John MacDonald: I like the cut of NZ First's 501s
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I don’t know about Winston Peters’ chances of deporting all non-citizens found guilty of violence and sex crimes. But I do like what he’s pushing for.
He also wants to kick out non-citizens involved in criminal groups and money laundering.
There’s one thing I’m grappling with, though. Which I’ll get to.
Kicking out crims is just one part of NZ First’s immigration policy for this year’s election.
As Winston Peters himself says, it’s about treating immigration is a privilege, not a right.
To some, his idea of deporting non-citizen criminals could sound a bit hypocritical. When you consider how much Winston Peters has had to say about Australia’s 501 deportees.
Which brings me to the bit I’m grappling with.
Even though I hate the problems Australia’s 501 scheme has created for us in New Zealand, I like this idea from NZ First.
The other thing that makes me wonder why I like it so much, is that the number of non-citizens behaving badly seems to be relatively low.
According to the World Prison Brief - which is a global database giving free access to information about prison systems throughout the world - just 3 percent of the people in New Zealand prisons at the moment are non-citizens.
It’s most recent numbers - from the end of June this year - say that there are 11,256 people in prison here in New Zealand. That includes people waiting to go on trial and remand prisoners. And just 3 percent of them aren’t New Zealand citizens. Which is about 330 people.
So, if we use those numbers, you could say that 97 percent of the serious crimes in New Zealand are being committed by New Zealand citizens. Which tells me that foreigners aren’t running rampage committing all sorts of crimes.
So the number of people Winston Peters would end up deporting would be very small.
But, despite all that, I like what he wants to do. I might be a hypocrite, given I’m anti the 501 scheme. But I like it.
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