Campbell: Ben Carroll finally said what Victorians know – Labor needs to get crime off the front page

Whether he meant to or not the Deputy Premier has – thank goodness – raised the rhetorical stakes for the government by calling on it to adopt a “zero tolerance” policy on crime. The ball is now in Jacinta Allan’s court.

Deputy Premier Ben Carroll has called for a ‘zero tolerance’ policy on crime. Picture: Getty Images

Ben Carroll has finally said out loud what Victorians have been waiting to hear after months of mealy-mouthed evasions from this government.

Blind Freddy can see more than anything else, Labor needs to find a way to get crime off the front page.

There are of course a number of ways it could achieve this.

One would be to actually tackle the youth crime wave that is plaguing Melbourne.

And the quickest way to make an immediate impact on that would be to keep offenders off the street by making sure they don’t get bail.

Deputy Premier Ben Carroll has declared his government ‘must end this lawlessness’. Picture: Wayne Taylor

But despite talking up their world’s toughest bail regime or whatever they call it, Labor has refused to reinstate the offence of breaching bail conditions for under 18s.

This charge – used to – have the consequence of making it harder for an alleged offender to get bail and the government’s refusal to reinstate it for juveniles means breaching bail has almost no consequences for them.

Reversing that would lead to an immediate improvement in public safety.

Because while criminologists may argue about the long term impact of incarceration it is an undisputed fact that a teenager who is on remand is not at liberty to break into your house to steal the keys to your car.

Another thing the government could do to make us feel a bit safer would be to increase the visible police presence, especially in the city.

This seems obvious and the Kiwi Commandant, Mike Bush, has made a great fuss about improving their public presence.

Chief Commissioner Mike Bush has vowed a restructure will put more cops back on the beat. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

But why this should be required is actually a bit of a mystery.

Because whatever problems Victoria Police has, a lack of manpower shouldn’t be one of them.

If you have a look at the Productivity Commission’s Report on Government Services you will find a fascinating table which lists the number of coppers in each state and territory.

And guess what? At 16,032 we had more coppers last June than any other jurisdiction in Australia.

Not only that.

Victoria also had more operational staff-per-head than anywhere else except the Northern Territory.

Which, when you think about, it is pretty weird because not only is Victoria much smaller than every other mainland state, its population is much more concentrated.

So while NSW not only has more people than Victoria, they are more spread out in large regional cities like Newcastle, Wollongong and Gosford, and its capital, Sydney, is much more difficult to get around than Melbourne.

In other words by any measure you would expect them to have more cops than us.

Who knows why we have more – this being Victoria, it is hard not to suspect it might be not unconnected to the amount of time at work that their enterprise agreement demands of them – but whatever they’re doing it clearly isn’t nearly as effective as the efforts of their NSW counterparts.

For whatever reason, Ben Carroll isn’t playing along with Jacinta Allan’s ‘Melbourne is safe’ narrative. Picture: Getty Images

Another thing that could be done to improve community safety would be to make sure the dangerous mentally ill are confined.

To achieve this however would not only take time, it would require a complete reversal of the presumption of ‘care in the community’ that has dominated the way we treat mentally ill people for at least 30 years.

Remanding teenagers, getting cops out and about, making sure those who are mentally unwell are safely confined.

All sensible measures only one of which – the one in the hands of Mike Bush, not the government – appears to be happening.

And since – despite hints – it appears Jacinta Allan has no plans to do much more on law and order at the moment, it makes sense she is trying to dial the issue down by talking about her goal “to make sure everyone feels as safe as possible with strong laws, strong policing and strong public services” and trying to avoid saying whether or not she thinks the CBD is safe.

For whatever reason however Ben Carroll isn’t playing along.

Fresh from delighting Victorian parents last week by limiting screen time in schools to 90 minutes a day and in the process massively increasing the productivity of the state’s teachers, on Saturday the Deputy Premier used a press conference the Italian Festa in Carlton to, well, basically redefine the law-and-order philosophy of the Allan Government.

“From the CBD to Cobblebank we must end this lawlessness, beginning with culture and a zero tolerance approach,” he thundered, adding “nothing that is bad behaviour affecting the peace of mind of law-abiding citizens should be tolerated” and “kids who commit violent crime, should face time.”

Zero tolerance? Who is this man? Is he even a Victorian?

Whether he meant to or not Carroll has – thank goodness – raised the rhetorical stakes for the Government

The ball is now in Jacinta Allan’s court.