ACTs insane child punishment vs Labour’s sensible response to ram raiding vs National mumble mumble

Jesus wept ACT are going full blown crazy now.

Children in chains is their ram raid solution?

ACT Party wants youth offenders who commit serious offences to wear ankle bracelets

Offenders as young as 11 who commit serious offences would have to wear ankle bracelets that monitor their every movement under a policy being proposed by ACT.

Leader David Seymour says the Government’s recently unveiled package to crack down on youth crime is just a “grab bag of reheated policy” and “doesn’t introduce a single consequence for youth offenders”.

“The Government’s answer is to extend policies they already have in place,” Seymour said. “Do they really think that ram raids will stop by extending a few programmes that already exist?”

…National agreed and wanted more bash for your buck…

The National Party reacted to the Government’s announcement on Tuesday by describing it as “window dressing” with no “meaningful consequences”.

“Most ram raiders aren’t being caught by Police and if they aren’t being caught they can’t be given ‘wraparound services’,” said justice spokesperson Paul Goldsmith.

“Once again, victims are not at the heart of Labour’s announcement. More support has been announced for offenders, while victims are still at the back of the queue.”

…Labour tried a reasonable and intelligent response…

Police Minister Chris Hipkins said punishing young people through the criminal justice system often sets them up for a life of adult crime.

While he said young offenders “will continue to be dealt with seriously”, the programmes the Government is extending are “about a second chance for those that merit it”.

“We’re ramping up our investment in young people to create even more opportunities for them to earn and learn,” Hipkins said.

“We want to provide every young New Zealander with the chance to succeed. To do that we’ve identified youth-focused programmes that are working already out in the community, and investing heavily to scale them up.”

…the true outrage here is that Labour are only now rolling out successful South Auckland youth engagement programs to West Auckland, why does MSDs refusal to fund universal programs in favour of cheaper options the over riding value here?

Let’s remember, the median age of these ram raiders are 15, these were the children that John Key’s Government had living in cars or were throwing out onto the streets because of the fake meth State House contamination scandal!

These ram raiders are our collective legacy from those draconian solutions in Key’s term, so listening to ACT and National demand more draconian laws as a response to crime that is the result of their last range of draconian measures is fucking insane!

I appreciate and fully acknowledge seeing children commit organised crime like this is genuinely concerning to the wider community.

But I beg us all to take a deep breath, appreciate the uniqueness of this moment and the extreme pressure on so many people right now.

I’ve said from the beginning that Covid is a triple peaked crisis, the first was the physical impact on physical health, the second was the economic impact and the third was the impact on mental health.

Human Beings are social creatures, the worst punishment is isolation – we’ve all gone through a unique universal experience and it’s damaged many.

We are seeing that mental health pressure exploding everywhere from the Dumb Lives Matter protest on Parliament’s Lawns, to domestic violence, to fights in Supermarkets to a spike in crime, to the increasingly toxic online misogyny,  to the Wellington Middle Class Marxists screaming to send in the military to bash protestors they didn’t like, everyone has been impacted mentally by these unprecedented times and the true cost is yet to be felt.

Polling for the Mental Health Foundation found 36 per cent of people surveyed were experiencing poor emotional wellbeing, up from 27 per cent a year ago.

Add to all of this stress the enormous jump in rents and cost of living crisis and you have desperation, anxiety, anger and fear all combining into the current maelstrom.

Of course every effort must be taken to catch every perpetrator and have them dealt appropriately through Youth Court processes or social agencies, but understanding these ram raids are the psychological and economic symptom of a deeper malaise that is running through post-Peak Covid NZ is a far greater starting point in terms of decision making than allowing our fear and anger dictate policing policy that might make things worse.

This is but the beginning of the post traumatic trauma this country is working through, we have to de-escalate and act like adults here, not become a fucking Lynch mob!

We have enough Lynch mobs as it is.

These damaged kids need our help, their criminality is a reflection of a gated neoliberal society who enrich the wealthy while providing crumbs for the poor.

The economic outlook is far more grim than we are admitting and these pressures are only building.

We need alternatives, not more of the same failed conservative social policy knee jerks.

The ramraids are a symptom of a much deeper malaise.

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