Napier visit: Christopher Luxon takes a swing at ‘whinge’ culture amid boot camp criticism

National Party leader Christopher Luxon and Napier electorate candidate Katie Nimon want to get tough on crime. Photo / Warren Buckland

Christopher Luxon says he’s more focused on better outcomes for average Kiwis than the reaction to his proposals.

The National Party leader was in Napier on Monday, eager to keep pushing his case for a “circuit breaker” to youth and gang crime.

Luxon did not win a lot of media acclaim for his boot camps plan - among other things for violent youth offenders - but believes he has the support of the victims of crime and many other folks besides.

“People can call us names, they can make sweeping judgments about the policy, but at the end of the day this government is doing nothing to fix the problem and New Zealanders are over this government,’’ Luxon said.

“On every single dimension: the economy, housing, health, education, crime; we’re going backwards. Every metric’s getting worse and I want us to do things, I want us to get things done in this country.

“We owe it to New Zealanders to improve outcomes and, so I’m sorry, but we are going to have ideas like this and proposals like this.’’

As politicians can be, Luxon is quite a persuasive talker in person.

But if he wants to form a government in 2023, he’ll have to take a few more people with him.

For all his talk about people being sick of this government, the reality is National and Labour remain much of a muchness in the polls.

Should Luxon go down, it appears as if he’s now committed to going down swinging.

“People can say what they want to say and they can complain and whinge about it, but I haven’t heard anything from this government about how to tackle the problem. There is a ram raid every 15 hours in this country.’’

He’s got statistics rolling right off his tongue that he says back up his point. Sixty per cent of children not attending school, 90 per cent of ram-raiders being completely dislocated from the school system, gang membership rising by over 50 per cent under this government.

“What we have in New Zealand is a culture of excuses. You cannot tell me in 2022, in a developed country, that having only 40 per cent of your kids going to school regularly and 100,000 chronically absent is a success for New Zealand going forward,’’ said Luxon.

“It’s a social failure, it’s a moral failure and it’s a future economic crisis.’’

Gangs are high on National’s agenda, with Luxon articulating a four-point plan to give police the tools to enable New Zealanders to feel safer in “their own homes, their own businesses and their own communities’’.

“And I want to be crystal clear: There is nothing, nothing good about gangs,’’ he said.

“They are peddling misery and pain and suffering upon their fellow New Zealanders. They want all the rights of being New Zealanders, but they’re not prepared to take all the responsibilities of being Kiwi as well, so that’s why we need a tougher course of action.’’

Luxon reiterated his party’s commitment to repealing Three Waters, should they come to power, citing Hawke’s Bay as an example of how district and regional councils can work in harmony to keep assets community-controlled.

He said National was also committed to extending the number of RSE workers to 19,000 and relaxing working holiday visa restrictions to ease staffing shortages in industries such as horticulture.

Meanwhile, National’s Napier electorate candidate, Katie Nimon, confirmed on Monday that she would be vacating her position as Hawke’s Bay Regional Council transport manager to concentrate on campaigning for that seat.