This week, New Zealanders watched a district court judge face cross-examination over allegedly yelling at Winston Peters, a story that's dominated headlines about respect for government authority and the justice system. But here's what nobody's mentioning: young people's offences against that very system are at their lowest point in three decades.

Youth court orders for offences against justice procedures, government security, and government operations totalled just 108 in 2024 — the lowest figure since the dataset began in 1992. (Source: Ministry of Justice, youth-court-orders)

To understand how dramatic this drop is, rewind to 2020. That year saw 453 such offences — more than four times this year's total. It was the peak of a spike that politicians and media outlets treated as evidence of growing disrespect for authority among young people. Four years later, that narrative has quietly collapsed along with the numbers.

The trajectory tells the story: 300 offences in 2019, that spike to 453 in 2020, then a steady decline to 198 in 2021, 114 in 2023, and now 108 in 2024. We're not just below pre-COVID levels — we're below everything in the dataset's history.

This category isn't small stuff. It includes breaching court orders, resisting arrest, perjury, obstructing justice, and offences against government security. These are the crimes that directly challenge the authority of courts, police, and government institutions — the exact issues politicians invoke when they talk about "respect for the rule of law."

Yet when was the last time you heard a press conference about youth crime mention this? The political conversation about young offenders focuses almost exclusively on headline-grabbing categories: ram raids, retail crime, violence. Those categories generate outrage and policy announcements. A 76% drop in offences against the justice system itself? Silence.

The 2020 spike likely reflected the chaos of COVID-19 lockdowns — more young people coming into conflict with rapidly changing rules, more breaches of emergency orders, more friction with authority during a year when nobody knew what normal looked like. What's remarkable is how completely that spike has reversed.

This isn't about excusing other categories of youth crime or suggesting there aren't real concerns in specific areas. It's about noticing when the data contradicts the narrative. If young people were genuinely showing less respect for authority and institutions, you'd expect this number to be climbing. Instead, it's in freefall.

So while we debate judicial conduct and government authority this week, the kids everyone worries about are committing fewer offences against that authority than at any point in living memory. It's the kind of good news that should matter in the conversation about crime and consequences. But good news doesn't generate the same heat as outrage.

The numbers are clear. Whether they get airtime is another question entirely.