As a lifetime National supporter, I am disgusted by the significant difference between Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s “incredibly serious about law & order” campaign promises and his & his Police Minister Mark Mitchell’s total apathy towards experienced widespread Police corruption and serious misconduct & neglect of duty.
When I lodged my 89 pages crime report on Police’s online portal in January 2021, I reasonably expected its very simple Euro/Interpol referral would be properly completed by Police within 3 months. I had no inkling 5 years later would be no closer to such a referral; while a ‘swamp’ of Police National Headquarters (PNHQ) constabulary’s corruption and serious misconduct & neglect of duty has been exposed.
Police’s Integrity & Conduct group are custodians of “Police investigations of complaints” policy. “Public trust & confidence is cornerstone for Police. Integrity & Conduct (I&C) group plays a pivotal role in championing our Core Values & Code of Conduct to support our staff to conduct themselves in accordance with legislation, Police policies & best practice.”
However, I&C repeatedly blocked me from accessing that complaint investigation process! (Presumably as my complaint includes I&C constabulary)
So, I emailed the complaint to Luxon’s office – requesting investigation assistance. On 5 October 2023, his office confirmed had bought the complaint to Police Minister Mark Mitchell’s attention – for his action &/or response.
In January 2024, I emailed (cced to Kevin Currie, CEO & Kenneth Johnston, Board Chairman) the complaint to IPCA – requesting they open an Investigation into PNHQ’s disgustingly woeful handling of my crime report over the previous 3 years. Despite 24 follow-up emails (all ccing Currie & Johnston), including updated versions of the complaint, no response.
Fed up with Mitchell’s non-response to any of my 11 follow-up emails, I again contacted Luxon’s office. On 26 February 2024, received “Your comments have been forwarded onto Prime Minister for his consideration” email.
On 26 March, received “Unfortunately, Prime Minister is unable to intervene in individual cases. The best way to bring a complaint against Police is by going through the IPCA” email from his Office.
An appallingly irresponsible stance from Luxon! He did not hold Mitchell accountable for his lack of effective action & response to me over the previous 5.5 months! So much for Luxon’s “driving his Ministers to perform” Public claim.
“unable to intervene in individual cases” is a sly play-on-words by Luxon! This applies to criminal cases of Public members. However, my complaint was of a Government agency’s performance. Of damn course, Ministers can intervene in those cases – Ministers are responsible for their performance! Effectively, Luxon was trying to have me believe Ministers’ responses to all Public complaints about their portfolios’ performance was “Not my problem”!
Between October 2023 & November 2025, Luxon received 84 times my actual – not just an email – (clearly marked in both email subject line & document title “Calling for Resignation of Andrew Coster” & “Widespread PNHQ Corruption and Serious Misconduct & Neglect of Duty”) performance complaint. Not once, did he seemingly properly instruct Mitchell to take action &/or respond to me!
Fed up with Mitchell’s continued non-response to my weekly follow-up emails, on 16 December, I submitted an OIA request asking what action he had taken with my complaint.
On 4 February 2025, Mitchell responded he had merely “FYI” forwarded my complaint to Police’s Ministerial Services (MS) 10 times from October 2023 to September 2024!
So:
– from the 2nd time, Mitchell did not have the very basic complaint management skill to say to MS “As this performance issue remains unaddressed, please forward the complaint to Coster or somebody else appropriate within Police for action &/or response”!
– from the 3rd time, Mitchell did not have the very basic complaint resolution skill to think “As MS aren’t forwarding the complaint to Coster or somebody else appropriate within Police for action &/or response, I’ll do it myself”!
– Mitchell had 10 opportunities to ‘nip’ this issue ‘in the bud’. Instead, 10 times he did nothing effective! A lot more corruption and serious misconduct & neglect of duty occurred after Mitchell first became aware of this Police performance issue in October 2023!
In April, I resubmitted the performance complaint to IPCA. Despite 37 follow-up emails (ccing Andrew Coleman & & Liz Sinclair – Board Members, Currie & Johnston), including updated versions of the complaint, no response.
Between October 2023 & November 2025, Mitchell received 30 times my actual – not just an email – (clearly marked in both email subject line & document title “Calling for Resignation of Andrew Coster” & “Widespread PNHQ Corruption and Serious Misconduct & Neglect of Duty”) Police performance complaint. Not once, did he appropriately manage the complaint!
In all Mitchell’s Police Commissioner interactions since October 2023, not once did he say to either of them “There’s a Public member wanting to bring a serious PNHQ performance issue to your attention. If you’re unaware of it, contact your MS Advisor or I can email you the Public member’s complaint”.
As it’s a conservative/reasonable assumption Mitchell was in contact with the Police Commissioner an average of 2 times per week, that is another 250 lost opportunities over the last 2.5 years!
On 2 December, Mitchell appeared in front of the Justice select committee. From the 132.5 minutes mark of this video, Mitchell repeatedly had the GALL to claim since becoming Police Minister he had been relentingly focused on improving their “integrity & standards”! Mitchell is in no position to comment on anybody else’s integrity & standards, when his own such are barely existent/significantly lacking!
Mitchell did PNHQ constabulary a huge disservice by mismanaging this complaint first time around in October 2023. Then, it was ‘only’ 14 pages in length. Now, it is 60 pages! Mitchell’s Ministerial neglect meant another 46 pages of PNHQ constabulary’s corruption and serious misconduct & neglect of duty over an additional 2.5 years was exposed!
It’s appalling the supposedly “incredibly serious about law & order” Luxon & Mitchell, despite 114+ requests since October 2023, have done absolutely nothing effective to address experienced widespread Police corruption and serious misconduct & neglect of duty. The ‘Serve the Public’ ethos of Luxon & Mitchell are woeful. So much for Luxon’s “It’s a government ruthlessly focused on action, delivery & outcomes” Public claim.
As Luxon claims “Personal responsibility is one of the National party’s core values”, let’s see him ‘walk that talk’. Mitchell’s Ministerial job includes being accountable to the Public for what goes on in Police. He HAS to be held accountable for his TOTAL apathy since October 2023 with this significant Police performance issue! For his $327k annual salary, Public/Taxpayers deserve a MUCH better Police Minister than ‘lot of spin, little substance’ Mitchell. I recommend the Police portfolio be Immediately reassigned (to Simeon Brown).
Click here for a complete overview of my appalling government experience. It got quite a lot worse than the above introduction!