Wellington city missioner 'delighted' with police's approach to move-on orders

Wellington's city missioner says he is deeply apprecitative of the way police have introduced move-on orders, saying they are mitigating harm the legislation can cause.

Move-on orders, which allow police to move on people with anti-social behaviour or rough sleepers, came into effect just over a week ago.

Twenty-nine known orders have been issued so far, the most being in Wellington, followed by Auckland and then Canterbury.

At this stage no orders had been issued for people who were begging in a way that unreasonably interfered or for rough sleeping.

In March, Wellington city missioner Murray Edridge, along with several other groups, wrote a letter to the Government strongly opposing the move-on orders.

Now, Edridge told RNZ he did not oppose the legislation in its entirety, rather the inclusion of rough sleepers and beggars.

"I'm actually delighted with the way the police are responding to the new move-on order legislation."

However, Edridge said he still hoped the next government would change the legislation to exclude rough sleepers and beggars.

"Unfortunately what our lawmakers have done, is they've introduced legislation that has potiental to do real harm to people. And police [are] mitigating that to the extent they can."

Labour promised that if re-elected, it would "abolish the criminalisation of homelessness".

Meanwhile, National said it would be comfortable with a review of the legislation in three years' time.

Edridge said he hoped the legislation would be changed before police began looking to issue orders on rough sleepers.

"They (police) do have a requirement to uphold the law ... and so police are caught in this."

He said Wellington police had focused on responding to those disrupting the community with threatening or intimidating behaviour.

"That's exactly what it was designed to do, they have not used it to move on anybody who's rough sleeping or begging."

He said he understood Wellington police were actively using the orders at night, looking to drunk and disruptive people.

The Wellington city missioner said he appreciated people being given the chance to be moved, before things escalated to the point of arrest.