Mark Mitchell: Police Minister on the 'organised criminal element' at the recent boy racer gatherings

The Police Minister says boy racers are terrorising communities throughout the country.

Four police vehicles were rammed at a Waikato gathering over the weekend, and an officer suffered minor injuries.

Police say a ute involved was stolen, with fake plates - and two people in the picture they've released weren't involved with the meet.

Minister Mark Mitchell says they're facing similar issues with gangs and youth offenders.

"They all think that they're above the law, they've got no respect for the police, they've got no respect for the public - and that's why we've got a massive public safety program currently underway in Government."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Police say that there was an organized criminal element at
a large boy racer meeting in Wye coup All over
the weekend. Four police vehicles were rammed during the event,
and in one incident, a white reversed its speed towards
a police car that officers were standing in front of.
Now here's what police Inspector Neil Faulkner said in an
interview on TV and z's Breakfast program this morning concerning
for police as the organized criminal element that's coming into

(00:21):
it and they're looking for sort of any opportunity to cause.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
Maximum um where they can, which is act a really
good stand.

Speaker 3 (00:29):
Mark Mitchell is the policeman assumed with us. Now, hey, Mark,
how are you? I'm very well, thank you. What is
this organized criminal element?

Speaker 2 (00:36):
He's probably talking about the gangs taking advantage of the
fact that this meet. It sounds like this meet was spontaneous.
The police have actually been outstanding and policing the ones
that they get intelligence on they are going to happen.
This one was probably more spontaneous. So I'd say that
he's probably referring to the fact that you will have
game members come out and join it because they see

(00:56):
as an opportunity of having a crack at the police
and join a bit of disorder and violence, which is
the sort of thing they like to spail it.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
Okay, And when we're talking about gangs, are we talking
about you know, the old gangs, the mongerl Mob and
the Black powt or these new guys coming from Australia.

Speaker 2 (01:11):
It could be a mix. I mean, they're all into related,
they're all working together, so you know, I could be
a mix. I can't say which gangs. And he sort
of referred to an organized crime element so money sort
of assuming that that's what he's referring to. But I'd
say that's I'm pretty sure that that is who is
referring to. I mean, the fact of the matter is
is that we've got whether it be gigs, whether it
be boy racist, whether it be these violent youth offenders,

(01:36):
they all think they're above the war. They got no
respect for the police, they got no respect for the public.
And that's why we've got a massive, you know, public
safety program currently under underwey and government.

Speaker 3 (01:47):
Okay, just explain this to me though.

Speaker 1 (01:48):
So when we're looking at this, we are seeing some
pretty bad behavior and as members of the public, we're going, Okay,
that's the whole lot of them. But are you saying actually,
for the most part, they're just kids wanting to have
a bit of a hen around and there are a
few bad eggs in there.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
Well, they're all bad eggs. I'm sorry, but you know
kids are having a horn around. I get around the country.
They go out into our rural areas, they terrorize the locals,
they damage year, they in just stock, they terrorize the
communities that they're in. So they're not going to be
treated with kid puffs. And that's why we've we're working
on some pretty tough legislation at the moment that will

(02:22):
come through cabinet to give the police additional powers to
be able to stop these boy racism. What powers, Well,
I can't go into detail on that because it hasn't
been through cabinet, but they're going to be significant and
I think they'll go a long way to stop to
being able to stop the sort of things.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
Is it impounding the cars, because you've talked to us
about that before.

Speaker 2 (02:39):
Yes, it'll be it is down there, definitely going down
that road.

Speaker 1 (02:43):
Do you have the kind of power where when they
get together, given past behavior and living and the white couple.
You can actually go in there, may be potentially with
new laws, go in there and just break the thing
up before it becomes.

Speaker 3 (02:52):
Out of hand.

Speaker 2 (02:53):
Yeah, absolutely, it's going to be. They'll be proactive powers,
but you know they'll also be the fact as well,
so they'll be broad wide ranging, and they'll give the
police the additional powers that I think they need to
be able to really clep down on this because you know,
not only they're putting the public at danger. You can
see that there's a lot of respect for our frontline

(03:13):
police officers and they are and big danger too when
they're trying to deal with these things. Cool.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
Hey, thank you very much for runningus through that. Looking
forward to seeing you take this through a cabinet. That's
Mark Mitchell, the Police Minister.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
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