A FINE STATE OF AFFAIRS

Evidence is compelling that police are working to infringement-notice quotas

THE AUSTRALIAN public has long held a deep distrust of how and when police hand out fines on our roads.

Police will respond with affront when asked if there are quotas, and yet in the last month there have been two separate incidents that showed the apparent ‘myth’ of quotas might not be as fanciful as police press offices want you to believe.

To recap, Queensland Police have been accused of having quotas after emails surfaced revealing how top cops pressured members of the force to write more tickets. The revelation comes amid a bullying case in the Queensland Industrial Relations Commission being brought by a former Gold Coast cop.

“Broadbeach as a whole is underperforming with regards to traffic enforcement,” senior cop Leanne Major is reported as telling officers in an internal email.

“We are GD (general duties) crews and there is an expectation that you WILL write tickets, and I don’t think 10 per month is an unrealistic expectation.”

Broadbeach officer-in-charge, Senior-Sergeant Paul Hunter, stated in another email that the fact that 16 officers had written just 15 traffic tickets between them in three months was “very disappointing”.

Emails from Runaway Bay officerin-charge, Myee Arandale, show that officers at that station were ordered to write at least five tickets for ‘LEOS’ – meaning ‘life-endangering offences’ such as speeding, running red lights and using mobile phones while driving. In which time frame is unclear.

Meanwhile, South Australian police were forced to issue an admonishing statement earlier this month after a manager purchased a gift card as an incentive for officers to issue more fines. The reward was promised for the member of staff that ‘made the greatest contribution to road safety by way of [Traffic Infringements or Cautions.]’

SAPOL tried to distance itself from the situation with an official statement that there never have been and never will be ticket quotas. But does anyone really believe it?

While no-one seems to be claiming there’s an official edict calling for a mandated number of infringements to be issued, middle- and upper-management in police forces around the nation clearly do pressure police on the roads to write more tickets.

The fact that police write traffic tickets isn’t the issue here, as we all know that bad drivers exist in Australia. It’s the methods used to measure success that is open to question.

There have been 75 more deaths on Australian roads compared to the same time last year, a rise of 11.5 percent. Merely writing more tickets hasn’t fixed the issue. Isn’t it about time the police realised it?

Senior police around the nation do pressure cops on the roads to write more tickets