Senior police put behind the desk at Surfers rather than guide rookie cops on the street

GOLD Coast policing is facing a budget crisis. Funds will be cut and channelled to Logan. Worse still, our top cops are desk bound.

Police officers at a murder suicide at Pimpama - a DV incident can quickly escalate.

THE Gold Coast’s most experienced senior coppers are holed up in a communication centre in Surfers Paradise preventing them from helping rookie officers at potential major crime scenes.

The Bulletin is receiving complaints from police fearing the new management strategy puts young recruits at risk and can stall serious criminal investigations if leads are missed.

“The District Duty Officers (DDO) have been taken off frontline management,” a police source.

“No one is happy. They’re sitting in an office trying to placate callers.

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Police at the scene of a shooting Upper Coomera. Picture: Jerad Williams

“If you have a siege, a violent DV case, the DDOs were designed to support the young coppers on the street. Now we’re left with an RDO (Regional Duty Officer) per shift servicing Logan to Coolangatta and west to the border.”

Another police source said DDOs at the district tasking and co-ordination centre were screening calls through the Police Link, determining their importance.

“They are ranking the need to go, sometimes they’re not going at all. The whole district is putting their tasks through the office and kind of wiping their hands with the responsibility of going to a call or not,” the insider said.

“This place (the DTACC) has gone down like a lead balloon among the troops, both senior and low level.”

A police spokesperson said the DDOs remain operational and were still on the street 24 hours a day, seven days a week, in their normal supervisory role for incidents in the district.

“A second layer of Gold Coast DDO has been added to DTACC to assist in the co-ordination and distribution of police resources throughout the Gold Coast District,” the spokesperson said.

“The district tasking and co-ordination centre is technologically equipped to monitor police resources 24 hours a day in the district.

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A District Duty Officer checks on an investigation into a brawl in Surfers Paradise.

“Having a District Duty Officer in the room allows an operational and experienced senior officer the ability to manage resources and provide a flexible and urgent distribution of these resources to areas of need when necessary.”

But criminologist Dr Terry Goldsworthy, a former Coast detective, suggests the management changes reflect the crisis in police budget funding.

Bulletin reports have detailed how the Coast’s police budget is to be reduced with funds funnelled off to the Logan District.

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“It’s robbing Peter to pay Paul,” Dr Goldsworthy said. “In that respect it’s a bad idea. The problem is you’re taking from one area to do this.

“Remove managing for policing is very difficult. If they’re doing DTACC, they shouldn’t be taking senior officers off the road. They should be funding it as an extra position.”

Dr Goldsworthy said the problem created by DTACC was junior officers would have to shoulder the responsibility of co-ordinating investigations at major crime scenes, serious traffic accidents and violent DV cases.

“You won’t have someone there going to the scene to see what they are doing, ensuring they are doing the right thing. You cannot do it remotely from the office.”

When in the CIB, Dr Goldsworthy recalled being tasked to a road accident only to realise an injured cyclist had been murdered.