Editorial: It’s no wonder cops are quitting
In the 21st century being a police officer is so much more than fighting crime which is creating problems, writes the editor.
To serve as a police officer in Queensland you need to be a counsellor, a babysitter, a youth worker, a taxi driver and a prison guard all rolled into one.
So it’s no wonder cops are quitting in droves – in fact, the service is haemorrhaging staff almost as quickly as they are recruiting new officers.
Exclusive data obtained by The Saturday Courier-Mail has revealed 709 sworn police left the service last financial year – the worst exodus in five years.
During the same time frame, 2832 officers left the service while 3285 were recruited, equating to just 453 extra cops since 2020.
And it can also be revealed more than 2000 officers across the state took long-term psychological stress and sick leave last year.
It’s an untenable situation in a state with a rapidly growing population and an Olympic Games to host in less than seven years.
In October last year, Police Commissioner Steve Gollschewski outlined in an exclusive interview with this newspaper a number of issues he believed urgently needed to be addressed to boost numbers.
He said mental health call-outs were problematic, with a 41 per cent increase from 2018 to 2023.
There was also a 33 per cent increase in calls from Queensland Health requesting assistance.
He said each mental health call-out took 4.6 hours on average for officers to deal with.
“I’m open to whatever can be done … ultimately governments will make a decision how they want to do that, but it clearly is an issue that needs to be looked at closely because it’s putting a lot of pressure on the system and it’s pretty risky,” he said of the mental health call-outs.
He noted domestic violence call-outs took an average of five hours and officers.
Excessive paperwork was frustrating officers, he said.
Mr Gollschewski floated two ideas to help culture and ultimately retention – give him the power to sack “bad apples”, and allow officers to work past the age of 60.
Sources say officers feel like they aren’t helping people anymore – they’re doing other people’s jobs, and spending hours filling out the paperwork.
A landmark review into the service released earlier this year found overworked police were doing the jobs of other departments, and needed to go back to their core role of protecting the community.
The state has done great things to tackle the scourge of domestic violence, but clearly it remains a significant problem taking up a lot of police time, and it is contributing to distressed officers quitting.
So there is clearly more work to be done.
Soon after Mr Gollschewski’s interview with The Courier-Mail, he was diagnosed with cancer and took sick leave, so understandably many of his ideas have not been actioned yet.
He is now back in the top job, and needs the State Government’s backing to solve our police recruitment and retention issue once and for all.
Just last month, we revealed Queensland won’t have enough numbers to police the 2032 Games.
When this State Government, led by Premier David Crisafulli, turns its mind to changing something – like it did with youth crime – it has an impact.
It now needs to take the same attitude to quickly work out how to keep cops from abandoning the service.
Get ready to cheer the Lions
No one could have predicted at the beginning of this year that Brisbane would be on the verge of possessing all four NRL and AFL trophies by the end of today.
But that’s the happy reality we find ourselves in as the Lions AFLW team attempts to complete the city’s clean sweep of the most coveted trophies in the country.
A win tonight against the North Melbourne Tasmanian Kangaroos would bring all four premiership trophies across NRL and AFL to Brisbane, after the success of the Brisbane Broncos NRL and NRLW sides, and the Brisbane Lions.
Lions women’s coach Craig Starcevich said the club – and the city – was feeding off the energy generated by those wins.
“The city is definitely up and about for their footy codes at the moment and it would be lovely to finish it off for them,” he said.
The Lions have the motivation and the talent to win the trophy.
The team had fallen down the ladder after their Round 5 loss to Melbourne, and after a heart-to-heart they turned their season around with nine straight wins that delivered them into their fourth consecutive AFLW grand final.
The story is not dissimilar to the Broncos, who faced missing the top 8 before a Reece Walsh-led blitz brought the NRL trophy back to Brisbane.
Let’s hope the Lions have a similar fate – and they have the whole of Queensland behind them.
‘Thanks to Labor the damage done to the country will be catastrophic’
