95bFM ‘This is all kind of crim 101 stuff’ — criminologist criticises backlash Tamatha Paul has received over police comments
12 April, 2025
Interview by Joel Armstrong, adapted by De Perry
People Against Prison Aotearoa’s, Emmy Rākete, says the backlash Green MP, Tamatha Paul, has received regarding her comments about police practices in Aotearoa is ‘absurd’.
Green MP, Tamatha Paul, has recently received backlash regarding comments she made at a panel.
At a panel with the University of Canterbury Greens and Peace Action Ōtautahi, the MP for Wellington Central said that people in Wellington do not want to see police officers everywhere and that for a lot of people, the police make them feel less safe.
She also alleged that police had waited for homeless people to “leave their spot and throw out their belongings,” which is information she says she received from a local MP from the Downtown Community Ministry and Salvation Army.
These remarks have received criticism from figures such as Prime Minister, Christopher Luxon, and Labour Party Leader, Chris Hipkins, with Luxon saying Paul is in “la-la land,” and Hipkins saying Paul’s comments were “ill-informed, were unwise, in fact were stupid”.
Press spokesperson for People Against Prisons Aotearoa and Criminology Lecturer at the University of Auckland, Emmy Rākete, told 95bFM’s The Wire that she believes Paul’s comments are not “controversial,” let alone “wrong”.
“This is all kind of crim 101 stuff.”
“This explosion of anger over her saying it is just really weird and quite hard to explain. From what [criminologists] can see, literally everything she said is true.”
Rākete pointed to recent incidents involving the police, including the misidentification and mistreatment of an 11-year-old girl and the fatal tasering of a man in Auckland last month.
"We have seen that the justice system in this country clearly doesn't work well and harms Māori people."
She says the police in New Zealand have had a long history of discriminating against marginalised communities.
“We've known this from the earliest days of the police when they were the armed constabulary force and their responsibility was to carry out the wars of colonisation and conquest that founded this country.”
“We knew this as recently as last year, when the police co-produced the Understanding Police Delivery report with a team of researchers, which found that there is systemic discrimination against Māori in how police operate.”
With these findings in mind, Rākete criticises how both Luxon and Hipkins have responded to Paul’s comments.
“The idea that Tamatha Paul is somehow out of touch or ill-informed is absurd.”
“She's very well-informed because everything she said is written down in the annals of every scientific study of the justice system ever conducted in this country.”
Paul’s comments also highlights a broader issue surrounding the effectiveness of current mental health response systems, which Rākete, Paul, and even others argue need urgent reform.
“Even Mark Mitchell, the Minister for Police, acknowledged the need for change, agreeing that the current system for mental health call-outs is failing to adequately support people in distress.”
Overall, Rākete commends Paul for her comments and her calls for something to change.
“[Regarding the original panel, Paul] actually went into quite a lot of detail about [her concerns on police responses], way more than, you know, most politicians do when asked to describe what their programme is.”
“Tam was asking for us to do something different, and she was right to do it.”
