Mike's Minute: Is the Government ignoring advice for a reason?

Yet another “advice ignored” story.

The trouble with advice is it's not automatically right and more often than not the media seems to think it counts for something, hence their obsession with coverage.

The latest example is Paul Goldsmith ignored advice around move-on orders.

The media plays these advice stories up because it suits their increasingly obvious bias against the Government.

But when you read the advice it’s a mixture of the vague, wrong and made up.

The best part is the bit that says evidence of a growing public disorder problem is limited. Are they serious?

They obviously work from home and looked out their kitchen window at morning tea time and didn’t see any disturbances.

Is there a person who has walked down Queen Street in Auckland, Courtenay Place in Wellington or their environs and not seen the trouble and upset the wonks can't see?

They go on - police data showing prosecutions for such offences has declined in recent years. I repeat, are they serious?

Why do you reckon that is? Just because you didn’t prosecute doesn’t mean it didn’t happen.

They also, in a very political way, go on to lump all homeless or rough sleepers into the same category. The media does the same thing.

It makes the very obvious and deliberate mistake of assuming all homeless or rough sleepers are the same. And like anyone else, they are not.

The move-on orders are not about anyone and everyone. They are about the ones who cause trouble, who abuse the shopper or stop the proprietor getting into their business.

As far as I can see, the aforementioned isn't actually mentioned in the advice.

At some point the wonks might want to ask about rights. As much as you might want to argue for the right for a drug-crazed lunatic to be able to say what they want and do what they want, where they want, you might like to wonder if a punter should be able to go about their business unhindered.

Out here in the real world the answer is, yes.

Hence the Government move-on move reads the mood of the community, and is welcome, and will be effective, and, like the ram-raids and shop smashing's, will be dealt with.

The question left is if that’s the quality of advice ministers get, I see some reasonably large and obvious savings to be made.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.