POLICE — CRIME STATISTICS
458. Dr D.J. HONEY to the Minister for Police:
I
refer to the most recent Western Australian crime statistics published on the Western
Australia Police Force website.
(1) Can the
minister confirm that violent crime—namely, crimes against the person—is
now the worst in Western Australia's history?
(2) Can the minister outline to the house how police
response times have been impacted over the last 12 months?
Mr P.
PAPALIA replied:
(1)–(2) I
thank the member for the question. What I can say with respect to crime
statistics, member, is that Western Australia confronts, like everywhere in the
world post-COVID, a significant uplift in family and domestic violence incidents. That has just been a sad phenomenon
encountered right around the world, and that certainly feeds into
statistics relating to crimes against the person. It is a significant challenge.
It is something that we are confronting. We are employing more resources and
putting more focused attention on this particular task than at any time in the
history of this state. The Minister for Community Services was with me and the
Commissioner of Police at the State Operations Command Centre only yesterday,
getting briefed by police and Communities personnel, including the director
general of Communities and other staff, about some initiatives that we can take
to focus very much on this particular challenge and seek out the benefits of
some of the technological advances that have been made in recent times. The
establishment of the State Operations Command Centre under this government will
enable us to provide better services to confront that challenge.
We all know, too, that right now we
are in the midst of the biggest expansion of the Western Australia Police Force
in a four-year period in the history of the state. There will be 950 police
officers, above and beyond attrition, added
to the force. That is something like a 15 per cent increase in the force. That
is above and beyond attrition, so we will also be recruiting beyond
that, so it will end up being around 1 200 police officers over our first term
and this coming term. The challenges we face are associated with a growing
population and around crime rates returning to where they were before the COVID
pandemic. As a consequence of COVID, there
was a massive drop-off in crime, which was experienced due to the border
closures and the interruption of the methamphetamine flow into the state. But
the challenges, once crime rates come back to pre-COVID levels, will be met
with more resources, more capability and more focus than at any time in the
state's history. That is true.