New Police Minister Ginny Andersen will be under no illusions as to her priorities as she takes over the portfolio from Stuart Nash.
Prime Minister Chris Hipkins rattled off several key areas he wants his fellow Hutt Valley local to focus on after naming Andersen to succeed Nash following repeated breaches of the Cabinet manual by the Napier MP.
Andersen, unavailable for an interview because she was busy being briefed on her new portfolio, said in a statement she recognised the importance of Kiwis having confidence in the police, having worked with them for nearly a decade.
“New Zealanders deserve to feel safe in their communities and I’ll be giving it everything I’ve got,” she said.
“Police do incredible work every single day. I’m looking forward to getting out and about and seeing their work on the ground and in our communities.
“I’ll be getting stuck right in, we’ve got work to do.”
Andersen, the MP for Hutt South, became a minister only this year when Hipkins appointed her Minister of Digital Economy and Communications, Seniors, and Small Business.
National police spokesman Mark Mitchell pointed to Andersen’s level of ministerial experience and claimed it was a signal from Labour that the Government had “given up on law and order”.
“They’ve appointed a minister with less than two months experience at the bottom of the Cabinet rankings at a time when the country is experiencing the worst crime levels it has ever seen.”
Mitchell earlier today published a statement citing police data that showed total reported victimisations had increased from 241,000 in 2017 to more than 350,000 in 2022 - a 45 per cent increase.
Hipkins, who was Police Minister before becoming Prime Minister and had a personal interest in the portfolio, said he would be having conversations with Andersen over the coming days in light of his reprioritisation of the Government’s bloated work programme, which has led to several policies of the Ardern Government being ditched to focus on the high cost of living.
Asked what he’d like Andersen to focus on, Hipkins first mentioned retail crime before adding youth offending, organised crime and legislation targeting gangs to her list.
“[Retail crime is] an area where I know the public wants to see the Government making good progress so we’ll continue to do that,” he said.
“The focus around youth offending, making sure that we’re targeting those prolific youth offenders and getting them back engaged in something more positive so that the pattern of offending is broken.
“The work that the police have been doing around organised crime and gangs needs to continue to have a ministerial focus, I mean, these are operational matters for the police but I’d expect a Minister of Police to be taking an interest in making sure that they’re being kept up to date with the work police are doing in that area.
“And then working with the Minister of Justice [Kiri Allan] and seeing through the current legislation that we’ve got before the house around organised crime.”
The legislation Hipkins was referring to included the Criminal Activity Intervention Legislation Bill and the Criminal Proceeds (Recovery) Amendment Bill, which expanded police’s seizure and warrant powers with respect to gang activity, among other changes.
One of the reasons Nash had to resign as Police Minister was because the Napier MP had publicly acknowledged that in 2021, in between his stints as Police Minister, he had contacted Police Commissioner Andrew Coster to question whether police would appeal a court decision he felt wasn’t tough enough - actions that were considered breaches of the Cabinet Manual and the Policing Act.
Hipkins referenced Andersen’s experience working for the police when explaining why he was confident she could “forge a good working relationship” with officials including the commissioner.
“When I’ve looked at what I’ve wanted to see from the minister of police, I think she’s very well suited to take up that role,” Hipkins said.
“It is a big portfolio and I have confidence in Ginny and her ability to tackle it.”
Hipkins rebuffed any suggestion Andersen’s appointment indicated the Government did not prioritise law and order, saying he would be monitoring work done in that space, given his own interest.
Oddly, Hipkins was unable to detail Andersen’s specific experience with police, except to say she had worked there for a decade.
A later statement from his office said Andersen started with the police as a senior policy adviser before progressing to be a policy manager at the national police headquarters.
She advised on Māori, Pacific and ethnic services with a focus on reducing Māori offending. As a policy manager, her main areas of work were methamphetamine and organised crime.
Andersen was also seconded into the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet during former PM John Key’s administration to work on the Tackling Methamphetamine Action Plan.
In an interview with the Herald soon after her promotion to Cabinet in January, Andersen said she felt honoured and was “really excited about what lies ahead”.
She recalled her love of Great Barrier Island where she spent a lot of her childhood.
“We ran free and wild, the rule was to be home before it got dark and you just played with kids on the beach until it got dark or your mum yelled.”
Having once described herself as a hippie, Andersen said her open-minded parents had motivated her to challenge herself, referencing her interest in learning te reo Māori “before it was PC [politically correct]”.
“I probably wouldn’t have made some of those early decisions in my life without their help and support and they’ve always been pretty liberally minded.”
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