Electronic Crime

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS (15:11): I seek leave to make an explanation prior to directing a question to the Minister for Police on the subject of civilianisation.

Leave granted.

The Hon. R.I. LUCAS: In 2015, a former commissioner gave evidence to the Budget and Finance Committee and said:

I can see in the near future additional resources having to move into these forensics areas to examine computers, etc., and I don't think they necessarily have to be police officers. Technicians.

Last year in February, the current commissioner, Commissioner Stevens, was asked, 'Would you broadly agree with the previous commissioner's position?' and his evidence was, 'Yes, I would. Absolutely, yes.' He further went on to indicate:

There's no current review in relation to our cyber-policing environment. It is one of those reviews that I have flagged that needs to be undertaken to ensure that we are getting the best value out of the resources we put into that particular environment and that we have the right skill sets to undertake that function appropriately.

That was in February of last year. My question to the minister is:

1. Has the commissioner undertaken that review into the civilianisation of the cybersecurity policing environment?

2. If he has, what were the results of that particular review, and what potential budget savings did the commissioner identify from such a move, if he chose to go down that particular path?

The Hon. P. MALINAUSKAS (Minister for Police, Minister for Correctional Services, Minister for Emergency Services, Minister for Road Safety) (15:12): I thank the honourable member for his question. There are a few elements to Hon. Mr Lucas's question that are worth noting and reporting back on. The first thing is that SAPOL, I think, has made it clear on the public record previously that it is difficult to recruit sworn members to specialist technical areas. One such example of that is the electronic crime section. Another example may well be the prosecution section.

As a result, SAPOL continues to look at ways they can adjust their recruitment of personnel in both sworn and non-sworn roles to try to ensure they have the capacity to be able to carry out these functions. SAPOL, as has been reported on previously in this chamber on a number of occasions, enjoys substantially growing resources, including much more coming from this government in a personnel context with the government's commitment to recruiting a lot more police officers, which provides the police commissioner additional flexibility in terms of where he recruits those people from and how they get allocated in a resource context. That is a good thing for community safety.

I am happy to take the components of Mr Lucas's question on notice to see if I can ascertain some more specific information. Again, I am happy to reiterate that this is an ongoing challenge. As was discussed at length during the estimates process recently, the commissioner made remarks on the record that speak to the substantial growth in the volume of work that is coming through to the e-crime section within SAPOL and the challenge that it presents, but I am more than happy to seek additional information with regard to the specifics of the Hon. Mr Lucas's question and get back to him as soon as possible.