Overall, the NSW Police Force (the Force) is not meeting its target for responding to urgent calls for assistance. Today, one in four complaints is about customer service. Victims of crime report issues including difficulties in contacting an officer and frustration at having to wait for an officer to return to duty to find out about their case. The timeliness of investigations is also at risk when follow-up is delayed. Seventy per cent of commanders surveyed indicated that rosters did not support continuity of investigations or victims’ needs.

We are also concerned that the current roster pattern may not be in the best interest of the health and safety of officers. Sick and injury leave is higher in NSW than other states and the Force is yet to assess the extent to which rosters may contribute to this. The Force also needs to do more to protect its general duties officers from fatigue in line with contemporary practice for managing shiftwork.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #173 - released 5 December 2007

The Department of Primary Industries (DPI) has a crucial role in assisting the irrigation industry to respond to the conflicting demands placed upon the state’s water resources. The State Plan emphasises the importance of water to agriculture, and gives DPI responsibility to use its training programs to help farmers continue to increase water use efficiency. DPI needs to work closely with agencies with which it shares responsibilities in the State Plan to ensure that its water use efficiency activities contribute to the State Plan goals. It needs to work closely with Treasury to document the services it will require to do this, the resources which will be needed, and how its success will be measured. This will ensure that DPI is well placed to continue to assist the NSW farming industry to adapt and survive periods of reduced water availability. 

Parliamentary reference - Report number #172 - released 21 November 2007

The NSW Police Force has done well to maintain a downward trend in household burglaries in NSW since 2001. Police recognise the impact this crime has on the community’s perception of security and safety. Success has come from a continued focus on prevention and enforcement. However, there are other factors which have influenced this result. These include a rise in the rate and length of imprisonment, the heroin drought in 2001, increases in the number of heroin users entering treatment, low levels of unemployment, and increases in the average weekly earnings of young males.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #169 - released 27 June 2007

The Department of Juvenile Justice and the NSW Police Force generally work together and with other agencies to identify and address the needs of young offenders. We found that this is done particularly well for young offenders who end up in detention and under community supervision. Both the Department of Juvenile Justice and the NSW Police Force have put some practices in place to identify and address the needs of young offenders diverted from the Children’s Court. However, we found that they are not doing this systematically.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #164 - released 28 March 2007

The NSW model of rural fire fighting is complex, and requires an extensive amount of coordination and cooperation to function properly. This has inherent risks. In general, the model has been made to work quite well and much improvement in rural fire fighting has been achieved over the past decade. The efforts of all concerned should be recognised and applauded especially since any change must be developed cooperatively between a number of agencies and groups.

Nevertheless, past tensions and difficulties have left pockets of disagreement and resistance. The rural fire fighting culture which was developed over the course of a century has always been highly dedicated, as it is today. However, changed organisational, technical, legal, financial and environmental factors have necessitated major and continuing changes.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #57 - released 2 December 1998

This audit was initiated following concerns expressed by the Department of Agriculture about the Police’s handling of a suspected fraud that it had first reported in 1996. The Department’s main concern related to the long delays before a full Police investigation took place.

Nevertheless, the current review highlighted a number of areas that, in the opinion of The Audit Office, require closer examination and resolution by the Police Service in implementing their changes. This report highlights those areas and provides recommendations for the Police to consider in its implementation of its reforms. Key areas requiring attention include: service standards are not clearly defined for the police response to fraud, without which it is difficult to ensure that police objectives and public expectations are met; restrictive employment arrangements which limit management’s ability to obtain the appropriate mix of people with skills to investigate fraud and inadequate information systems to support operational, tactical and strategic decision-making.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #53 - released 14 October 1998

While central communications units are responsible for broadcasting calls from the public for assistance to police cars; these units have no authority over those police cars. And while local police commands are responsible for police deployment, they have no ready capability to communicate with their police cars. The report also found that Local police management have limited contemporaneous knowledge of what their response resources are doing, and little useful management information that can tell them what they have done over prior periods. Current systems of response fail to distinguish adequately between calls of various types. All tend to be allocated for response by a police car, even where the caller’s needs may be equally well met by alternatives which are less resource intensive.

The NSW Police Service has begun to address these limitations. But it understands that more needs to be done before the service can realise improvements in response performance, and evidence levels of efficiency and effectiveness. In particular, the NSW Police Service should: formulate a strategy for improving response overall, before it commits itself to major new investments in this area and, as part of this strategy it should clarify accountabilities throughout the response “system” and develop a framework of indicators and standards to help it (and the public) monitor response performance.

Parliamentary reference - Report number #47 - released 10 March 1998