A shameful act from a foundering government

When Police Minister Anthony Carbines declared on February 5 that Victoria Police’s Chief Commissioner Shane Patton had “the government’s confidence, he has my confidence, and he has the confidence of police members”, the police officers’ union saw a lever and gave it a pull. But even they must have been rubbing their eyes to find all the reels lined up and that their jackpot was dislodging the boss who was informed by another public servant that his contract would not be renewed, prompting him to resign from his position on Sunday.

The pay dispute between the Police Association of Victoria and their employers has been bruising, and anyone who has seen the slogans scrawled in felt pen on the windows of squad cars and vans in our streets knows some of the hardest hits have been directed at Carbines and Premier Jacinta Allan. Last month police members voted informally to accept a new EBA, after a dispute lasting 18 months. But the formal vote on pay and conditions will now take place in a very different atmosphere.

The government says that when its MPs knock on doors in their constituencies, they are repeatedly having to talk about youth crime. They have also sensed widespread dissatisfaction with the state’s bail regime, though having only recently instituted new laws in this area, it is far from clear what the further review they have now announced would seek to achieve beyond just optics.

It is indisputable that on Patton’s watch a new wave of organised crime has seen gangs torching tobacco stores at will, attacking suburban homes and assassinating their rivals. This wound has been allowed to fester and, sadly but unsurprisingly, has claimed the life of an innocent woman. Bringing Victoria into line with other states on tobacco licensing is something Patton had argued for. The state government has committed to reform, but progress has been slow, and Patton won’t be around to see whether it helps.

The backdrop to all these difficulties is a force already hundreds of officers short of its recruiting targets and which is being asked to make budget cuts as the government struggles to regain control of its runaway debt. The effects this has had on morale can be seen in the no-confidence vote and last month’s helicopter disruption of a press conference by acting premier Ben Carroll.

In the end, Patton found himself caught between an angry and restive rank and file and a government foundering at the polls, jumping at shadows after its near-death experience in the Werribee byelection.

Successive state governments have gone to the well of toughness on law and order, seeing it as a sure-fire vote winner, regardless of the facts of each issue or the efficacy of their proposals. Yet as our crime reporter John Silvester has written: “Building a law and order policy is a little like preparing a house for sale. We spend the money on the look … and hope they don’t notice the dodgy foundations.”

If it was made for the right reasons, such as a failure to accomplish agreed goals, the decision to force the commissioner’s hand could be accepted and even welcomed. But the opaque, underhanded and shambolic way this career-long servant of the public appears to have been discarded is a shameful act.

When the premier and police minister fronted the media on Monday and were asked whether they had spoken to the state’s top officer after the no-confidence vote, they declined to answer “out of respect to Mr Patton”. What this demonstrates is this government’s continuing aversion to transparency, and how little respect some Victorian leaders seem to have for the state’s institutions and those who run them.

As for Allan and the ALP more widely, wherever they look they see ex-policemen, from Peter Dutton in Canberra to Brad Battin in Spring Street. Having a grown-up discussion around crime and budget priorities may be the only way they can avoid being collared.

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