Oceania

INTERVIEW: Recognised by the International Association of Women Police as the longest serving female police officer in the world, Victoria Police Det Snr Sgt Joy Murphy this month received the Medal of the Order of Australia in the King’s Birthday Honours; now in her 51st year as a police officer, she spoke to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons about her passion for policing, her efforts to improve the service to victims, and her continuing advocacy for equal opportunities

OPINION: Convicted al-Qaeda terrorist Abdul Nacer Benbrika is currently challenging his ongoing imprisonment in Australia under a continuing detention order, a measure which the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor recently argued should be abolished; but John Coyne and Justin Bassi of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute believe a systemic approach to managing risk must also recognise that some offenders are too dangerous to be released.

King's Birthday Honours: We are pleased to publish and recognise Australian policing recipients of the 2023 King's Birthday Honours. The team at Policing Insight offer our congratulations and thank all the recipients for their service.

KING'S BIRTHDAY HONOURS: We are pleased to publish and recognise the New Zealand Police recipients of the 2023 King's Birthday Honours. The team at Policing Insight offer our congratulations and thank all the recipients for their service.

ANALYSIS: The decision earlier this year by TVNZ to cancel Police Ten 7 – the channel’s longest running reality series – sparked claims of wokeness and cancel culture; but new research by Auckland University of Technology Associate Professor Antje Deckert, and Juan Marcellus Tauri, Adjunct Associate Professor at Macquarie University, found that the programme had over-represented Māori and Pasifika suspects in violent offences, and under-represented the proportion of Māori and Pasifika police officers.

OPINION: Recent high-profile disruptive protests by climate activists in Australia have led to rapid changes in legislation, with new laws and amendments to existing acts being introduced in some cases in as little as 24 hours; but University of South Australia Senior Law Lecturer Dr Sarah Moulds warns that such swift lawmaking can lead to poorly designed, unconstitutional and widely opposed legislation.

OPINION: A series of recent cases in New Zealand has seen offenders under the age of 25 given home detention despite being found guilty of sexual assault, on the basis that were too young to fully understand the consequences of what they were doing; University of Canterbury Associate Professor Debra Wilson believes these and other cases underline the need for the country’s Sentencing Act to be reformed.

FEATURE: New research from the Australian Institute of Criminology presents shocking findings on the level of domestic violence among members of outlaw motorcycle gangs (OMCGs); with higher rates of violence and lower conviction rates, it’s a complex challenge for police officers in New South Wales to solve, as Policing Insight’s James Sweetland reports.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Presented by the Australia and New Zealand Police Commissioners and supported by Policing Insight as media partner, this two day conference will bring together police personnel and the law enforcement community and industry to explore how partnerships can improve community safety.

OPINION: A new report into the policing of the 2022 occupation of parliamentary grounds in Wellington describes a largely successful operation with a positive outcome; but Professors Alexander Gillespie and Claire Breen of the University of Waikato warn that while policing has moved on significantly since previous high-profile demonstrations, there is still room for improvement around practice, equipment, legislation, and ensuring police independence.

JOB ADVERTISEMENT: Australia's Charles Sturt University is seeking a new Head for the School of Policing Studies. The school is Australia's leading provider of police recruit level training with the University and the NSW Police Force having a unique partnership to design, develop and deliver tertiary courses in policing. Closing Date: 11pm, 24 May 2023 Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST).

INTERVIEW: The focus of New Zealand Police’s road policing approach has been widened to include impairment prevention relating to drug-driving and fatigue; Supt Steve Greally, Director of the National Road Policing Centre, spoke to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons about the need for a holistic approach, the plans for roadside drug testing, and the impact on officers of dealing with the fatalities and serious injuries caused by poor driver decisions.

FEATURE: Australia is the latest country to give serious consideration to criminalising coercive control, a step taken in the UK in 2015; new research published by Melbourne’s Monash University suggests that while the majority of victim-survivors believe such a step would be beneficial, they also argue significant investment in police training and a ‘cultural shift’ in the policing of domestic abuse would be required to make any new offence effective, reports Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons.

FEATURE: While police agencies have increased their supportive responses to the trauma that can damage staff wellbeing, the role of leaders and managers in taking a preventative approach to organisational stressors has been largely overlooked; now a new paper from the Australian Institute of Police Management and Griffith University sets out a Leadership for Wellness Strategy that could address those gaps, as Policing Insight’s Keith Potter reports.

ANALYSIS: Ten years after the pilot of the first Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme (DVDS) in England and Wales, this vital safeguarding tool is now on the statute books; while other countries around the world have introduced similar schemes, Dr Katerina Hadjimatheou of Essex University believes the approaches adopted both in England and Wales and South Australia  around who can be given information, and when and how disclosures can be made, set an example for other countries to follow.

OPINION: While LGBTQ+ people in Australia experience disproportionately high levels of sexual violence, to date little has been known about their experiences of sexual crimes or of seeking support; now new research by a team of academics from the University of Tasmania and the University of Melbourne has highlighted the significant impact of such crimes, gaps in the provision of support, and failings in some of the responses to those who do choose to report the crime.

FEATURE: A new money-laundering taskforce led by the Australian Federal Police and including the Australian Border Force and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission will target the tens of million dollars believed to be laundered in the country every day that is the ‘lifeblood’ of Australia’s organised crime gangs, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

INNOVATION: A 12-month trial which allows officers from Queensland Police Service to use body-worn cameras to record interviews with domestic violence victims that can then be used as evidence-in-chief has been hailed a success for reducing the trauma experienced by victim-survivors and enabling officers to re-invest more time providing support, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

ANALYSIS: This month’s 2023 Australian threat assessment maintained that the risk of terrorist attacks was ‘possible’ rather than ‘probable’; but Dr John Coyne, head of the Northern Australia Strategic Policy Centre at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, warns that the domestic terror threat hasn’t gone away, and that policing’s focus on early intervention around extremist beliefs could prove counter-productive.

FEATURE: The theft of livestock is a serious and growing problem in Australia, with large-scale and sophisticated thefts are being reported with increasing frequency; Kyle J D Mulrooney and Alistair Harkness, Co-directors of the Centre for Rural Criminology at the University of New England, explore the scale of the problem as well as highlighting new technologies which could help to tackle the challenge.

FEATURE: To better support policing’s evolution to the changing state of the climate and deal with emergency management, the Australia New Zealand Policing Advisory Agency (ANZPAA) recently spoke to Dr Jarrett Blaustein, Associate Professor at the Australian National University, as ANZPAA Policy and Research Officer Rhiannon Van Vliet explains.

LONG READ: Despite four decades of recognition of the challenges a policing career poses to officers’ mental health and wellbeing, police organisations still seem to struggle to deliver an effective response for their workforce; new research by Policing Insight’s Dr Alan Beckley and colleagues at the University of Technology Sydney highlights the nature and scale of those challenges, and will explore what interventions work best.

ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE: Amid growing demand and tighter budgetary constraints, police and other bluelight services are under increased pressure to do more with less, particularly by making more effective use of technology; Hexagon Director Nick Chorley spoke to Policing Insight about the potential benefits – for service delivery, citizens and staff – of digital transformation, as well as some of the challenges that journey presents.

INTERVIEW: International development organisations around the world are focused on achieving sustainable development goals, but their efforts are at risk of being undermined by financial crime; Oliver May, Leader for International Development Practice at Deloitte Australia, spoke to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons about the improving response of NGOs to financial crime and the need for law enforcement to help countries and organisations tackle that threat.