The Government has no plans to launch any additional reviews into the Parliament protest after seeing the terms of reference of the Independent Police Conduct Authority
The police watchdog received nearly 1900 complaints related to the three-week occupation of Parliament grounds and surrounding streets.
The IPCA announced last week it would spend the next 12 months conducting an inquiry into the police handling of the protest, including what intelligence police had available before and during the protest and how that affected decision-making.
The terms of reference cover police engagement with agencies, government officials and iwi, and also look into planning around tactics, the staff involved and their training for what unfolded.
The IPCA will also inquire into how the rights of protesters were balanced alongside the rights of everyone else affected by the occupation.
Ahead of the terms of reference being released the Prime Minister hadn’t ruled out any further inquiries if they were warranted.
Last Monday she told media the IPCA was best placed to inquire directly into the police’s operational response, and once she’d seen the scope of its investigation “we’ll be in a better position to judge whether or not there are gaps’’.
In a statement to Newsroom on Wednesday a spokesperson for Jacinda Ardern said, “given that these terms of reference are broad and comprehensive any additional review would double up with their work and incur further expense’’.
The Government has made up to $3.5 million available to the IPCA to set up a dedicated team to complete its year-long review.
While no other formal inquiries are planned by the Government, it's understood the Parliamentary Service Commission, which is made up of members from all parties, may end up reviewing the role of Parliament security during the protest.
The National Party’s justice spokesperson Paul Goldsmith says the lack of a review into other aspects, such as the conduct of the Speaker, other agencies, and the possible involvement of ministers or MPs, was “another example of the increasingly brazen Government shutting down debate and inquiry’’.
“This example of the parliamentary riots is a big issue, a broad issue affecting more than the police behaviour - of course that’s an important part of it but it’s much broader than that.
“I believe they’ll try as hard as they can to avoid any proper discussion until well into next year when the IPCA review is due out,’’ Goldsmith told Newsroom.
This comes after Labour MPs on the justice select committee blocked Goldsmith’s request earlier this month for the Police Commissioner Andrew Coster to brief members and answer questions about the protest.
“The humble starting point was a briefing from the Commissioner, but I’d like to hear from the Speaker about his actions, it raises issues around parliamentary security and what involvement, if any, did ministers or local MPs have?’’
Goldsmith told Newsroom there are a range of questions that would be “quite proper and normal” for the select committee to work through.
In the past, select committee or ministerial inquiries have been used as investigative tools; for example, the education select committee inquiry into student accommodation or the ministerial inquiry in 2021 into migrant labour in the seafood workforce.
Goldsmith told Newsroom those types of inquiries could be used to debate the issues around the Parliament protest.
