United Nations Committee all too easy for Kiwi fringe to hijack
Baseless claims are parroted back as PR by proxy, writes Greg O'Connor.
In the past few days we have seen a flurry of reporting after the United Nations' call for New Zealand to consider relinquishing Tasers. This pronouncement from the UN's Human Rights Committee was accompanied by criticisms of our justice system as discriminatory against Maori and too harsh on young offenders. It also said the Foreshore and Seabed Act was an attack on human rights.
This follows earlier claims by the committee that Tasers are "torture devices".
Most New Zealanders will shake their heads in disbelief. The committee will have achieved little more than to confirm, in the minds of most of us, that it is out of touch and irrelevant. The UN's own official reports of proceedings demonstrate a startling lack of comprehension of New Zealand and New Zealanders, and an alarming reliance on false or misleading information provided by fringe lobby groups.
The committee is, unfortunately, seen by some interest groups as a tool that can be manipulated to advance their own narrow political agendas. By feeding selective information, couched in emotive and misleading language, interest groups know they can prompt the UN to express concerns in equally sensational language. This is then fed back into New Zealand media.
A good example is the committee's grave concerns about the "militarisation" of New Zealand young offenders. This was prompted by Peace Movement Aotearoa, and is transparently a way to attack the Government's "boot camp" Fresh Start plans. Emotive and arguably effective lobbying, but patently false.
Similar hysterical human rights claims were made by the Aotearoa Indigenous Rights Charitable Trust - hardly a renowned group here - and duly parroted by the committee, in relation to the Foreshore and Seabed Act and Operation Eight.
This is PR by proxy, by groups that lack sufficient credibility to campaign successfully here on their own merits, and it does the UN no credit to allow itself to be used in this way. The committee makes this manipulation too easy. It apparently fails to do basic research, or seek comment from other New Zealand organisations and experts to balance claims that are obviously politically motivated.
In relation to Tasers, the committee's comments suggest members are ignorant of the fact that New Zealand police are unarmed, and being seriously assaulted in record and ever-increasing numbers. Considering most of the committee members come from countries where police carry firearms at all times - like most police worldwide - their concerns about our less- than-lethal response to violent criminals are difficult to understand. Are they suggesting we should relinquish Tasers, in favour of full arming with lethal firearms?
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Concerns about the over- representation of Maori in crime and imprisonment statistics show little more than a fleeting appreciation of the facts. Maori are also hugely over-represented in victim statistics.
These figures are two sides of the same coin, and both attributable to the unfortunate reality that Maori are also over- represented in the lower socio-economic communities and suburbs where most crime happens. There are all kinds of reasons for that fact, many of them uncomfortable for New Zealanders, but the UN's suggestion that "discrimination in the administration of justice" is one of them is simply nonsense. No evidence is produced by the UN to support the claim, because none exists.
Mostly, the UN Human Rights Committee simply damages its own credibility through reports such as this. However, the predictable cycle by which baseless claims are parroted back through New Zealand media is concerning, in that it gives fringe agendas attention they do not deserve. The danger is that ministers or officials overreact, and compromise policies in response to concerns that lack merit. Doing so in respect of Tasers would also compromise the safety of police officers and the public they protect. That must not be allowed.
Greg O'Connor
Police Association President.
