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Speaker 1: Now we know that the Northern Territory Police Association is

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Speaker 1: calling on the Northern Territory Government to urgently and directly

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Speaker 1: address the ongoing media reports that the Northern Territory Police Commissioner,

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Speaker 1: Jamie Chalker APM, has been asked to resign from his position.

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Speaker 1: The Northern Territory Police Association president said that it's frustrating

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Speaker 1: and disappointing that the Chief Minister has refused to clarify

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Speaker 1: these reports and he joins me in the studio right now,

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Speaker 1: Good morning to you, Paul.

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Speaker 2: Good morning Katie.

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Speaker 1: Now, Paul, tell me have you ever seen anything like

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Speaker 1: this situation that we're dealing with right now?

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Speaker 2: I don't think I've seen this sort of a situation

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Speaker 2: nationally yet alone here in the territory. So it's a

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Speaker 2: very awkward position the government have found themselves in now,

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Speaker 2: and I think it's important, probably from the outset to

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Speaker 2: just remind people this is not unusual timing in terms

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Speaker 2: of the contract for the commissioner. So his contract was

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Speaker 2: due up later this year, so obviously negotiations or discussions

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Speaker 2: you will commence early this year around it. So the

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Speaker 2: time is not unusual. What is unusual is having a

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Speaker 2: situation where clearly some information has been leaked out into

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Speaker 2: the public domain, and we're now in a situation where

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Speaker 2: the government needs to either confirm or deny such information

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Speaker 2: on behalf of our membership. You alone in the community.

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Speaker 1: I mean, the Chief Minister and Cabinet decide in confidence

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Speaker 1: whether they do or do not have confidence in the commissioner.

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Speaker 1: It seems that they've obviously, you know, the Cabinet has

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Speaker 1: obviously made this decision, it's come out into the public domain.

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Speaker 1: But I just can't understand why the Chief Minister is

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Speaker 1: not prepared to be really upfront about this and just say, yeah,

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Speaker 1: they've lost confidence in the police Commissioner or they've decided

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Speaker 1: not to renew his contract. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Look, it's clearly an untenable position really what they've found

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Speaker 2: themselves in. So it is a commercial and confidence process normally.

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Speaker 2: It's now some information has been as I've said, made

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Speaker 2: it leaked its way into the public domain. The impact

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Speaker 2: that has of course the Commissioner himself, but also the

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Speaker 2: entire membership of the Northern Territory Police Force is damaging

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Speaker 2: because ultimately, you know, they've been under the I guess

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Speaker 2: leadership of Jamie Chalker since late twenty nineteen, he's had

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Speaker 2: a clear direction for that police force. Some have agreed

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Speaker 2: with it and clearly some haven't. But the fact remains

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Speaker 2: he has had a direction and they've been asked to

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Speaker 2: work in conjunction with that. And now we find a

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Speaker 2: situation where it's probably unlikely he'll be back because you know,

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Speaker 2: whether you like it or not, this situation is untenable now.

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Speaker 2: The government and him are clearly at loggerheads and we

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Speaker 2: need to get it resolved.

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Speaker 1: Does that mean that we've now got a police force

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Speaker 1: that's floundering. I mean, we know that our police are

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Speaker 1: incredibly professional. They're going to do their jobs regardless. I

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Speaker 1: mean we saw that even on the weekend this story

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Speaker 1: broke on Saturday. There was an enormous amount of crime

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Speaker 1: around the Northern Territory on the weekend and the police

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Speaker 1: were out there doing their jobs like they always do.

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Speaker 1: But is it a difficult situation to not know who's

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Speaker 1: running the show or.

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Speaker 3: What the go is.

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Speaker 2: I guess it's not unusually in terms of we have

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Speaker 2: acting commissions all the time. So Michael Murphy's of course

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Speaker 2: taken that seat for the time being and until this situation,

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Speaker 2: of course, is resolved. That's not unusual. What is frustrating,

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Speaker 2: You know, what really our members really care about, Katie,

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Speaker 2: is turning up to work and having enough staff to

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Speaker 2: do the job right. They are fed up with turning

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Speaker 2: up and simply not having enough boots to fill vehicles

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Speaker 2: to respond to the public's needs. They are fed up

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Speaker 2: with that. That affects them morale more than anything else.

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Speaker 2: Of Course, the leadership issue is important. They need to

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Speaker 2: have confidence their stability at the top of the police

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Speaker 2: senior executive right now. Of course, there's uncertainty around that

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Speaker 2: until this is resolved. But we will do what we've

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Speaker 2: always done and we will work with Michael Murphy for

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Speaker 2: the time being in the best interest of our membership.

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Speaker 1: Paul back in twenty twenty two last year, the eighteenth

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Speaker 1: of the eighth was when a survey was conducted. Now,

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Speaker 1: at the time, sixty five percent of the membership, well

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Speaker 1: basically there was one forty four members that had taken part.

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Speaker 1: Was sixty five percent is my understanding of the membership.

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Speaker 1: It was the highest ever general survey return rate at

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Speaker 1: that point. Seventy nine point seven percent of those respondents

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Speaker 1: at the time had said that they do not have

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Speaker 1: confidence in the Police Commissioner Jamie Chalker Like at the

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Speaker 1: time you and I had discussed that, I'd ask the

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Speaker 1: government at that time whether his position was tenable. They

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Speaker 1: kept saying that they had confidence in him. Do you

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Speaker 1: find it a bit ironic now that the Chief Minister

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Speaker 1: is not prepared to actually say if she has confidence

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Speaker 1: in the Police commissioner when those results back then showed

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Speaker 1: that a large number of the force didn't and she

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Speaker 1: supported him.

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Speaker 2: Then yeah, look, I think not saying anything is saying everything,

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Speaker 2: isn't it in this situation? So I think you know,

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Speaker 2: we did do that survey last year. It was extremely

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Speaker 2: well received survey in terms of numbers, as you've pointed out,

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Speaker 2: over a thousand of our members that she's our largest

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Speaker 2: ever return. Did return a result for that survey, of course,

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Speaker 2: eighty percent demonstrating at that point they had no confidence

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Speaker 2: in the commissioner. The top three reasons of course for

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Speaker 2: that surrounded the und move critical incident, the perception around

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Speaker 2: double standards, so that was the senior police executive of

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Speaker 2: course treated differently to the rank and file, and then

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Speaker 2: of course the failure to stop the bleed, stop the

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Speaker 2: resignation rate of over ten percent here in the Northern Territory,

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Speaker 2: which was which is horrendous and has not slowed down.

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Speaker 2: So they are critical factors that haven't been resolved.

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Speaker 3: Clearly now they haven't been resolved.

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Speaker 1: I mean when you talk about the number of people

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Speaker 1: that are on leave, the number of police officers leaving

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Speaker 1: the force, that those attrition rates are incredibly high.

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Speaker 3: I want to ask you though about the.

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Speaker 1: Number of police officers that are on leave, because we've

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Speaker 1: had this number of four hundred bandied around earlier in

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Speaker 1: the week. The Chief Minister had said to this said

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Speaker 1: to us on this show a few weeks back, that

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Speaker 1: was in the hundreds. How many police officers you know,

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Speaker 1: would you suspect that are on leave at any one time?

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Speaker 1: And is that a big reason why we don't have

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Speaker 1: enough vans on the roads and while we don't have

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Speaker 1: enough police officers, you know, manning the watch housers and

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Speaker 1: that kind of thing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, look, I think it's it's somewhat irresponsible to throw

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Speaker 2: out a number of three or four hundred people that

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Speaker 2: aren't coming to work without putting some context to that.

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Speaker 2: So my understanding is there's around one hundred and twenty

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Speaker 2: officers that are unavailable at the moment. The remainder of

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Speaker 2: those that may be spoken about over and above that

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Speaker 2: are probably on their actual recreation leave, which they're actually

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Speaker 2: entitled to take. Every single officer here in the Northern

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Speaker 2: Territory is entitaled to recreation leave. Now out of those

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Speaker 2: other one hundred and twenty, forty or fifty of those

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Speaker 2: are on workers' compensation. That means the job has injured them,

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Speaker 2: and the remainder are waiting for other issues to be resolved.

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Speaker 2: It could be discipline matters, it could be any number

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Speaker 2: of things, or they're just genuinely sick. So context is

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Speaker 2: very important when you're throwing numbers like that around.

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Speaker 1: So have we got a situation where there is a

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Speaker 1: large number of police officers who are on leave because

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Speaker 1: they don't have confidence the police commissioner, Because I guess

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Speaker 1: that's sort of been maybe part of the insinuation.

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Speaker 2: I don't think that's the case. I think we're more

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Speaker 2: in a situation where there are constant and frustrating delays

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Speaker 2: in resolving discipline matters. We've got some members who are

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Speaker 2: waiting over one or two years for an appeal to

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Speaker 2: be heard. It becomes damaging to their health to be

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Speaker 2: waiting that long to get a matter resolved. So of

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Speaker 2: course those people don't have confidence in the system around

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Speaker 2: discipline or appeals, more so than obviously the Commissioner.

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Speaker 1: Paul, it's a really tough situation right now. As I

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Speaker 1: mentioned just a little while ago, we've got terrible rates

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Speaker 1: of crime. You know, We've got a situation on the

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Speaker 1: weekend where there's all those vehicles that were stolen in

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Speaker 1: Alice Springs, people driving erratically around the town. We had

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Speaker 1: a family that was carjacked in the early hours of

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Speaker 1: Sunday morning. We've also had we've also seen, if I

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Speaker 1: remember correctly, officers surged to another remote community due to

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Speaker 1: some of the issues that we're seeing out there. You know,

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Speaker 1: from a normal person perspective, a lot of people feel

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Speaker 1: like the issues of crime at the moment are out

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Speaker 1: of control and they're actually in step I think with

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Speaker 1: the Northern Territory Police where they don't feel like there

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Speaker 1: are enough police to be able to deal with these issues.

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Speaker 1: How big an impact then, does this situation that we're

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Speaker 1: in right now with the Commissioner have to play.

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Speaker 2: I guess it's challenging because what police will keep doing,

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Speaker 2: what they're doing. The rank and file members will turn up,

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Speaker 2: they will respond to the community's needs as best they can.

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Speaker 2: There's some incredibly dedicated people out there doing that. That

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Speaker 2: will not change. It will never change. What really has

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Speaker 2: to be resolved, of course, is the direction of the

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Speaker 2: police force and the government's I guess the situation they

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Speaker 2: found themselves in because ultimately the direction of the police

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Speaker 2: force and the feeling amongst the rank and file is

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Speaker 2: driven from the top. The senior police executive are there

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Speaker 2: to support the rank and file do their job. If

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Speaker 2: that situation is I guess, as it is at the

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Speaker 2: moment questionable, that does have an impact on the membership.

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Speaker 3: For sure. We're too from here, Paul.

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Speaker 2: Well, Ultimately, there's obviously some reasons the government don't want

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Speaker 2: to talk about this any further. It's a frustrating position

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Speaker 2: to be in from our membership's point of view. Ultimately,

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Speaker 2: as I said, they will keep turning up and doing

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Speaker 2: the job they always will do on behalf of the community.

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Speaker 2: But you know what we want to see is I

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Speaker 2: guess the Chief Minister show some leadership on this issue.

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Speaker 2: For one reason or another, these negotiations have made their

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Speaker 2: way into the public domain. That is not a position

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Speaker 2: you want to have unresolved for any lengthy period of time.

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Speaker 2: It is not healthy for us all the community.

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Speaker 3: No, it's really not. It's quite unbelievable.

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Speaker 1: I think, you know, I cannot believe that we're in

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Speaker 1: a situation that we are right now where the Chief

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Speaker 1: Minister is refusing to say what is going on with

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Speaker 1: the police commissioner. It's really not sustainable in any way,

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Speaker 1: shape or form. The public deserves better and so does

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Speaker 1: the police force.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, one hundred percent. And obviously, as I said, I

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Speaker 2: want the public to be really sure our members are

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Speaker 2: turning up. They're doing enormous amounts of overtime. That operation

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Speaker 2: in Palmerston over the last couple of weeks has all

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Speaker 2: been done on overtime. These are people working additional hours

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Speaker 2: to make sure the community's safe. That's how dedicated they

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Speaker 2: are out there. So be assured that will not change.

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Speaker 1: Paul any update. Like when it comes to the numbers,

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Speaker 1: where our police numbers are at and how many more

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Speaker 1: we actually need, Yeah, we obviously sitting around that one

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Speaker 1: than six hundred and fifty total sworn members for the

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Speaker 1: police force.

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Speaker 2: We know the constable ranks are our real issue here.

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Speaker 2: They've only risen around forty odd in the last ten years.

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Speaker 2: They are the boots on the ground that respond to

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Speaker 2: the crime, which has obviously increased far greater than that rate.

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Speaker 2: So you know, we know the government committed to a review.

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Speaker 2: It could happen now, it doesn't have to wait for

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Speaker 2: the next eight eight months. But you know, ultimately we

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Speaker 2: already know. You talk to the members on the ground,

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Speaker 2: they don't have enough to do the job. Ninety seven

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Speaker 2: percent of our members told us that, so we know

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Speaker 2: that's the fact.

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Speaker 1: Well, Paul Mcue, President of the Northern Territory Police Association,

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Speaker 1: we always appreciate your time. Thanks so much for having

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Speaker 1: a chat with us this morning.

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Speaker 2: Thanks Coatie.