Arming NZ cops would be an unnecessarily 'emotional' move, former top crisis negotiator says

There has been renewed calls for frontline officers to carry firearms following a string of incidents targeted at police in recent weeks. But former top crisis negotiator for New Zealand Police, Lance Burdett, cast some doubt this morning on whether the move is necessary.

While there "seems to be a perceived rise of incidents" - and, with it, and increased number of incidents involving firearms used against police - Mr Burdett suggested it may be a result of the public's perception.

"So before we talk about arming police, we really do need an independent review of what's actually happening and perhaps the underlying causes of why this may be happening," he told TVNZ1's Breakfast. 

He said the discussion around arming police needs to "take the emotion out of the situation", stressing that it is "a serious, serious thing to do".

"It needs to be done very calm and calculated, and so the only way to do that is to have somebody completely independent - perhaps a university or somebody – to do a review, look at the statistics, look at the near-misses," he said. "Are they being reported? Are the statistics that are being reported – are they accurate? Let's look at overseas experiences."

While some may argue that arming police will increase the number of incidents involving officers, it "may not be the case", he said. 

"What we do know is when you arm police, it alienates them from members of the public. Now, are we going to all police or just tier-one police?

"What happened in Christchurch [is] they armed the tier-one, the people that are actually on the streets, so they didn't arm all police. And it was a response to the need to find somebody who was at large and dangerous, so they were both protecting themselves but also the public – that's why they were armed."

At this stage, Mr Burdett said, he doesn't believe police need to be armed. 

"I believe what we should be focusing on is the underlying causes," he explained. "Perhaps we need to fix society first and just take a big, deep breath before we make an emotional response to an emotional situation."