Manukau City Council (Control of Graffiti)
Te Ururoa Flavell, MP for Waiariki
Wednesday 16 April 2008; 5.30pm
I te tuatahi, me whai atu au i nga korero i te ahiahi nei mo te hunga kua ngaro atu i te tirohanga kanohi, ara o nga
tamariki tokoono, me to rätou kaiako.
Ko nga korero i puta mai inapö mo taua hïkoi i te awa o Mangatepopo i Tongariro, he mea ohorere tonu, a kua paa mai te
aroha me te mamae ki a tätou katoa. No reira, moe mai koutou.
Apiti hono tätai hono ko te hunga mate ki te hunga mate, äpiti hono tätai hono, ko te hunga ora ki te hunga ora, tena
ano tätou.
We acknowledge, firstly, with deep sadness the tragic loss of lives from Elim Christian College in Howick, including six
students and their teacher.
The news last night of the catastrophic outcome of a trip down the Mangatepopo River near Tongariro, has left a profound
impact on all of our lives. Let those who have passed on rest, let us who remain here, move on.
I appreciated the comments made this evening by Mr Rodney Hide. I believe he made an excellent contribution to the
debate.
Can I say from the start that the Maori Party can understand the motivation for such a Bill. We can understand the
feelings of people as they see their homes, paths, walls painted. But we do not believe that this Bill will deal with
the problem.
Instead the focus of the Bill is on putting in place a harsh punishment regime to deal with offenders; measures which
will increase the surveillance capacities available to the Police and the Manukau City Council.
When all else fails, the Bill sets up a range of options including increasingly intrusive opportunities to arrest and
fine offenders.
Mr Speaker, in its entirety, this Bill targets young people, prohibiting the sale of spray paint to minors under
eighteen years of age; requiring evidence of age to be revealed – measures which Government has willingly picked up in
their Tagging and Graffiti Vandalism Bill.
It would hardly be news to anyone in this House, that tangata whenua will be disproportionately more likely to
experience the new suite of options meted out to address youth crime.
Let’s look at the facts. The report, Youth Justice Statistics in New Zealand 1992-2006, shows that Maori youth arrests
were more than three times that of Pakeha and twice that of Pasifika peoples.
Is there likely to be a different situation in Manukau? Hell no!
Mr Speaker, throughout the duration of the debate around graffiti, some brave people have actually dared to raise
another view, to look beyond the hysteria and the hype around grafitti, and ask why.
They are people who have dared to ask questions about the causes for creating graffiti in the first place, the
motivation that results in the reactions we see displayed on city walls.
Why do our young people bother to leave behind these embellished autographs, to make their mark, to stake out their
turf?
The Children’s Commissioner was one of the people who dared to speak out, to demonstrate courage in asking the House to
look at the widest possible range of processes and policies to manage tagging and graffiti.
She encouraged Parliament to think beyond what she called “the punitive and restrictive measures” that appear in both
the tagging – and we would suggest also, in this Bill. Dr Kiro was immediately censured.
Some at the more extreme end of reason even protesting that by taking a broad-brushed approach towards understanding
graffiti she may well have signed the arrest warrant for thousands more young people.
Mr Speaker, two years ago this House erupted in anger over a similar debate, about whether legislation was promoting the
punishment of children.
At the time of the Section 59 Debate, the Social Justice Commission of the Anglican Church, called for a more just
society in which all members are treated equally, respected and cared for.
Their submission made the case, passionately, and I quote, for a
“legal framework that is clear, consistent, compassionate and caring, especially towards the most vulnerable in our
society”.
This House passed legislation, to create such a society, as we outlawed the use of physical force against children as a
defence in any court.
And yet today, with this Bill, we have new legislation to enter private property and remove graffiti, to establish a
fine of $2500, to create an offence of carrying a paintbrush – a graffiti implement; put in place a pathway of
punishment which can lead to jail if fines are not paid.
It could have all been quite different.
The Select Committee report gave an indication of other options that could have been available.
They described the work of the Manukau Beautification Charitable Trust; the 24-7 graffiti clean up programme of
Christchurch City Council; the voluntary Memorandums of Understanding between Councils and retailers regarding the
display and storage of spray cans.
Just last week we heard about the initiative being pioneered by a Christchurch primary school, Te Rito o te Harakeke, in
fighting graffiti with graffiti.
Deputy Principal of that kura, Ruawhitu Pokaia, described the need for a different approach to dissuading young people
from tagging or bombing their site. So the kura went out and commissioned artists to bomb their school fence, Pokaia
concluding that the exercise was not only useful in brightening up the school but that the eventual product of the art
became a teaching resource in itself.
The fence now inspires questions about the birthplace of our nation; Waitangi; about the mana whenua; about Ötäkaro –
known to some as the Avon River.
Mr Speaker, the very name that this kura goes by reminds us of a holistic approach towards our young people. The name is
derived of course from the well known waiata, Hutia o te rito o te harakeke, kei whea te komako e ko.
A waiata which reminds us, that just as the centre stem of a flax bush is nurtured and supported by the older leaves, so
too, our children must be nurtured and supported by their whanau – their siblings, their parents and grandparents.
We have argued consistently throughout this debate and other more recent ones on tagging, that punishment is not the
only answer.
We have raised concerns about the vigilante action that has taken place as people have sought out their own punishments
for property crime.
And we have laid down the challenge, that a restorative justice approach would look at a comprehensive campaign which
included those offending being given the responsibility of eradicating their own graffiti and facing the people who have
suffered because of their actions.
The greatest fear that we have with legislation such as this, which sets up a scenario by which the world can sit back
and let the heavy hand of the law intervene, is that there is no call for people to do anything themselves, to get
involved in their communities, to empower themselves to make a difference to the future.
Our co-leader, Tariana Turia, spoke up for a restorative justice approach and the Thought Police exploded in righteous
fury, condemning her for her comments that we needed to think about the social commentary that graffiti represents, and
respond to the underlying concerns around the alienation of young people.
Another woman who has dared to try a different approach we have been told was the unsung community hero, Minnie of
Manukau, who gets up every morning at 5am to look over her local park, to care for the environment in her words, for the
sake of the little children.
She has become the official guardian of a community park in Otara, trying to stop the boys from tagging, running over to
catch offenders in the act and march them to their parents. As one of the neighbours described her, Minnie brings good
to the hood.
She tells the parents to care for their children, and in doing so she encourages us all to care for our environment, to
care for each other.
We can all be like Minnie of Manukau, engaging positively with our young people, rather than always persisting with
legislation and approaches which punish and condemn, which impose fines, which lock ‘em up and destroy all hope
especially if all we are doing is focusing just on Manukau.
We in the Maori Party will never agree to knee-jerk legislation which seeks to criminalize anti-social behaviour when we
all have the opportunity to support our alienated young people and encourage them to find positive ways of participating
and contributing to our communities.
We do not need this over-reaction and this continually critical, hostile attack on our young. We need to engage with our
young, we need to seek solutions, we need to restore hope that we can all nurture our young to grow into the leaders who
will help to shape our tomorrow.
ENDS