Thursday, 22 June 2023

Western Metropolitan Region police resources

Trung LUU (Western Metropolitan) (17:49): (320) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Police. I implore the minister to assist the west with more police and provide the required number of police so that they can effectively operate local police stations and serve the community in the west. These additional police numbers will fill vacancies in police stations and increase the police presence. The west of Melbourne requires an immediate increase in police numbers to assist in the combating of increased crime in the area.

Crimes stats show that the west of Melbourne has a higher incidence of violent crimes, such as theft, assault and drug-related offences, than other regions. In stats for March 2023, Brimbank municipality had 12,463 reported incidents, an increase of 1.4 per cent from last year.

Wyndham Vale, one of the state’s fastest growing municipalities, had 13,833 reported incidents, an increase of 14.9 per cent on the previous year. To combat these numbers we need sufficient police in the PSA, the police service area. The records for April 2023 show that Werribee police have a number of core strength, which is the number of police needed to operate the station, of 92. The strength number designated to effectively operate this station is actually 64 – 33 per cent down from that needed to effectively deliver the service to the community. The police station at Sunshine requires a core strength of 100 to operate the police station but actually has a strength of 61 – 39 per cent down from what is required.

This high rate of vacancy of police from these police stations is consistent throughout the west, for Williamstown, Altona and Footscray in the south to Keilor, Melton and Sunbury in the north. These numbers are shocking for our region. One could say it is ridiculous, especially when the region reportedly has a high number of reported crimes. The western suburbs face unique challenges, requiring police to service the area. These challenges are in relation to gang-related activity, home invasions, drug trafficking and specific cultural and social issues, so we do need that number of police to operate these police stations. At the moment all police stations in the outer west are down by between 8 per cent and 33 per cent on the numbers needed to actually operate the stations effectively. So I ask the minister: please, could you deploy more police to fill the vacancies in police stations so they can detect the crimes and improve safety and security for residents in the west?