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Parliamentary Questions


Question Without Notice No. 1215 asked in the Legislative Council on 16 December 2021 by Hon Neil Thomson

Parliament: 41 Session: 1

POLICE — STAFF — REGIONS

1215. Hon NEIL THOMSON to the minister representing the Minister for Police:

Will the minister please advise how many job vacancies there are today within Western Australia Police Force separately for each of the districts in the Kimberley, the Pilbara, the Gascoyne–midwest and the goldfields–Esperance regions?

Hon MATTHEW SWINBOURN replied:

I thank the member for some notice of the question. Can the member confirm that was C1195?

Hon Neil Thomson: It was C1271.

Hon MATTHEW SWINBOURN: Was the question: will the minister please advise how many job vacancies there are today within Western Australia Police Force separately for each of the districts in the Kimberley, the Pilbara, the Gascoyne–midwest and the goldfields–Esperance regions?

Hon Neil Thomson: That is right.

Hon MATTHEW SWINBOURN: I thank the member for some notice of the question.

On behalf of the minister representing the Minister for Police, I provide the following response based on information provide to me by the Minister for Police.

The McGowan government is delivering 950 extra police officers over four years, the single-largest increase in police officer numbers. Over 400 new officers will have graduated this year. Full-time equivalents are deployed by the Commissioner of Police to address the areas of greatest operational need. To enable this, vacancies are carefully managed across the Western Australia Police Force. The Western Australia Police Force advises that data identifying officer numbers can vary daily due to a number of factors, including natural attrition, leave without pay, officers attending training, transfers between districts, and officers being attached to specific operations. As at 30 November 2021, there are 211.23 FTE police officers in the Kimberley district; 221.23 FTE police officers in the Pilbara; 246.41 FTE police officers in the midwest–Gascoyne district; and 193.32 FTE police officers in the goldfields–Esperance district. This is an increase of 75 FTE police officers across these regions from 30 June 2016. As at 15 December there were 25 FTE vacancies in the Kimberley district, seven FTE vacancies in the Pilbara district, 19 FTE vacancies in the midwest–Gascoyne district and 22 FTE vacancies in the goldfields–Esperance district.