Heather du Plessis-Allan: We shouldn't get rid of the boot camps

I do not buy the argument, which seems to have taken hold, that the boot camps trial has to be shut down immediately because two kids escaped and got arrested after allegedly stealing a car. If you haven't caught up on this, what’s happened is that those two boot camp kids who ran away after the tangi last week have now been found... because they’ve been arrested. They allegedly hooked up with each other, found another couple of mates, went and nicked a car, ran from the cops and when the cops busted them one legged it with a machete (allegedly), tried to carjack another vehicle and then the police then apparently found knives and balaclavas. As a result Labour and the Greens are losing their minds, calling on the Government to end the boot camp trial immediately. But why? If anything this tells me how badly we need the boot camps to continue, because these are obviously very bad kids. You don’t put a balaclava in your car unless you’ve got some pretty dark plans. This is already after you’ve committed two crimes that carry a maximum sentence of ten years each, which is why you’re in the boot camp already. The boot camps haven’t turned these kids into criminals. They already are criminals. Which is why they’re in the boot camps. Ask yourself this - if we shut down the boot camps, what’s the alternative? Jail? Letting them roam free, in which case they keep on committing these kinds of crimes? I don’t see these two going on the run as a failure of the boot camp trial. I see it as a reason to keep doing the boot camp trial. Because how much do these kids need intervention if they are prepared to allegedly run around in a stolen car with balaclavas, knives and a machete?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.