Editorial: Between a rock and a hard place

Mark Dawson, Editor of Wanganui Chronicle

ANOTHER driver trying to escape the police, another pursuit by the forces of law and order, and another bad outcome ...

That was the story on Thursday when a fleeing driver crashed his vehicle on State Highway 16 in Auckland and a five-month-old baby in the car was seriously injured.

And it produced the predictable focus on police chases, particularly in light of a call by the Independent Police Conduct Authority on Wednesday for a review of the rules around such pursuits.

Talk about being caught between a rock and a hard place ...

Police officers do the job they are trained, and paid, to do and attempt to deal with a law-breaker (the driver in this case hit 150km/h, was disqualified from driving and had breached bail conditions), and then find the spotlight turned on them when injury and even death brings the chase to an end.

There is too often a sub-text here that the police were in some way to blame - that their pursuit caused the crash.

So we need to remind ourselves who is at fault, who put this five-month-old baby in peril, and who was to blame for the deaths a couple of weeks ago of two 15-year-olds in Masterton who thought they could out-run the police.

The responsibility lies squarely with those behind the wheel and breaking the law; the officers are quite rightly seeking to protect the public from what are clearly dangerous people.

The police already have protocols in place in that they will end the pursuit if they believe there is carnage in the offing, but for them to be further hamstrung in such cases would only act as a spur to the criminal element.

Being chased by the law? Simply accelerate to 140km/h and the police will give up. Is that what we want?

The balance between law enforcement and highway risk looks about right as it is. It is just very sad that idiots put babies, passengers and themselves in harm's way.