Leader of the ACT Party /u/Fresh3001 today discussed his party’s prisoner rehabilitation policy and opposition to Labour’s criminal justice reform with supporters at a rally in New Plymouth.

“The Greens-Labour government has done terrible things to New Zealand’s criminal justice system, and Kiwis are in danger as a result. The Labour-led Criminal Justice Reform Act treats twenty year olds as children in a youth court where if they plead guilty the maximum possible sentence is 3 months in a social welfare institution, or 6 months being monitored. This is an absolute travesty of justice, and allows adults to get away with awful crimes without proper punishment. Labour also weakened our bail laws by repealing an Act that allowed police to arrest 17 year olds in breach of bail conditions, and which standardised those conditions across the country. It’s clear that this government doesn’t care for the safety of New Zealand streets at all, and if elected ACT would repeal the Criminal Justice Reform Act in its entirety.

“That’s not to say that ACT does not support rehabilitation; our policy is centred around that as its name implies. We simply believe that it must be done in a sensible manner and in a way which does not put Kiwis at risk unnecessarily. ACT would promote the prisoner participation in programs which give them valuable skills for life outside a penitentiary; non-violent offenders would be able to have their sentences reduced by completing literacy and trade programs. This would also serve to fix the tradie shortage in our cities, and would reduce recidivism by giving former-criminals a steady income working a real job. ACT would also create its own youth offender program by allowing offenders aged 17 to 21 the ability to enlist in the NZDF over serving a prison sentence; this would only apply to non-violent offenders whose sentence is less than 3 years, who can pass the standard recruitment criteria, and who can fill a vacancy in a branch of our Defence Force. Vitally, this would fill personnel shortages within the NZDF and would give a sense of purpose to young offenders with no other goal in life.

“Finally, ACT would institute harsher penalties for returning extremists or fighters for foreign terrorist organisations. With ‘Kiwis’ like Mark John Taylor having left the country to fight for or otherwise serve ISIS, New Zealand should increase the maximum penalty from 14 years in prison to one of life in order to keep violent extremists off the street. We would be careful to ensure that this legislation would not needlessly affect the volunteers in foreign militias with a more righteous cause, such as the Syrian Democratic Forces.”