Jan Tinetti Labour MP

There's no question that Tauranga is a beautiful place to live, with vibrant communities and great local businesses. It's also a safe place to live, and making sure it stays that way is a top priority for me.

While youth crime has been trending down long-term, the recent spike that New Zealand has seen in ram raids is not acceptable.

Our Government is focused on tackling the problems that cause crime with solutions that are proven to work, while also making sure appropriate consequences are in place. We've rolled out a raft of measures to achieve this, including our Better Pathways package.

Announced in September, this package expands programmes that support young people back into education or employment, and it's already having an impact on offending. Around half of the most serious and repeat young offenders that have been identified and targeted are now in education or training, and wrap-around support is in place to help them get back on the right track.

Now we're taking the next step in our plan with a circuit-breaker for a specific group of children who engage in serious and repeat offending. It will ensure children who commit serious crimes will be dealt with immediately and receive the support they need to stop them offending again.

By taking this type of approach, fast-tracking it and applying it to a small group of 10-13 year olds who are serious offenders, we can help address the recent spike in offending and continue to see the number of ram raids come down.

Nobody should feel unsafe going to work in NZ, which is why we also recently released a package of practical measures to tackle retail crime, alongside new initiatives to partner with small businesses and local councils.

This includes a new fog cannon subsidy scheme, which will be open to all small shops and dairies in New Zealand. We are also extending the Retail Crime Prevention Fund to help businesses that have been victim to an aggravated robbery, as well as a ram raid, to access better security measures, like CCTV systems, shatter-proof glass and bollards.

Police are already doing good work catching the people doing these crimes and it is having a noticeable impact on offending rates, but we need to lock in that progress and sustain it. These next steps add to the measures this Government is already taking to combat crime and keep people here in Tauranga safe.

We know there's no single solution to tackling crime or the causes of it, but we're absolutely focused on putting in place solutions that work and helping at-risk young people turn their lives around.