South Australia Police

The Hon. V.A. TARZIA (Hartley—Leader of the Opposition) (14:10): My question is to the Premier. What action is the Premier taking to address the concerns raised by the police commissioner about demands on our police force? With your leave, sir, and that of the house I will explain.

Leave granted.

The Hon. V.A. TARZIA: The Commissioner of Police was quoted in The Advertiser recently as saying:

I have been clear to government…that SAPOL is struggling to keep up with increasing calls for service including increasing…complex domestic violence and mental health incidents, compounded by a retention and recruitment challenge. Our people are doing it tough.

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS (Croydon—Premier) (14:11): There are a few things to say to the Leader of the Opposition's question, which is entirely relevant. The first is this. The comparative strength of the South Australian economy, compared with the rest of the country—yet again the Commonwealth Bank has ranked us as one of the top two in the country; we've gone from first to second, although they acknowledge we are neck and neck with Western Australia and that it was a close deliberation—is quite an extraordinary performance that has no precedent in the history of South Australia, certainly not when those opposite were in charge.

As a result of the strong performance of the labour market even for South Australia Police, which was once a go-to job—they would put out an ad for recruitment and there would be a queue out the door of people applying—that is no longer the case, because of the strength of the economy. South Australia Police are enduring the same challenges as every other employer in the state: they are crying out for people because they have more work, more demand, than they have access to a ready supply of labour.

As a result of that, through actions taken by the Treasurer, the Minister for Police, the Minister for Police's predecessor, we have dramatically invested in recruitment efforts. Notwithstanding that, we still have more people that we need to recruit to South Australia Police, which is reflected in the police commissioner's remarks, and that I have naturally spoken to him about.

We are working with South Australia Police beyond the investment in recruitment. We have also funded the substantial increase in the number of protective security officers, which also serves the function of allowing police to focus on other core duties.

But do you know what, Mr Speaker? Notwithstanding those challenges, which are well-documented—as is our response—quite amazingly, what we have seen in South Australia is a reduction in crime in a whole suite of areas, which is such a credit to South Australia Police. Despite the fact that the police aren't able to recruit to their fully funded level, and the fact that means, in turn, that there are actually fewer police, what we are seeing in South Australia, in a range of crime stats, is crime coming down, which speaks to the extraordinary professionalism that we see from men and women in uniform.

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Members to my left! Member for Chaffey!

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS: I can only take it, from those interjections, that those opposite aren't as keen as those on this side of the house to commend the extraordinary work of SA Police. Here I am commending police, and those opposite interject. I would have thought that would be a position of bipartisanship.

Let's go through the numbers. These are rolling statistics of the immediate 12 months prior, so this takes us to 31 August. Offences against property and person: down; offences against—

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Member for Colton, you can leave the chamber until the end of question time.

The honourable member for Colton having withdrawn from the chamber:

The Hon. P.B. MALINAUSKAS: Offences against person: down; sexual assault and related offences: down; robbery and related offences: down, by 21 per cent in this instance; other offences against the person: down; theft and related offences: down; theft of motor vehicles: down; fraud, deception and related offences: down.

What we are seeing is that despite the challenges in terms of staffing, South Australia Police are undertaking an extraordinary effort to deliver a safer community. We commend them: those men and women in uniform, we commend them. I also commend the efforts of SAPOL leadership from the police commissioner but also in other sections senior within SAPOL that are responsible for recruitment and retention to maintain the effort. The government stands with them. We have committed more resources and we will continue to liaise with South Australia Police over future budgets.