Stuart Nash: Former Police Minister on the changes to the citizen's arrest laws

A former Police Minister is declaring his support for a loosening of citizen's arrest laws. 

The Government is set to announce a retail crime strategy re-jig based on an advisory group's recommendations, which include making it easier for people to arrest others. 

Currently they can only occur at night between 9pm and 6am, for crimes with a maximum punishment of at least three years in prison. 

Stuart Nash told Mike Hosking hard working Kiwis have their hands tied while crime is being committed, and it's crazy that they can't do anything. 

However, he says they have to be proportionate, and can’t become an excuse for beating others up. 

LISTEN ABOVE 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now the rules around making a citizen arrest look said
to be loosened the retail crime deal we talked to
Paul Goldsmith about as officially being announced later on today.
As it stands, security guard, shop workers, the public, et cetera,
can only make a citizens arrest in two instances, and
a bit you didn't notice is the stupidest rules going
and item has been stolen that's worth more than a
thousand dollars, or an incidence has taken place overnight between

(00:21):
the hours of nine pm and six am. Anyway, the
form of Police Minister Stuart Nash is with us on
this very good morning.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
To you very well.

Speaker 1 (00:29):
Indeed, the broad idea, I mean, first of all those
numbers that we got this morning, the two percent decrease
in violent crime, would you concede, despite your political background,
that some of what this government is doing actually might
be working, could be society.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
Keeping in mind, Mike, I was a police minister that
increased police numbers by eighteen hundred scot to throw that
in the yeah, good on you.

Speaker 1 (00:47):
But the numbers are coming down. Numbers or not, the
stats are the stats, and a violent crime is coming down,
that's a winn isn't it.

Speaker 2 (00:55):
It's fantastic with iblant crime coming down. But what we
talked about our citizens arrest is retail crimes go up
by about twelve percent, and you've got these keyws who
are working really bloody hard to make ends meet, often
not making that much money because queues are spending whole
lot of money online and TAMU, and then you get
these misgrints coming in and stealing from them and they
don't have the ability to do anything that's crazy.

Speaker 1 (01:16):
Do you think did you ever look at it by
the way citizens arrest as police minister?

Speaker 2 (01:21):
I don't think we did, and I was resting my
brain to think why we wouldn't have. You've got a
situation right where if you steal stuff, which is you know,
obviously you're doing something every us to do that's pretty serious.
You could just shop of them. Then the cost of
prosecuting someone is substantial competed to the crime it's been committed.
But what you've ended up with is in a really
terrible situation where these guys just get away with it.

(01:44):
So what we were seriously looking at is some form
of fine or something along those lines which was proportionate
with a citizens arrest though. Yeah, you know, I'm a fan,
there's no doubt about that. But it's got to be proportionate.
You know, we don't want to get to a stage
we have big, tough guys like yourself are using this
to beat the crap cut someone.

Speaker 1 (02:02):
That's exactly right. Last video I watched was a guy.
There were two of them, but he was massive. He
was a huge I mean he would have been one
hundred and twenty kg's and he had under one arm
he had a slab of beer and under the other
he had literally a side of whatever pork beef and
he walked out of the shop past the security guard.
Would a security guard if they had the right take

(02:24):
a guy that size.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
On, probably not unless he had some form of martial
arts train. So this is the thing. So people have
got to put their own safety serious. And I don't
think there'd been an employer who would disagree with that.
So you know, there might be an instant with security
guard challenges this guy. But if in the end he
feels that, you know, it's going to be a hell
of enlisted his life of limb, then no. But what

(02:46):
you do do is you make sure that you got
the you know, the cameras to place, you call the cops.
The other situation we find themselves in the course is that,
you know, if someone's shoplifting or you know, we've all
seen and I've seen someone's pushing a Trillia boad groceries
out of the supermarket, Well what do you do. You
don't dial one one one, You can't dal triple five

(03:07):
because the you know, and the police are often too busy,
you know, going after the really bad guys, and so
people get away scott free. Being able to make systems
a rest in this case and hold the person to
the police turn up, I think is just a pragmatic move.
I'm very supportive.

Speaker 1 (03:21):
Okay, So so put your hat back on if you
were still minister, because the obvious question is are what
level of force do you sit on them? Do three
people sit on them when the guy goes, oh my
arm is breaking, do you still hold them down? And
then are there repercussions down the track for people getting
a bit carried away?

Speaker 2 (03:37):
Well, let's flip that around. What you can't have is
a situation where well at the moment, where people can't
protect themselves right or they can't spot some of them
stealing your property. It has got to be proportionate. And
because it is a change to the Crimes Act, it's
going to go through Select Committee and the sort of
in the full parliamentary process, so no doubt they will
come up with some with some measure there. But it

(04:01):
is a good point I suspect. You know, again, you're
not going to be able to pull out a baseball
bat and the guy because he stole a cigarettes or something.
But what you've got to be able to do, or
got to be allowed to do, is use proportionate force
depending on the circumstance. So you know, at the moment
dairy owners and sunny cushiers talks about this until he's
blue and faith they can't do anything for fear of

(04:22):
being prosecuted if they do bring out a basebook back
to try and clock someone when they're protecting themselves or
their stock. You've got to give these guys cover to
use proportionate force given the circumstance. So you know you
wouldn't do that if someone's will trying to load out
the grocers out of the supermarke, but you might have
come with a couple of knives and that have gotten
for you will have gone to the smokes cabinet behind

(04:44):
the counter, so I think it'll be proportionate to the
circumstances of play yourself.

Speaker 1 (04:48):
The good to have you on the program, Stuart Nash,
former Police Ministry. For more from the mic Asking Breakfast,
listen live to news talks. It'd be from six am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on I Radio.