OPINION: My eyes are sore from rolling them so much at Thursday's Justice Select Committee into retail crime.
Maybe it's because I've been away from Parliament for five years, or maybe it's because I've matured, but the tit-for-tat point scoring left me disillusioned.
There's always a place for theatre and grandstanding in the political landscape – it's what makes it fun to cover.
But it grates when politicians are in a gotcha battle like Police Minister Ginny Anderson and former Police Minister Mark Mitchell.
Anderson was in front of the select committee as part of a post-Budget annual exercise that all portfolio holders must go through.
She was flanked by Police Commissioner Andrew Coster and an army of top brass including deputy commissioners and even those from the Serious Fraud Office.
Her goal was to explain her Government's approach to curbing the retail crime wave that's currently blasting the country.
Members of the committee have the role of holding her to account. But there's a problem when the committee is made up of 50 percent Labour MPs and 50 percent Opposition MPs.
The Labour MPs ask patsy questions and defend the minister. The Opposition MPs get frustrated and cuss and curse about it.
Thursday's performance had me wondering what the hundreds of victimised dairy owners would make of their elected representatives trying to one-up the other.
Mitchell was trying to string up Anderson and Coster over numerous things.
First, it was about statistics regarding the promised 1800 new officers. It became a painful debate over semantics, process, and official information requests.
The minister retorted snarkily: "Would you like to come along and actually count the police officers with me?". Even Coster was confused: "Beyond getting a printout of the payroll, I don't know what you're asking for".
Mitchell then moved on to crime stats, citing legitimate concerns about ram raids, youth crime, and gang crime increasing.
Anderson blamed the previous National Government for the increase in youth crime, saying the social investment approach left abused children over the age of two in their homes. Those abused children are now teenagers who are committing the crime.
It's a long bow for the minister to draw and pretty pathetic politics when there are hundreds of small businesses who want a solution rather than a blame game.
The tit-for-tat turned to prison musters and whether a reduction in prisoner numbers is the reason for an increase in crime. Both Mitchell and Anderson had their figures and explanations.
The fleeing driver policy came up. This is the policy where police cars don't chase fleeing drivers because it leads to innocent members of the public being killed in the process.
Anderson defends the policy. Mitchell wants car chases back.
The whole time, Coster had to navigate the political posturing carefully; an impartial public servant caught between the mud-slinging.
Did the committee achieve anything? No. Will Kiwis be safer because of this platforming? No.
Would they be disillusioned that action has taken a backseat to political point-scoring? Yes.
Lloyd Burr is a Newshub political reporter.
