It's hoped a new police station in Auckland's CBD will make people feel safe and make it easier for police to attend crime.
The Federal Street facility will have 51 beat officers and staff, including prosecutors and firearms safety authority personnel.
Newstalk ZB senior political correspondent Barry Soper says this development will help make the city centre safer.
LISTEN ABOVE
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Barriosoper seen your political correspondence with us.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Hey Barry, good afternoon, Heather.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Okay, So this new police station, it's on Federal Street
in Auckland. It does it sound like it's like road
frontage or is it upstairs?
Speaker 3 (00:10):
No, it's going to be they're going to have a
street frontage.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
This isn't that way at the moment.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
But at the moment they occupy two floors in this
building and non negotiating with the tenants by the sounds
of things, to get off the other two floors and
then they'll occupy the whole building. That'll cost the taxpayer,
of course, quite a lot of money. And I thought
they may go back to but it's probably too late
because it would have been sold on a mural drive.
(00:37):
That was they moved out of that in twenty nineteen.
They went to Freeman's Bay to College Street and that's
the main Central Auckland police station. There's been a campaign
to get a police station in Central Auckland for some time,
but some of the critics would say, well, look to
get from College Hill to Federal Street takes no time
(00:59):
at all. Why are we wasting our money to get
into the city.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
But about people being able.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
To go the presence, isn't it.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
It's about you're in trouble, somebody's having a somebody smashed
you in the face. You need to go see a copper.
You know where to find them. Why they shut down
the Meryl Street one, by the way.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Well presumably because they'd built this new one on College Hill,
which is a pretty flash police station. The nice aspect
of it today was it's the first day of the
new police Commissioner, Richard Chambers job in the job, so
it's his first day on duty and they the Prime
Minister and he were downstairs talking to the beat cops.
(01:37):
They found a cop that was his first day on
the job, so they all got a photo together and
I thought that would have been rather nice. Wayne Brown's
really happy because this police station he lives in the city.
He said it's great for him because he'll feel much
safer now that the cops have established themselves. There'll be
fifty one police at the new station.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
So yeah, I'll tell you what. When I was at university,
it was perfectly fine to wander around that part of
town where that cop shop was on meryorl Drive, so
you'd wander up grays have.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
No problem at all.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
You'd go to the local theater there and stuff because
there was you know, downtown food and all that kind
of stuff. Cop shop's gone that place. I would not
walk down it now. So it says a lot about
the importance of a police presence.
Speaker 3 (02:22):
I think it does. And it was the funny at
the parade, the Christmas parade the other day here in Auckland.
I was down there and I got one of the
cops to take a photograph of me and my little boy. Yeah,
and I said, I know it's not your job description,
but I've got to say so. I saw a lot
of cops around there and I thought, you know, it
was good to see.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
I'll tell you what. They will have their work cut
out though, because one of.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Them left the Police Commissioner the Prime Minister's itinerary when
he was in when he was in Queenstown yesterday on
the desk board or the car.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
So they may have culprit over that one.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
And I think it's probably fair enough that it's one
of the those things that you probably don't think about
when you're jumping out of the car to open the
door for the Prime Minister and you leave it on the.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Dashboard probably as somebody made the point, not so bad
with Luxon would have been terrible with Jacinda because of
the feels around it totally and yeah yeah, So what
do you make of the first year of the coalition government.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Well, i'll tell you what that police station launch. The
Prime Minister is enthusiastic about ending his first year. He
said the government has performed well.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
Have listen, We've made some tremendous progress over the last
twelve months. We know there's a lot more for us
to do. I have to say, twelve months into this job,
I feel incredibly optimistic about the future for New Zealand.
I think there is no reason why together we can't
build the best small country on planet Earth, period. And
we know we've got work to do economically, socially, environmentally,
but we're working our way through that. We certainly for
(03:48):
now are in a turnaround job.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
Yeah they are, and it's going to be really interesting.
They had a baptism afar. Let's face, it had a
hell of a time when they took the treasury benches.
But it's interesting to me the dynamics, I mean, the leadership,
because that shared deputy prime ministership that's never been done before.
So in main X year, you're going to have David
Seymour sit alongside the Prime Minister in the House and
(04:12):
Winston Peters will no doubt be relegated, but he'd be
pretty close by, I would imagine.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
But look, you only have to look down.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
As I did last week on the Prime Minister and
Winston Peters to see that the rapport between these two
is very good and certainly they obviously get on well.
We saw in an interview with the Prime Minister that
he and his wife and Winston and his partner have
dinner from time to time.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Not the same with David Seymour.
Speaker 3 (04:41):
But David Seymour was a much more difficult character to
work with than what Winston Peters would be.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
It's not allowed on the double dates, no okay. Now,
as a rugby fan, did TJ make you angry?
Speaker 2 (04:55):
I yelled at the screen.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
I wonder what he was doing and there was a
lot of grunting and stuff before the harker started. And
to learn that he was involving himself in politics in
the way he did with what is our national sport?
I thought was, you know, call me old fashioned, but
I really don't believe there's a place for politics on
the field, on the rugby field when you're at an
(05:19):
international test fixture. And I thought it was not unforgivable,
but it was unacceptable. The thing that worries me, Heather,
that we've heard Debbie beating her gums about. Look, the
Harker is our way of expressing ourselves. So in the
(05:39):
house when we saw that hakker a couple of weeks ago,
you can probably bet your bottom dollar there'll be more
of that sort of behavior in the House of the
Speaker doesn't do something.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
About Garry, were you not proud of the All Blacks
when they said that they were not going to go
to South Africa in opposition to the Apartics?
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Absolutely?
Speaker 1 (05:57):
So why is okay for politics?
Speaker 3 (05:59):
No? No, that was a totally different situation. It wasn't
an internal New Zealand problem, although the country was divided
on the apart eid issue, but that's a totally different
scenario to what this is. And the Treaty of Wye.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Tonguey okay, thank you Berry, appreciate it, Barry so for
seeing your political correspondence.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to
news talks.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
It'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio
Barriosoper seen your political correspondence with us.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Hey Barry, good afternoon, Heather.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Okay, So this new police station, it's on Federal Street
in Auckland. It does it sound like it's like road
frontage or is it upstairs?
Speaker 3 (00:10):
No, it's going to be they're going to have a
street frontage.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
This isn't that way at the moment.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
But at the moment they occupy two floors in this
building and non negotiating with the tenants by the sounds
of things, to get off the other two floors and
then they'll occupy the whole building. That'll cost the taxpayer,
of course, quite a lot of money. And I thought
they may go back to but it's probably too late
because it would have been sold on a mural drive.
(00:37):
That was they moved out of that in twenty nineteen.
They went to Freeman's Bay to College Street and that's
the main Central Auckland police station. There's been a campaign
to get a police station in Central Auckland for some time,
but some of the critics would say, well, look to
get from College Hill to Federal Street takes no time
(00:59):
at all. Why are we wasting our money to get
into the city.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
But about people being able.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
To go the presence, isn't it.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
It's about you're in trouble, somebody's having a somebody smashed
you in the face. You need to go see a copper.
You know where to find them. Why they shut down
the Meryl Street one, by the way.
Speaker 3 (01:15):
Well presumably because they'd built this new one on College Hill,
which is a pretty flash police station. The nice aspect
of it today was it's the first day of the
new police Commissioner, Richard Chambers job in the job, so
it's his first day on duty and they the Prime
Minister and he were downstairs talking to the beat cops.
(01:37):
They found a cop that was his first day on
the job, so they all got a photo together and
I thought that would have been rather nice. Wayne Brown's
really happy because this police station he lives in the city.
He said it's great for him because he'll feel much
safer now that the cops have established themselves. There'll be
fifty one police at the new station.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
So yeah, I'll tell you what. When I was at university,
it was perfectly fine to wander around that part of
town where that cop shop was on meryorl Drive, so
you'd wander up grays have.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
No problem at all.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
You'd go to the local theater there and stuff because
there was you know, downtown food and all that kind
of stuff. Cop shop's gone that place. I would not
walk down it now. So it says a lot about
the importance of a police presence.
Speaker 3 (02:22):
I think it does. And it was the funny at
the parade, the Christmas parade the other day here in Auckland.
I was down there and I got one of the
cops to take a photograph of me and my little boy. Yeah,
and I said, I know it's not your job description,
but I've got to say so. I saw a lot
of cops around there and I thought, you know, it
was good to see.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
I'll tell you what. They will have their work cut
out though, because one of.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Them left the Police Commissioner the Prime Minister's itinerary when
he was in when he was in Queenstown yesterday on
the desk board or the car.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
So they may have culprit over that one.
Speaker 3 (02:57):
And I think it's probably fair enough that it's one
of the those things that you probably don't think about
when you're jumping out of the car to open the
door for the Prime Minister and you leave it on the.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Dashboard probably as somebody made the point, not so bad
with Luxon would have been terrible with Jacinda because of
the feels around it totally and yeah yeah, So what
do you make of the first year of the coalition government.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Well, i'll tell you what that police station launch. The
Prime Minister is enthusiastic about ending his first year. He
said the government has performed well.
Speaker 4 (03:25):
Have listen, We've made some tremendous progress over the last
twelve months. We know there's a lot more for us
to do. I have to say, twelve months into this job,
I feel incredibly optimistic about the future for New Zealand.
I think there is no reason why together we can't
build the best small country on planet Earth, period. And
we know we've got work to do economically, socially, environmentally,
but we're working our way through that. We certainly for
(03:48):
now are in a turnaround job.
Speaker 3 (03:49):
Yeah they are, and it's going to be really interesting.
They had a baptism afar. Let's face, it had a
hell of a time when they took the treasury benches.
But it's interesting to me the dynamics, I mean, the leadership,
because that shared deputy prime ministership that's never been done before.
So in main X year, you're going to have David
Seymour sit alongside the Prime Minister in the House and
(04:12):
Winston Peters will no doubt be relegated, but he'd be
pretty close by, I would imagine.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
But look, you only have to look down.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
As I did last week on the Prime Minister and
Winston Peters to see that the rapport between these two
is very good and certainly they obviously get on well.
We saw in an interview with the Prime Minister that
he and his wife and Winston and his partner have
dinner from time to time.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Not the same with David Seymour.
Speaker 3 (04:41):
But David Seymour was a much more difficult character to
work with than what Winston Peters would be.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
It's not allowed on the double dates, no okay. Now,
as a rugby fan, did TJ make you angry?
Speaker 2 (04:55):
I yelled at the screen.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
I wonder what he was doing and there was a
lot of grunting and stuff before the harker started. And
to learn that he was involving himself in politics in
the way he did with what is our national sport?
I thought was, you know, call me old fashioned, but
I really don't believe there's a place for politics on
the field, on the rugby field when you're at an
(05:19):
international test fixture. And I thought it was not unforgivable,
but it was unacceptable. The thing that worries me, Heather,
that we've heard Debbie beating her gums about. Look, the
Harker is our way of expressing ourselves. So in the
(05:39):
house when we saw that hakker a couple of weeks ago,
you can probably bet your bottom dollar there'll be more
of that sort of behavior in the House of the
Speaker doesn't do something.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
About Garry, were you not proud of the All Blacks
when they said that they were not going to go
to South Africa in opposition to the Apartics?
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Absolutely?
Speaker 1 (05:57):
So why is okay for politics?
Speaker 3 (05:59):
No? No, that was a totally different situation. It wasn't
an internal New Zealand problem, although the country was divided
on the apart eid issue, but that's a totally different
scenario to what this is. And the Treaty of Wye.
Speaker 1 (06:15):
Tonguey okay, thank you Berry, appreciate it, Barry so for
seeing your political correspondence.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
For more from Hither Duplessy Allen Drive, listen live to
news talks.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
It'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.