Police Stations with No Police – Bad Joke

By Taylah Fellows

Lee Watts, candidate for the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers party said having police stations with not police to operate them is not good enough and sounds like a bad joke.

“We have police stations in this electorate, but not enough police to staff them, much less enough police working in our towns,” she said.

“I have people from all of our towns talking to me about how long it takes for police to reach them from Muswellbrook, how they can’t remember the last time they saw police on the beat in our towns and it’s because neither of the major parties have bothered to make sure police numbers keep pace with our communities growing needs,”she said.

“It is not ok that both of the major parties have let numbers dwindle away and our stations close, because it has happened under both of them, but they don’t have a problem pumping money into billion dollar stadiums and weird multi-million dollar art works in Sydney while we get left behind with the basics,” Lee Watts said.

Lee Watts speaking with Mick Hardes out the front of the Singleton Polcie Station.

The issue of police vacancies was addressed last year when the NSW Police Association launched the ‘Back the Blue’ campaign.

The campaign included a petition calling for additional 2500 police officers to alleviate overstressed stations and fill the 194 vacancies outside the state capital.

In May last year Hunter Valley Branch secretary Ryan Froml told the Herald Sun that increasing duties and responsibilities were exceeding police numbers.

“Each and every officer and station in the Hunter Valley Police District – which takes in Cessnock, Muswellbrook, Upper Hunter and Singleton LGAs (local government areas) relies upon each other to function,” he said.

In November last year, the Berejiklian Government promised to recruit 1,500 officers by the next election, a policy that is estimated to cost more than $580 million.

Labor Opposition leader Michael Daley questioned the timing of the announcement.

“Now on the eve of an election the government have decided to beef up police numbers, well the Police Association have been calling for the government to do this for eight long years,” he said.