POLICE CONFERENCE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23488, 27 October 1939, Page 10

POLICE CONFERENCE

ADDRESS BY HON. P. C. WEBB VISION OF CRIMELESS AGE [by telegraph—press Association']: "WELLINGTON, Thursday A vision of a golden age, when crime would disappear, made' possible only by . a dissolution of the present, economic system, was conjured up by the Minister of Labour, the Hon. P. C. Webb, in addressing the police officers' annua! conference. The Minister said it seemed to him that in a society which allowed some of its people to be driven to degradation and penury while it allowed others to grow enormously wealthy, crime was inevitable. "We want," he said, "to lay the foundation of a society in which crime would be practically unheard of and in which every human personality would be given a chance to flower in all its beauty. Crime would tjjen be only the outcome of mental instability, and persons so suffering would be" treated pathologically, in the. same way as tliose who suffered physical ills." The police officer who did most good, Mr. Webb said, the one who had a good knowledge of psychology, "After all, your job is not primarily to put people in cells, but rather to prevent their reaching the stage when that is necessary. ... "As most of you know, of*course, I know something of prison life, from actual experience," continued Webb. "I have been associated with many police officers as friends, and I also have been under their charge. Some of those whose duty it was .to arrest me were among my best friends. They had to act according to the! law. I acted against the law, and they did their duty by apprehending me, and 1 have no feelings whatever against them for so doing. Faced with similar circumstances, I would do the same tomorrow, and some of your members would do the same as they did. I would not blame them. I would blame them if they did not arrest me."