NEW ACC MINISTER APPOINTED
The Prime Minister has announced a Cabinet reshuffle which sees Dr Nick Smith losing the ACC Portfolio in favour of Judith Collins, formerly Minister of Police. Ms Collins is minister of Justice taking over from Simon Power who resigned from politics, and ACC.
Judith Anne Collins (born 24 February 1959) is a New Zealand National Party politician and a lawyer. She is a front bench Cabinet minister with the portfolios of Justice (The Justice portfolio includes responsibility for the Law Commission), ACC and Ethnic Affairs, in the Fifth National Government.
Early life and career
Judith Collins was born in Hamilton. Her parents were dairy farmers, Percy and Jessie Collins of Walton in the Waikato, and she was the youngest of six children attending Walton Primary School. In 1977 and 1978 she studied at the University of Canterbury. In 1979 she switched to the University of Auckland, and obtained first an LLB and then a LLM (Hons) and later a Master of Taxation Studies (MTaxS).
She met her husband, part-Samoan David Wong Tung, at university. He was then a police officer and had migrated from Samoa as a child. They have one son.
After leaving university, she worked as a lawyer, specializing in employment, property, commercial, and tax law. She was active in legal associations, and was President of the Auckland District Law Society and Vice-President of the New Zealand Law Society. She also served as chairperson of the Casino Control Authority. Early in her married life, she and her husband bought into a restaurant. She had been a keen supporter of the Labour Party from childhood, but personal reflection and life experiences impacted significantly enough on Ms Collins that she switched her support to the National Party.
Political career
Ms Collins was elected to Parliament in the 2002 elections as National MP for Clevedon. Clevedon, although technically a new electorate, was largely based on the old Hunua seat, held by National's Warren Kyd. Ms Collins' challenge to Mr Kyd's candidacy in Clevedon was controversial, as sitting MPs were rarely opposed for re-selection. In Parliament, Ms Collins became National's Associate Spokesperson on Health and Spokesperson on Internal Affairs.
In 2003, these responsibilities were changed for those of Associate Spokesperson on Justice and Spokesperson on Tourism. She was generally regarded as having performed well, and she then served as Spokesperson on Social Welfare, Spokesperson on Family, and Spokesperson on Pacific Island Affairs. She is ranked seventh in the current National Party caucus.
Ms Collins' Clevedon seat disappeared under boundary changes for the 2008 general election. She originally announced her intention to seek the National Party nomination for Howick, which comprises the urban part of her former Clevedon seat. However, following objections made to the Electoral Commission over draft changes to the boundaries that saw a major redrawing of the adjacent constituency Pakuranga, the draft Howick was redrawn and renamed Botany.
Ms Collins then sought and won the nomination for Papakura (which comprises the other half of her former Clevedon seat) and allowed her colleague, National Party MP Pansy Wong to seek nomination for Botany. Collins won Papakura with a majority of more than 10,000.[3] The National Party formed a government and Collins entered Cabinet with the portfolios of Police, Corrections and Veterans' Affairs. Her portfolios were changed to Justice, ACC, and Ethnic Affairs following the general election of 2011.
In 2009, Ms Collins was nicknamed "Crusher Collins" when she proposed legislation to crush the cars of persistent "boy racers". The Labour Party MP for Waimakariri, Clayton Cosgrove, pointed out that "a boy racer's car was often the only asset they had to pay fines and court costs, and if crushed, those costs would be passed onto the taxpayer." Despite Ms Collins' concerns, most road deaths in the South Island are caused by average drivers rather than "boy racers".
Ms Collins hard-headed approach has sometimes led her into difficulties; for example, soon after National was elected in 2008, she wanted to get rid of Corrections' chief executive, Barry Mathews. However, the State Services Commissioner refused to bow to her apparent wish for a personnel change. Ms Collins' inflexibility is also apparent in her reluctance to accept well-documented evidence (in a Department of Corrections publication) that prison does not act as a deterrent to criminal offending. In a speech at the Auckland Region Women's Corrections Facility in October 2009, she said: “Certainly, the belief that they will be caught and punished is the greatest deterrent for criminals”. Ms Collins also seems unconcerned about diplomacy.
She was quoted on 3 News in September 2009 describing those University of Otago and University of Canterbury students involved in the Undie 500 student riots as "spoilt little rich kids, who think that they are going to be the future leaders of our country" and, further, that if they are the future leaders of our country, then "God help us".
References
a b Collins, Judith (30 August 2002). "Maiden speech". Scoop. http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0208/S00310.htm. Retrieved 2009-05-09.
a b Clifton, Jane (18–24 March 2006). "Leader of the pack". Listener 202 (3436). http://www.listener.co.nz/uncategorized/leader-of-the-pack/. Retrieved 2011-10-25.
