Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Carolyn Young: Retail NZ Chief Executive says proposed changes to citizen arrest laws are dangerous

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Carolyn Young: Retail NZ Chief Executive says proposed changes to citizen arrest laws are dangerous · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: All right.
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  Speaker 2: The big story yesterday was the announcement of citizens arrests,
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  Speaker 2: and we thought retailers would love them. But a lot
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  Speaker 2: of retailers came out and they did not seem to
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  Speaker 2: be on board with the government's proposed changes to the
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  Speaker 2: citizen arrest laws. You can still do it now, but
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  Speaker 2: it's pretty pretty difficult. And now the new proposal is
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  Speaker 2: to allow citizens to intervene and stop any crimes act
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  Speaker 2: offense at any time of the day and allowing them
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  Speaker 2: to detain alleged offenders and to use restraints. So retailers
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  Speaker 2: that came out yesterday and they were concerned that this
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  Speaker 2: will end up actually increasing crime and putting staff at risk.
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  Speaker 2: And so I'm joined now by Retail New Zealand Chief
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  Speaker 2: executive Carolyn young Heller.
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  Speaker 1: Carolyn, whatever, how are you this morning?
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  Speaker 2: I'm very well, what's your problem with it?
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  Speaker 1: Look, the challenge was this is that retailers are not
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  Speaker 1: trained to deal with law enforcement issues, which is what
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  Speaker 1: we're talking about. When you've most or any training that
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  Speaker 1: you never see around retail from specialist training providers that
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  Speaker 1: are always talking about how you remain harm, you don't
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  Speaker 1: you don't engage in with inwardly with the alleged offenders
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  Speaker 1: in your store. You don't physically engage with them. You
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  Speaker 1: keep a safe distance. You try to get the nails
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  Speaker 1: the store as soon as possible. What retailers want to
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  Speaker 1: be able to do is to be able to legally
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  Speaker 1: be able to ask to get the stop back. All
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  Speaker 1: of our members have told us they don't want to
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  Speaker 1: be able to do that in a physical way. They
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  Speaker 1: want to be able to get people out of their
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  Speaker 1: premises and they want to be able to trespass them
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  Speaker 1: with the law that's got some teeth in it, so
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  Speaker 1: that they won't be able to return to their store
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  Speaker 1: again and create harm. Actually physically engaging with something it
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  Speaker 1: is not something that retailers do. You know, it's an
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  Speaker 1: extremely dangerous thing. You don't know is somebody on medication?
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  Speaker 1: Are they on drugs? Do they have a hidden weapon.
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  Speaker 1: A lot of retail workers are quite young. You know
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  Speaker 1: a lot of people that work on shop tools. Many
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  Speaker 1: of us have had our first jobs in retail. You
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  Speaker 1: don't have the life experience or the knowledge around how
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  Speaker 1: you want to agent that sort of space, and we
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  Speaker 1: fear that it will create a situation where if an
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  Speaker 1: offender thinks that they might be a physically approached and
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  Speaker 1: restraint that they will come and armed with more expansive weapons.
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  Speaker 1: We'll see more knives or their guns, all of those
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  Speaker 1: sorts of things.
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  Speaker 2: But this is really actually I caught it an announcement
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  Speaker 2: of an announcement. Because this is an announcement of a proposal.
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  Speaker 2: It was there needed to be a lot more clarification
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  Speaker 2: about what is meant by detaining and what is meant
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  Speaker 2: by using restraints, in fact, what is meant by the
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  Speaker 2: entire law. So obviously it's going to Select Committee. Obviously
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  Speaker 2: it's going to be debated, So you're going to have
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  Speaker 2: the opportunity to go there and eyeball Justice Minister Paul
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  Speaker 2: Goldsmith and make these changes, don't you.
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  Speaker 1: We'll certainly be making a strong submission about this, and
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  Speaker 1: we know that in legislation and case law already there's
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  Speaker 1: you know, it's already defined what a reasonable force looks like.
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  Speaker 1: And when you're talking about restraints, we know that they're
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  Speaker 1: talking about mechanical restraints, so you're talking about handcuffs and
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  Speaker 1: or something like cable ties and things like that, So
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  Speaker 1: you know, we know a lot about what they're already
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  Speaker 1: talking about and you know, retail just isn't set up
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  Speaker 1: to be detaining offenders in store.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and one of the parties that came out and
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  Speaker 2: weren't full bore into it was supermarkets, which we everyone
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  Speaker 2: was a bit surprised at because we've all seen people
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  Speaker 2: waltz out at supermarkets with stuff. But as they said,
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  Speaker 2: they've already got their security guards, They've already got all
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  Speaker 2: this the same concerns that you have about the whole process.
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  Speaker 2: So you know, the point is, shouldn't retailers be working
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  Speaker 2: together to actually sort themselves out without the help of
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  Speaker 2: the government.
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  Speaker 1: So we are absolutely working together around what we need
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  Speaker 1: to do to prevent retail crime, and our focus is
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  Speaker 1: on prevention and keeping people safe. Every business has to
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  Speaker 1: comply to the health and safety regulations, and if you're
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  Speaker 1: putting staff potentially in harm's way by having to engage
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  Speaker 1: with an alleged defender in store, then you're not going
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  Speaker 1: to be able to come live with heart and safety regulation.
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  Speaker 1: So you're going to be in lots of trouble with
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  Speaker 1: the labored department. So, you know, preventive measures like facial
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  Speaker 1: recognition technology where you can you're identifying prior offenders in
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  Speaker 1: your store and ensuring that they don't come in store
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  Speaker 1: really ways to keep staff and customers safe. We know
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  Speaker 1: that in retail and specifically if you're thinking about social markets,
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  Speaker 1: between thirty five and fifty percent of offenders are recipibus offenders,
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  Speaker 1: so they're coming back time and time again. Facial recognition
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  Speaker 1: can stop them coming in the door. So the use
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  Speaker 1: of technology moving forward, it's really important.
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  Speaker 2: Carolyn, I thank you so much. Carolyn Young is the
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  Speaker 2: Retail New Zealand chief executive and yes she does have
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  Speaker 2: a mandate to speak on behalf of retailers and a
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  Speaker 2: Texas says the minister clearly said yesterday the citizen arrest
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  Speaker 2: law was for dairy owners. Yes, but there was no
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  Speaker 2: detail on how it would actually work. And he said that,
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  Speaker 2: he said, we're about to talk about this, so we're
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  Speaker 2: talking about it.
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  Speaker 1: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge. Listen live
• 4:56
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• 4:59
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