Expect to see more police pursuits as the heat goes on fleeing drivers from today.
The crackdown comes after 10,000 people led police on chases last year - double the number recorded prior to 2020.
But experts say while the tougher approach is understandable it could cause more deaths on our roads, including innocent people.
Fleeing drivers are unpredictable, dangerous and can be deadly. And now they've been put on notice.
"What we are aiming for with this policy is to reduce the number of people who flee from police and increase safety overall, accepting that when we pursue there is risk with that," said Police Commissioner Andrew Coster.
And at the weekend there was evidence of that in Dunedin. One person was killed and three injured within a minute of police pursuing a car following a burglary.
But from Monday, Police is adopting a tougher stance after 5000 more drivers fled from police last year.
"We've gone from an apprehension rate of about 70 percent of all drivers who flee to less than half that figure so it has been a dramatic reduction and that is where we are going to redress the balance," Coster said.
Police are giving away little detail "because there is a real interest in offenders not knowing what police will do", he added.
But expect more pursuits on our streets, depending on the crime and risk to the public.
"If you have serious offending for example an aggravated robbery, a vehicle flees from a crime scene and if there is an apprehension of further ongoing serious offending then police will pursue," he said.
University of Canterbury research into just what makes fleeing drivers tick has found particularly with young people they'll purposely drive more dangerously during a chase as a way of encouraging police to call it off because they know the threshold is currently so low.
"I would be worried if there is an increase in that threshold then the behaviour of the fleeing drivers will also become more dangerous to meet that threshold in order to have that chase called off," said Jacinta Cording, senior lecturer in psychology at the University of Canterbury.
Almost 80 people, including innocent members of the public, died in the decade before 2020 during police pursuits.
And while police top brass acknowledge the policy change may mean more deaths, "this is an incredibly difficult area though. There are risks on either side", Coster said.
They say the responsibility lies with the fleeing driver.
"The problem with drivers who flee is that they create a risk to the public whether we are behind them they are not," he said.
Former cop Brendon Crompton works with at-risk youth and believes the new rules may prompt more adults to pull over, but not teens whose rational brain is not fully developed until age 25.
"Most young people we deal with play video games that are violent and include police chases, car crashes and it's game over and you reset. But in real life it doesn't happen like that.," he said.
A game of cat and mouse police find themselves playing all too often now there's a commitment to go harder for longer.
