‘Discriminatory’ Queensland Police hiring practice slammed

Queensland’s corruption watchdog has found 2000 men were subjected to discrimination as women who had previously failed tests joined the force.

Queensland Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll says she scrapped the target after feedback from women who believed it undermined their credibility. Picture: Dan Peled

A female inspector and two civilians have been suspended over a “discriminatory” drive for women to make up half of all new Queensland police recruits, despite it being ordered from the top.

In a report tabled in state parliament on Wednesday, the Crime and Corruption Commission slammed the implementation of a gender target ordered by then police commissioner Ian Stewart in November 2015 to address the low number of women in the service.

At the time, about three-quarters of sworn Queensland police officers were men, and gender equity was seen as a key imperative of the state government.

To meet the target the police service resorted to selecting women who previously had failed psychological and physical assessments and standards, the CCC found. About 200 “more meritorious” men would have succeeded in becoming recruits across a three-year period if it wasn’t for the policy.

No one appeared to have given any serious thought to how the strategy would affect the organisation, the CCC says.

Police Union president Ian Leavers in response labelled the use of quotas “woke, pandering nonsense”.

Mr Leavers said the report should put an end to the practice across the board, while Queensland’s first female police commissioner, Katarina Carroll, said women wanted roles on merit.

Ms Carroll revealed that almost as soon as she was appointed commissioner in 2019 she scrapped the 50-50 gender equity target for recruits following feedback from women who believed the policy undermined their credibility.

“Their view was that ‘I got here on merit and I maintained all of the high standards to get through.’ That’s the way they wanted to be considered,” Ms Carroll said.

The former commissioner, Mr Stewart, told the CCC he understood men who were better candidates would be overlooked to meet the target and achieve greater diversity. He was comfortable with that as long as selected candidates met minimum standards, the CCC’s report states.

Despite the target coming from the top, the inspector and two civilian employees have been suspended and are facing disciplinary action over their implementation of the policy. A third civilian involved has already left the police service.

The rank of inspector is the lowest of all commissioned officer ranks.

CCC chairman Alan MacSporran QC defended the apportioning of blame, saying more senior staff were “actively and argu­ably deliberately misled” about how the target was being achieved.

Some staff interpreted the target as a direction from the commissioner, which had to be obeyed unless it was illegal, he said. Police had failed to apply for an exemption to allow them to engage in positive discrimination “so it was unlawful conduct”, he said.

However, the CCC also has said there is insufficient evidence for any criminal prosecutions.

Ms Carroll said she had contacted almost 600 women recruited across the period to advise them of the report and to let them know “they are fully supported by us”. The police service also was going back to men who missed out.

The CCC report says an investigation by the watchdog had found “ample evidence” that to achieve the target the Queensland Police Service — whose officers had been conditioned to not question orders from above — “engaged in discriminatory recruitment practices”.

Frontline staff were taken by surprise by the commissioner’s gender-based recruitment announcement “as there had been a lack of consultation about it previously”, and struggled to meet the target from the limited number of applications from women, the Investigation Arista report states.

“Warnings by staff about the need to discriminate based on gender to achieve the target and the risks that followed were not communicated to the then commissioner and senior QPS staff,” the report states.

“Staff of the QPS Recruiting Section were so intent on achieving this target that discriminatory recruitment practices were used.

“The discriminatory practices saw different standards applied to female and male applicants, with females selected in preference to male applicants who had performed to a higher standard across entry assessments.”