The fact that the govt is fighting a war of perception on the unabated rise of crime is undeniable. However, the important question that deserves attention is if the government is losing this perception battle. Most certainly, it is not winning this battle.
The battle of perception reached a new milestone when the Opposition National Party picked up a call being made by some small business advocacy group for quite some time of removing the Police Minister Poto Williams from the job and was robustly rebutted by none other than the Prime Minister.
At the beginning of the week, National Party leader Christopher Luxon said Williams was not equipped to be a police minister.
The minister was out of her depth at a time when gang activity was increasing unabated Luxon argued.
Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern was emphatic in her response and defended Williams’ track record as Police Minister, saying that there was a significant increase in the number of police, record investment in police, and the recently introduced firearm prohibition orders that many believe goes further than what National's policy had proposed to achieve.
This pitch is cautiously projected by every minister in the government fronting up media questions around the recent spate in incidences of ram-raids in dairy shops and small businesses followed with gun-related violence due to inter-gang rivalry playing out in open streets in Auckland and the Northland region.
Along with this pitch of "record investment in police," "arming up of special gang-related units and the recently introduced "firearm prohibition orders", the government is occasionally throwing the police under the bus, saying that it is the police's job to quell the rising spate of crime.
By doing so, the government is effectively washing its hand from the responsibility of taking any ownership and showing leadership and direction to the police on how to take control of a law-and-order situation that is clearly deteriorating.
When guns are being fired and bullets being sprayed in households in South Auckland almost at a will, demonstrating little fear of any consequences, including police response and possible prosecution that too almost on a daily basis then it must be acknowledged that something in the law-and-order mechanism is failing badly.
The perception about general law and order is now a bit distorted anyway.
For a long time, the central attention in the deteriorating law and order space was captured by the rising numbers and the increase in boldness in the manner of ram-raids of dairy stores and small businesses.
It was also accompanied by the dramatic reduction of the age of alleged offenders, with often reports of kids as young as seven-year-old participating in the collective act of crime confounding the police and law enforcement agencies on how best to respond in a manner that looks equitably on both – safety of young offenders and the safety and concerns of victims of such crime.
It is important to accept the fact that the police and this government have so far not been able to rightly reflect the concerns of the dairy store and small business operators who were victims of repeated ram raids and left unsupported.
This complex law and order situation has in recent months been further aggravated by the increase in gun violence and gang violence, thereby distorting the entire perception around law and order.
What is the primary, most immediate and urgent law and order problem facing the country?
Is it the rising number of audacious ram raids by young offenders at small businesses, thereby risking the lives of workers, staff, and customers alike?
Or the gang-related gun violence running amok in several patches around the country?
Are these incidences of crime related by any means, or one is seen as precipitating the other?
What is the government's view on this?
This perception battle around the law-and-order situation plays out in politics as the government being charged by some critics, including the opposition National Party as being "soft on crime" – a charge that the government denies and rebuts vehemently.
While the government could be right in many assertions of making a record investment in police and changing gun laws in NZ like never before, the public has an expectation of seeing the result of those steps on the ground.
They expect to see a rapid fall in the number of such incidences playing out on our roads.
Till that happens, it will not be an exaggeration to say that the government may be losing this battle of perception around the deteriorating law and order situation, despite its best intention.