Heather du Plessis-Allan: We shouldn't get rid of the boot camps

I do not buy the argument, which seems to have taken hold, that the boot camps trial has to be shut down immediately because two kids escaped and got arrested after allegedly stealing a car.

If you haven't caught up on this, what’s happened is that those two boot camp kids who ran away after the tangi last week have now been found... because they’ve been arrested.

They allegedly hooked up with each other, found another couple of mates, went and nicked a car, ran from the cops and when the cops busted them one legged it with a machete (allegedly), tried to carjack another vehicle and then the police then apparently found knives and balaclavas.

As a result Labour and the Greens are losing their minds, calling on the Government to end the boot camp trial immediately.

But why?

If anything this tells me how badly we need the boot camps to continue, because these are obviously very bad kids.

You don’t put a balaclava in your car unless you’ve got some pretty dark plans.

This is already after you’ve committed two crimes that carry a maximum sentence of ten years each, which is why you’re in the boot camp already.

The boot camps haven’t turned these kids into criminals. They already are criminals.

Which is why they’re in the boot camps.

Ask yourself this - if we shut down the boot camps, what’s the alternative?

Jail? Letting them roam free, in which case they keep on committing these kinds of crimes?

I don’t see these two going on the run as a failure of the boot camp trial.

I see it as a reason to keep doing the boot camp trial.

Because how much do these kids need intervention if they are prepared to allegedly run around in a stolen car with balaclavas, knives and a machete?

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
I do not buy this argument, which seems to have
taken hold kind of widely, that the boot camp trial
has to be shut down immediately because two kids escaped
and got arrested after allegedly stealing the carnf you haven't
caught up on this. Over the weekend, the couple of
kids who ran away after the tongue he last week
got rounded up. They were arrested, they allegedly hooked up
with each other, found another couple of mates, went out

(00:20):
and licked a car, then ran from the cops in
that car. When the cops finally busted them, one of
them legged it with a machete allegedly and then tried
to carjack another vehicle, and the cops found on them
or in their vehicle wherever they were found a bunch
of knives and balaclavas, not to mention the machete as well. Now,
as a result of this, the Green Party and the
Labour Party, both of them hate the boot camps, are

(00:42):
losing their minds over this and calling on the government
to end the boot camp trial immediately. But the thing is,
I cannot understand why why do we need to end
the boot camp trial because of what's just happened. I mean,
if anything, this tells me how badly we actually need
the boot camps to continue, because these are obviously very
bad kids. You don't put a balaklava in your unless
you've got some pretty sinister and dark plans, do you,

(01:04):
And this after you've already committed two crimes, not one,
but two crimes that carry a maximum sentence of ten
years each, which is why you're in the boot camp
in the first place. And the boot camps haven't turned
these kids into criminals. These kids will already criminals, which
is why they're in the boot camps. So ask yourself this, Okay,
if we shut down the boot camps, we've already got

(01:24):
ten criminals. If we shut down the boot camps, what's
gonna happen to these kids? If they're going to go
to jail, would we prefer that or would do we
want them to just roam around in the community for
you know, just roam around free, in which case, to
just carry on committing these kinds of crimes, the kinds
of crimes we just saw them do allegedly over the weekend.
I don't see these two going on the run as
a failure of the boot camp trial. I see it

(01:46):
as a reason to keep odd doing the boot camp trial,
because clearly, how much do these kids need intervention if
they're prepared to allegedly run around in a stolen car
with Balaclav's knives in a machete. For more from the
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