
I don't know who he's gone on holiday with, but yes,
he's having a break with Amanda and you know which
is very well to see the more of you.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
You got any goss on that, Jenny, No, I would
not be in the loop for knowing who like so holidays?
Do you know who should have gone on holiday? Jenny
is Chris Hopkins. What's up with him?
Speaker 2 (01:12):
He's doing fine, He's been great, He's been fire lately,
he's been awesome. Incredibly had we he incredibly had talking
about the cost of living, which a government keeps trying
to hide with announcements on.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
What did you make of him saying that the COVID
inquiry is platforming the conspiracy theorists.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
Well, I did agree with the point that I have two.
Have you ever in New Zealand a stink job with
the first one? That's why we had to have it
was pretty good. First one looked at what we need
to loom from pretty good A pandemic A pandemic in
the first place, So I think that's important. We're planning
for a future pandemic, not just doing a political hit job.
Speaker 3 (01:56):
Well, that's that's really important. But your first round was
a complete political whitewash. So that's why the second reality,
which gives.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
You is another political whitewash? Is that why one good
white wash?
Speaker 3 (02:07):
Well if you call, if you call giving everyone a
voice and being able to come along and have this, say,
a whitewash, If that's how you view it, then it's fine.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
But we know they were your words. Fine, they were
your words.
Speaker 3 (02:17):
Well you just said, is this what a political white wash?
Speaker 1 (02:20):
What are the chances would Jenny, what are the chances
Cinda comes back for it? Do you reckon?
Speaker 2 (02:25):
I really don't know. I mean I think that I've
heard lots of speculation about that, but I don't know
if she's even been formally invited to do that.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
If she was formal because she's she's your patron saint. Now,
I mean you basically you got to put some rosary
beads and you know, st you Cinda for the for
the Labor Party. Would you think less of your patron saints?
If she was invited and she didn't come back.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Not really, I mean she had so her decision. She's
no longer accountable, she's no longer as a politician, she's
no direct requirement to do that, So that will be
a decision completely up to her.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
Go on, Well, last time I checked, she was a
key and she had quite a bit to do, Jenny,
with the decisions that were made that impacted all of
us as a country. Because she's milky.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yeah, you'd like me to ask you personally, Mark, is it? Yes?
I would.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
I don't mind if you do.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
Go on, Yeah, yeah, absolutely, that'd be great. Come back
to us as though what she says.
Speaker 2 (03:18):
Yeah, well, I don't. I don't talk to a regularly.
But that's really a decision.
Speaker 3 (03:23):
Does a regular conversation. It can be one.
Speaker 2 (03:25):
You should give her back, you should give her.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Oh look, just give me her number. I'll give her
the ring, Jenny. If you don't want to do it,
I'm sure. Yeah, she was stoke. Yeah the minute I
says Heather head lord, I might be able to slide
through for a bit if I pretend to be Heather Simpson.
But anyway, listen, what do you think Mitch is a
family on two hundred and thirty thousand dollars poor?
Speaker 3 (03:51):
Well, I mean, really good question.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
The moment.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
Obviously, we're in a you know, things are tough. We
are in a recovery phase with the economy. Although we're
starting to see some green it's moving in the right direction.
But quite simply obviously the decision was made for the
around the ECC, around the family Boost policy to give
to increase the access for it.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
I don't think a family on two hundred and thirty
thousand dollars is poor, in which case, why are we
giving welfare to them? Because sure, I mean it might
be cost of living is difficult right now, But once
you introduce this welfare metch, it hangs around forever. Are
you sure we should be giving welfare to people who
are actually pretty comfortable?
Speaker 3 (04:26):
The real reason when we say welfare, it's around looking,
it's around childcare and making sure.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
There's still welfare though, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
But the real reason here that is that not they
can't find national can't find one single family that benefited
from the initial family Boost and that was a big
part of their election promises. So no one has been
able to benefit from this policy because it's too hard
to eis no. I think this is rubbish. This is
doing everything they possibly can to make sure at least
some people get it, and it's gone. Probably.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
What do you think Jimmy is two thirty too wealthy
to get welfare?
Speaker 2 (05:01):
Well? What they The way they've set it up is
difficult to access because you have to come and claim.
So we've seen right from the start the bureaucracy involved
for actually getting the money back is preventing people from
accessing it. And so instead of going back to the
drawing board and saying, how do we do this in
a way that families who really need it get it,
they're just widened the existing credit, so they've gone about
(05:22):
the wrong way.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Is two thirty Is two thirty too wealthy to get welfare? Jinny?
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Well that's come on, mate, true salaries. It is pretty
high to getting excess.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
It's too high, okay, So are you going to get
it pretty high?
Speaker 2 (05:37):
Really high? Well, it doesn't work, so you don't need
to get rid of it as well.
Speaker 1 (05:42):
The excess Why I hate welfare because welfare, once you've
got it, everybody keeps it going. All right, Mark, when
you're in the cops, did you ever have people do
the breathalyzer but then try to blow past it or
suck in?
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Yeah? You had always had lots of lots of different
ways that they tried to avoid the test. Absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
And was it obvious to you when they were doing.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
It, Yes, it was. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
Okay, So when you read that about Kerry Allen. Did
you think that wouldn't have flown with me?
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:09):
I think. Look, I spoke with Kerry at the time.
I had already known that the police had been given
quite a hard time and had to talk with her
about that. And I'm not going to pick over the bones,
but I know that when I was up at WAITINGI
last year, myself and Simon Wat's r on their way
to a meeting up north and we found a lady
who were tragically that had a messive heart attack on
the side of the road and we worked on her
for about We did CPR on her for about half
(06:30):
an hour before assistants arrived and carry Ellen stopped and
gave us a hand. So, you know, she's made some mistakes.
The way she behaved as Justice Minister was completely totally
unacceptable on that, but I believe in redemption and everyone
makes mistakes, and you know she's sort of getting on
with it.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
There is a debate at the moment, Ginny about whether
this is relevant or not, given that it's such a
long time ago now and she's not a minister anymore.
What do you think.
Speaker 2 (06:54):
I think it's a hard call. This that's always the
issue whether these public interests involved and what's the point
in rehashing those things. I mean, it must be incredibly
hard for Kittee it's been. Yes, I agree with Mark,
she made the mistakes and she paid the price for those,
including going through the court process. But it must be
really difficult for her to have all of these details
(07:16):
playing out again and people going through them. And I
was the Minister of Police at the time that took
the call from police when when she'd been found, so
it was it was an incredibly tough time.
Speaker 1 (07:27):
Now, Jinny, listen, what do you make of the minimum
sentences thing? Would you be okay with us telling judges
what the minimum sentences on certain crimes should be?
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Well, he said, it's he's kind of danced around his
knees kind of what we might do it these things
don't work. But it seems like they're kind of throwing
everything at the wall. It doesn't seem to be much
of a connection between you know, yep, coward punch and
you've got first if the first responders, and then there
was another one, and there's this one. It's sort of
to me it smacked a bit of the cost of
(07:56):
living crisis is really biting it's really hurting us in
the pole, and we're going to just chuck a whole
bunch of law and order stuff out there as a
bit of a distraction. So I'm not convinced that there's
a connection between all of these announcements or whether there's
a genuine intent on actually making.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
That's like that would be Labour's approach. And that's why
I don't take Labor or the Green seriously when it.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Comes to really it's a surprise.
Speaker 3 (08:19):
No, no, I never have because you're not serious people
when it comes to public safety, and you haven't supported
any of the measures that we're brought through Parliament this
term that actually are proving to be effective. Cowards punches
are terrible. People die because of cowards punch the first
I know we are, but you were just that those
were raised. I'll get to minimum sentences first responders. We
(08:39):
should have zero tolerance on this country for the people
that protect us respond when we need the most being
assaulted or abused, and there should be legislation. I tried
to take this bill through. I picked it up from
Derek Bill and tried to take it through an opposition.
Labor wouldn't support it. Now we've got the bill up.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
What about the minimum sentence.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Though, minimum sentences I'm me personally I like the idea
of minimum sentences, but the way that we've done things
in this country, as we've gone for maximum and we've
lawed the judiciary to have discretion around that, we've sent
very clear signals as a government to the judiciary that
we expect the seriousness the offending to be reflected in
the consequences and the sentencing. We'll wait and see what happens,
(09:17):
but I'm very open to go in minimum sentences absolutely.
Speaker 1 (09:19):
Okay, fantastic. Now, Ginny, what about the citizen's arrest right,
because the Children's Commissioner wants kids to be excluded, what
do you think.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
Well, when we got the Official Information Act information even
police said this is really dangerous and these are risks
not just to the shop owners and to whoever's being
held on to which is likely to be kids, but
it's also just a general public safety risk and police
we're advising, you know, Mark Mitchell as Minister of Police
not to do this because it's going to actually make
(09:47):
life harder for police and create more dangerous situations. So
I think she's got some fear points that we just
don't know how this is going to play out, and
there's a real fear that the first time it's used
could be quite serious if.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
You do not do this though for the kids match,
do you not simply end up with a situation where
actually they are incentivised to set the criminal criminal gangs
and sin devised to send the kids in because the
kids get away.
Speaker 3 (10:07):
Yeah, again, we'd hear it. An awful situation where we're
retail theft and crime, especially violent crime, is through the roof.
And we're taking positive actions to address with that. And
one of them is a citizen's power of arrest, which
was already in existence, it has already been used. We've
extended the hours. People can choose whether I want to,
whether or not they want to use it or not.
Some retailers will embrace it, they'll use it with they'll
(10:29):
invest in their security and their physical security. But we've
got to take measures to get on top of this
retail crime. And you've Jenny's completely overread the position that
the police presented on us, and the fact and the
fact of the matter is, as a government, we are
going to give every tool and we're going to use
every tool that's available to start to clemp down on
retail crime. It is not except all right.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Listen, guys, thank you so much. Enjoy the rest of
your school holidays. Few more days left.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Thank you very much. Here.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
That says a mother right there. Ginny Anderson and Mark
Mitchell follow six Wednesday for more from The Mic Asking Breakfast.
Speaker 3 (11:03):
Listen live to News Talks at B from six am weekdays,
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