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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 8 Hansard (8 August) . . Page.. 2606 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Some points were made by Mr Hargreaves. You had the lowest ratio of police to citizens. The fact is that we inherited that number of police from the Labor Party. It was only when we eliminated Labor's $344 million operating loss that we were able to do anything about finding the money to put extra police on the streets of this city. We have now done that. Those police are there. We intend to make sure that they are used productively to reduce the incidence of crime in this city, and the figures are there. There has been a 12 per cent reduction in crime in the space of one year, and a 21 per cent reduction in burglary in the space of one year. That is a significant achievement, and, with great respect to those people who heap praise only on the police's shoulders, it was not possible without extra resourcing, which of course came from government.

Mr Temporary Deputy Speaker, I think we should reject the politics of fear and phrases like: "It's not safe to walk to your car in this city." That is irresponsible, and I think Labor should be condemned for that, particularly in an environment where the crime rate is getting better. At least when Labor was in office the figures on crime were deteriorating on a year by year basis. We have demonstrated and provided an improvement in the course of this year, and we should get credit for that.

Mr Hargreaves questioned the provision of 50 extra police, and, frankly, he was fast and loose with the figures. Mr Hargreaves pointed out that some of the 29 police who had been transferred when the communication centre was civilianised were unsworn police. That may be true, but unsworn police also have a role to play in the provision of policing in this city. Not every person who is on the payroll of the AFP can be a sworn member. You need unsworn people behind them in order to provide the workings of the engine room to make sure that the people out there on the prowl are actually sworn police, properly trained police. In those circumstances, freeing up unsworn police in the communication centre allows those police to be slotted in elsewhere and again free up sworn police to go on to the front line of policing. So it is untrue to suggest that by civilianising communications and having some of those freed up people being unsworn police you do not produce some benefit for policing. Of course you do.

Mr Hargreaves also suggested, I think quite mischievously, that some of the police quit subsequently and were not replaced. The fact is that police quit all the time. We would prefer in some cases that they did not, but they do. But the point of our relationship under this contract, which Mr Hargreaves praised, between the ACT government and the Federal Police is that we end up with-

At 5.00 pm, in accordance with standing order 34, the debate was interrupted. The motion for the adjournment of the Assembly having been put and negatived, the debate was resumed.

MR HUMPHRIES: The fact is that police have to go all the time, but they are replaced. That is a contract with the federal government. They are replaced. Sometimes there are lags in that. Occasionally we do not get the replacements as quickly as we would like. But it is simply untrue to suggest that people who might have resigned, ex-communication staff or anyone else, are not going to be replaced. It is simply not true. That is the sort of distortion and misleading we have had from Mr Hargreaves in this debate throughout the last few years. (Extension of time granted.)

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