From policing to politicking: Police Minister’s half-term report

Monday, 17 March 2025

During the election campaign National launched a relentless crusade against Labour’s supposedly weak-on-crime rhetoric. So, how is the new Police Minister doing?

In an office on the fourth floor of the Beehive, amidst the gleam of polished medals and moments of history captured in now fading photographs, is a framed magazine cut-out.

In the image, a fresh-faced Mark Mitchell is bent low, looking past the camera as he kneels beside his loyal police dog, their bond captured in a rare moment of calm.

It’s here, in this unassuming wooden frame, that a glimpse into Mitchell’s life before he entered the cut-throat world of politics is offered.

During a policing career that spanned a decade-and-a-half, Mitchell worked among specialist units as a dog handler and on the Armed Offenders Squad.

Now 56 years old, the policing portfolio is a natural fit for Mitchell, whose life has been devoted to a no-nonsense approach to law and order.

He’s been stabbed with a samurai sword and fought for his life in a five-day siege in Iraq, but how is Mitchell faring almost half-way through his tenure as Police Minister?

Becoming Police Minister

With former National MP Frank Gill as a grandfather, a sense of public service was ingrained in Mitchell from a young age as he grew up on Auckland’s North Shore.

Mitchell said he didn’t have “rose tinted glasses on” when it came to the New Zealand Police Force. “We’re an organisation that’s looking for constant improvement, and ocasionally make mistakes, but in my view, we’ve got the best police force in the world.”

Having dropped out of school at 15, Mitchell’s first job was in shepherding but after five years on farms, he was ready for more. Despite fleetingly considering the defence force (“I didn’t think I’d thrive in that command control type environment”), Mitchell joined the police at 20.

“I loved my policing career. I loved every moment of it. It’s really challenging, but it’s hugely rewarding as well,” he recalled.

During his 13 year policing career, Mitchell also sustained a number of serious injuries that ultimately contributed to his leaving the job.

To name just two, he was stabbed by an armed offender with a samurai sword (as was his beloved police dog, Czar), and was left with blinding headaches after sustaining a head injury that required surgery to pin his face back together with steel plates.

In the end, however, it was the death of a colleague that led to Mitchell leaving the job he’d so loved.

In 1999, Constable Murray Stretch was called out to reports of a burglary at a Four Square in Mangakino. Stretch chased then 19-year-old Carlos Namana from the store and caught him at the entrance to the local hospital.

During the struggle that ensued, Namana beat Stretch to death. Mitchell had been called out as the dog handler on duty from Taupō, but he didn’t arrive in time.

Police Minister Mark Mitchell flew to Nelson to attend the funeral of Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming, whose death he described as his “worst nightmare”.

“I was already carrying the injuries and I think everyone reaches a place where they say ‘you know what, maybe it’s time to go out and do something different’ and that’s what I did.”

Earlier this year, Mitchell was again reminded of the grave risks of policing when Senior Sergeant Lyn Fleming died after being struck by a vehicle during the early hours of New Year’s Day. A man is going through the courts, charged with her murder.

“That was the worst possible way to start the year. Certainly for me, it’s my worst nightmare as a Police Minister. You don’t get over those things.”

After leaving the police, Mitchell spent a decade overseas.

Initially he was asked to form part of a risk assessment and management team for the newly-formed interim government in Iraq. During this time, he was embedded in an Iraqi special forces unit as an adviser and trainer.

But Mitchell was also approached by a Middle Eastern logistics company that asked him to take over their security.

He later formed his own company to run security for critical infrastructure, ports and airports, while working in rescue operations as an international hostage negotiator, at one point fighting for his life on the rooftop of a diplomatic compound during a five-day siege.

Mitchell said he “loved every moment” of his time in the police force.

“But my kids were growing up as expat kids, and I wanted them to be reconnected with home and I was ready to get back in the public service, so we came back to New Zealand.”

Mitchell entered Parliament in 2011 when he was elected as the MP for the Rodney electorate. Today, he is the MP for Whangaparāoa.

As well as being the Minister of Police, Mitchell is also the Minister of Corrections, Minister for Emergency Management and Recovery, Minister for Ethnic Communities, and Minister for Sport and Recreation.

Gang patch ban notched down as a win

First signalled during National’s ‘tough on crime’ election campaign, legislation banning the wearing of gang insignia in any public place became illegal in Aotearoa on November 21.

The first arrest came at three minutes past midnight that day, with a steady trickle of arrests continuing in the weeks that followed. But the expected windfall of arrests never eventuated.

Instead, fears of mass rebellion and protests proved unfounded and overnight gang patches seemed to mostly disappear from New Zealand’s streets.

Mitchell said police had been able to “roll back up over the top of the gangs” in New Zealand.

As the face of the new law, alongside Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith, Mitchell is owed the credit for this.

As sociologist and gang expert Dr Jarrod Gilbert told The Post: “I think the implementation of the patch ban, which had all the potential to be incredibly problematic, has gone about as smoothly as anyone could have hoped.”

However, the high level of compliance with the new laws to date was by no means an indication that police were out of the woods yet, Gilbert said.

“The conversation isn’t over. We’re now going to see these cases coming before the courts, and that’s when we’ll start to see arguments about interpretations of the legislation,” Gilbert said.

But Mitchell is more confident: 'Commentators were very sceptical. They thought the gangs were too strong and didn’t feel that police had the capability to be able to deal with them, but it’s been quite the opposite.”

More recently, Mitchell has been plagued with questions about whether Destiny Church should be placed on the list of gangs who are prohibited from gathering in large groups in public. His answer is simple: “They don’t meet the criteria.”

In the end, Mitchell left the police force after the death of his good friend, Murray Stretch, which he says hit him “very, very hard”.

‘Headwinds’ hindering police recruitment

Last year, Associate Police Minister Casey Costello announced the ambitious target of bolstering the police frontline by 500 officers by the end of 2025.

At the time, there were 10,112 constabulary staff, according to data collected by the Police Association. This month there are 10,176, marking a net gain of 64 police officers.

“We’d had headwinds. There’s no doubt about that,” says Mitchell, of police recruitment struggles. “The police had been put in a position for several years where they were trying to do their job, in my view, with one hand tied behind their back.”

Yet, Mitchell remains adamant that the Government’s goal is still achievable.

“We were behind on numbers when we came into Government, I think over 200 behind. We’re making gains on that. There’s over 300 police officers at the Police College at the moment, and there’s plans to be able to recruit and train over 600 this year […]

“The police have been working really hard. It is a stretch target, without a doubt, and they’re having to work really hard to achieve it, but yes, the information that I have through my associate is that we can still meet that target.”

One particular thorn in the side of the police recruitment campaign has been the efforts from Australian forces to poach Kiwi cops. While Mitchell said he doesn’t want to see New Zealand police officers going to Australia, he understood and respected their personal decisions.

“It’s indicative of the challenges that [Australia has]. Without a doubt, they’ve got bigger challenges than us.”

Mitchell said all officers who went over to Australia would be welcomed back, citing anecdotal information he’d received that indicated “five or six” are lined up to come back to Aotearoa.

The changing face of crime in New Zealand had taken its toll on some police officers, Mitchell said, acknoweldging “it’s difficult out there”.

“I had 12 months of everyone almost goading police officers to go overseas and leave New Zealand, but we’ve now got police officers that want to come home,” he said.

Police morale: A tale of two halves

A year and a half into Mitchell’s tenure as Police Minister, reports about the morale amongst officers are mixed.

While Mitchell says morale is tracking well, frontline officers The Post spoke to indicated otherwise. One said: “We are running so low on numbers it’s burning staff out. Everyone is afraid to speak up because they will be squashed and it will ruin any career progression. It’s a complete mess.”

Another added: “I’ve never seen morale so low. Some staff call in sick because they know how busy the shift will be with the low numbers.”

But, while Mitchell said morale amongst the troops is “not something I like to comment on because I can’t speak on behalf of all police officers and their individual experiences”, he added that the anecdotal feedback he’s received has been positive.

“I’m out and about meeting our frontline police officers on a daily basis. I had a policing career myself, so I've still got many friends and colleagues that are still in the police right through the full range of ranks and specialist sections, and they're not afraid to tell me exactly what's going on and what's happening.”

Mitchell said it was a challenging job, and because of the nature of the work police do, some will reach a point where they need to leave the job if they’ve “started to become too negative, because that can spread”.

Black mould, leaking custody suites and chronic overcrowding

From black mould, to leaks and chronic overcrowding, regional police stations have been crying out for capital expenditure for years.

The Post understands that Greymouth police station has developed a black mould problem so bad that staff have resorted to wearing masks in the building. Those not willing to risk it have abandoned ship altogether, with some working from portacoms set up in the carpark.

Further south in Rolleston, chronic overcrowding has meant that some officers have lockers inside the disabled toilet cubicle.

Wellington’s Upper Hutt police station, on the other hand, is “leaking like a sieve', with pots, pans and buckets placed around the base in the hopes the station avoids the same fate as in Greymouth and Wairarapa.

Custody suites in Hawke’s Bay are also struggling with so many leaks that plastic tarpaulin has been placed over the entirety of the roof.

Mitchell acknowledged there were “huge challenges with police property”.

Mark Mitchell and his beloved police dog, Czar.

So what’s the plan to fix it?

“Police are working on prioritising that”.

But is it a priority for him?

“There are lots of priorities. It’s operational, it’s for the police to prioritise.”

‘Early signs of a recovery’ in NZ’s crime landscape

As Mitchell approaches the half-way point of his term, he believes he’s starting to see results.

“There are early signs of a recovery, but we know that we have a lot more work to do.”

For Mitchell, this includes continuing his war against gangs and turning his attention to targeting methamphetamine usage across the country.

But where Labour placed their focus on looking at the structural causes of crime across Aotearoa, National has focused on results ‒ tangible, numerical targets.

The Government set itself the target of reducing violent crime victimisations by 20,000, by 2030.

Latest data from December classes the target as 'feasible' but the current number of victims is about 25,000 more than the target, although it has reduced by about 10,000 since the last quarterly update, and by 24,000 since a peak in June 2024.

The Government’s overall focus, of course, is also on improving the economic outlook of the country, something which Mitchell hinted at when discussing the police property portfolio.

“It’s frustrating because our political cycle means that […] we’ve got to come in and try and steer the ship back onto a positive fiscal trajectory and back into surplus.”

This, Mitchell said, was “tough” and meant that until the Government was able to drive itself into a better financial position there would be limits to what they could do.