Green MPs and the Green Party were quick to pivot from support of the George Floyd/Black Lives Matter protests in the US to use of firearms by police in New Zealand.
They have refined this to a campaign against the use of armed police patrols, which has more success than some calls for de-arming the police.
Green Party NZ @NZGreensWe have written to Police Commissioner Andrew Coster asking him to rule out armed police patrols in NZ following a recent trial in South Auckland.
Your NZ 
Maggy Wassilieff
/ 5th June 2020The trial started in October 2019.
Didn’t anyone in the Greens know it was going on.
Didn’t anyone in the community or the Police Force tell them what was happening?
Looks like they are out of the Loop… just like all the Maori MPs in the Labour Party knew Nothing….
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/te-manu-korihi/418194/labour-maori-mps-acknowledge-armed-response-teams-consultation-gap
Gezza
/ 5th June 2020Another Mike Bush screw up. And he gets a knighthood?
Gezza
/ 5th June 2020Aww .. hang on, don’t think it was a knighthood – but he still picked up another honour for being mostly MIA.
Kitty Catkin
/ 5th June 2020Maggy, I did wonder; I couldn’t see how they were in the wake of poor George Floyd’s cruel murder. That made no sense at all as there would be no point in our police being armed because of an incident on the other side of the world.
Kitty Catkin
/ 5th June 2020I do not like the way that they seem to be cashing in on the poor bloke’s murder. Trust dear Golriz for that, seeing racism everywhere.
Duker
/ 5th June 2020“Looks like they are out of the Loop… just like all the Maori MPs in the Labour Party knew Nothing….”
The NZ Police is totally independent from any politicians in its operational decisions , of which this would be one. It doesnt require government Mps approval- so should be out of the loop- although it was well publicised at the time
Gezza
/ 5th June 2020I think Davidson raises some good points about not wanting our police to end up with the culture of brutality, control & distrust we see in the US with general arming, but it would be good to know how they propose NZ should deal with all the armed offenders they’re encountering nowadays.
What is the Greens’ Policy on dealing with Gang intimidation, violence, & armed offenders who are members? How do they propose the police deal with that problem?
Corky
/ 5th June 2020What good points? I don’t see any. If there where good points they should have provided an answer to your question raised in the last paragraph of your comment.
To be fair, I class the Greens as a party of rhetoric and idealism.
Gezza
/ 5th June 2020What good points? I don’t see any.
You come across as a Weekend Rambo type. You wouldn’t.
The strongest point she makes is that in the US increased use of firearms by police hasn’t made for safer communities.
I’m waiting for the report evaluating the ARTs. I don’t have any experience of being profiled & over-policed because of my ethnicity & the fact that most street crime & violent offences are committed by members of certain ethnic communities.
I don’t support general arming of the police but I think the current policy of quick access to guns if needed is a good one for now. The AOS has worked well from my perspective.
Kitty Catkin
/ 5th June 2020I have lived in a country with armed police and been in others, and felt that it made a barrier between me and them, I must admit. I didn’t expect to be shot by them, but as there was a fair bit of terrorism going on, I knew that they would shoot if they felt it justified and if someone was in the way, tough luck.
Kitty Catkin
/ 5th June 2020Hello, Corky.
Pink David
/ 5th June 2020They are quite tepid are they not?
Minneapolis is going to scrap it’s entire police department. Cool to see an experement like that.
Duker
/ 5th June 2020The municipal area that is covered by Minneapolis City has around 430,000 people while the metro area is 7x that of 3.3 mill.
They arent going to scrap the police department in the way you think, more like reform it root and branch
Pete George
/ 5th June 2020