Tuesday, August 10, 2004
"Police didn't take over Traffic, Traffic took over the Police."
That from Greg O'Connor who has just articulated what we all already knew on Holmes - that the Government has turned the entire Police force into a glorified Traffic Unit.
Police are given a directive to order a certain number of tickets, if they don't, they lose funding. Yet the senior Police hierarchy to date have stood by their Minister and maintained that this is not a quota. In what way is it not? Please don't tell me it is policy excused by data manfactured by the contemptible LTSA.
My Right feels sorry for the Police. They are hand cuffed by Beehive revenue gathering policy, to quote Mr O'Connor, "They have lost any discretion" - without discretion, they lose the public. I will be interested to see George Hawkins in question time tomorrow (if he even fronts) - he must be in for some vociferous questioning for this.
The Police deserve better than this, more to follow.
