You’re more likely to be sent to jail following a conviction than ever before, according to the latest Ministry of Justice statistics.
The number of charges and convictions for possessing cannabis or methamphetamine has also jumped in recent years, returning to levels before a pivotal 2019 law change seeking to put health ahead of punishment.
The data, released yesterday, were for finalised charges for 2024/25, meaning they do not include charges that are still before the courts. It is a different data set from what the Government uses for its public service target on violent crime, which takes into account the vast majority of crime that goes unreported.
For the year to June 2025, 7415 people were sent to prison following conviction, a 14% rise on the previous year and a 35% jump on 2022/23.
“The proportion of people who received prison sentences is the highest proportion on record (15%),” the ministry’s report on the data said.
The proportion of convicted charges leading to prison sentences (27%) was also at an all-time high.
“People convicted of robbery (61%), sexual offences (58%) and homicide (56%) had the highest imprisonment rates. Most offences had an increase in imprisonment rates,” the report said.
“Māori were two times more likely to receive a prison sentence than non-Māori (20% versus 10%), whereas non-Māori were more likely to receive a monetary sentence (37% versus 17%).”
It’s unclear why this is happening.
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has previously talked up the impact of the Government’s law and order vibe pushing back on the “concerning trend where the courts have imposed fewer and shorter prison sentences”.
But most of the Government’s law and order agenda focuses on lengthening sentences, and many polices – including Three Strikes 2.0 and sentencing reforms – were not implemented until after the period covered in the data.
New policies targeting gangs were in place, but this made up a tiny fraction of the overall number of people who were convicted in 2024/25 (176 out of 50,800 people convicted).
Part of the increase is due to a spike in charges and prison sentences for drug offences, though this appears to be operational, as there has been no change to drug policy.
The Herald has asked police whether there have been any operational changes to policing drug use.
The data suggests police are cracking down increasingly severely on cannabis.
In 2024/25, there was a 27% increase in the number of charges for possessing cannabis compared with the previous year (and by 66% compared with 2021/22), while there was also a 37% increase in charges for dealing or distributing the drug.
There was a similar 28% increase in charges for methamphetamine possession compared with the previous year (and by 57% compared to 2021/22), but unlike for cannabis, this was accompanied by a surge in P consumption, which doubled in late 2024 to the highest on record.
Curiously, charges for distribution or dealing meth dropped by 8% compared to the previous year, though international trafficking charges skyrocketed by 275% over the last five years.
The growth in charges reverses a dramatic fall following a law change in 2019, described by some as effective decriminalisation for personal drug use. It clarified that police shouldn’t prosecute for drug use if a therapeutic approach would be “more beneficial to the public interest”.
The change also codified police discretion, so how it was operationalised was up to frontline police.
The number of people charged with drug possession subsequently dropped from about 4000 a year to 2356 in 2021/22. The latest numbers show a return to what preceded the change: about 4000 people were charged and about 3000 convicted.
“There were a staggering 2953 New Zealanders who were convicted for low-level drug use type charges where that was the most serious charge,” Drug Foundation executive director Sarah Helm told the Herald.
“The positive effects of the [2019 change] appear to have gone together. That’s not a good use of police or justice resources, to arrest people whose crime is hurting no one other than themselves. And for those people, a criminal conviction is very likely to compound their problems.”
The higher volume of charges contributed to more people in prison for drug possession (as their most serious drug offence), which more than doubled from 334 in 2021/22 to 688 in 2024/25. For 465 of them, a 40% increase in numbers from the previous year, drug use/possession was their only charge.
Helm said the rise in methamphetamine consumption has not been met with an equal rise in support services.
“In fact, over a similar time period – between 2019/20 compared to 2023/24 – there were 5000 fewer people able to access specialist addiction services. So we’re seeing a reduction in the availability of help, and an increase in punitive measures.”
Drug charges in 2024/25 mostly involved cannabis (40%) or methamphetamine (49%), though there has been an increasing number of cocaine-related charges over the past two years, reflecting an increase in cocaine consumption.
Overall, the number of people convicted in 2024/25 was 2% higher than in the previous year, but the number of charges was 5% higher: each person is facing more charges on average, a trend evident in previous years.
“This was driven by people aged 40 and over, who had 10% more offences on average in the last year,” the Ministry of Justice report said.
Other key findings include:
“The New Zealand Crime and Victims Survey showed that the proportion of adults experiencing sexual assault has remained around 2% since 2018,” the report said.
“However, the proportion of victims reporting at least one incident of sexual assault to police has increased, from 9% in 2019 to 32% in 2024.”
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Derek Cheng is a senior journalist who started at the Herald in 2004. He has worked several stints in the press gallery team and is a former deputy political editor.