100 Days as Chief Police Officer
Mike Jeffreys - 2CC Interview with Chief Police Officer Audrey Fagan
Tuesday 11 October 2005
Mike Jeffreys: Audrey Fagan is the ACT Chief Police Officer. Ms Fagan's been in that role for 100 days. Audrey good morning and thanks for your time.
Audrey Fagan: Good morning Mike and thank you.
Mike Jeffreys: How do you like the job so far?
Audrey Fagan: The job has been really rewarding and satisfying and to be able to look back over 100 days and realise how fast it's gone has been good, but my priority's been getting out in to the community, meeting with my staff and setting our new priorities for the executive team.
Mike Jeffreys: In this role do you find that you have to be more politician than policewoman?
Audrey Fagan: I feel like I operate as a police officer each and every day Mike; that's really the priority for me and serving the community as best we can.
Mike Jeffreys: Ok, let's look at the successes: what do you see as being the achievements in those 100 days that you can point to with pride.
Audrey Fagan: Oh thanks Mike. Look what we've done is, we've been able to do a number of investigations with New South Wales, Victoria, Northern Territory and Queensland police, a lot of those are focused on drug investigation, drug interdiction, with a number of people arrested. Similarly one of the first charges under the new legislation of alleged online grooming has been laid here in Canberra that's now before the courts, and that's a first for the new laws.
Mike Jeffreys: What do you see as the areas that need more attention?
Audrey Fagan: We continue to work with the community and continue to practice our counter terrorism preparedness. I think that's a priority for us. Crime Stoppers encourages people to report in any little piece of information, and a lot of that has lead to arrests. Since Crime Stoppers started we've had about $15 million worth of drugs seized just from information from the community.
Mike Jeffreys: Specifically on that, what do you think about this story that appeared yesterday: police have admitted they knew about a dumped van near the Lodge for two days before it became the centre of a full scale security alert. How could that happen?
Audrey Fagan: Well, of course we did know about it and were making a number of enquiries with the van about the abandonment of that van and identifying the owner. I'm very pleased and confident with the police response in relation to that van. They were precautionary measures that were taken and effected on the Saturday, so I think the community would expect that as well that we made a number of enquiries to work through to identify the owners, and then take the actions we did.
Mike Jeffreys: Are you working your police too hard?
Audrey Fagan: Oh look I think, looking at my day sometimes I think I'm working a bit hard, but…
Mike Jeffreys: People ask the question that because you're a bit light on numbers, that police are having to do things which really isn't specific to their job description, that some are getting fed up, and you've seen some resignations -- any truth?
Audrey Fagan: Look our attrition rate Mike's the lowest it has been in the last couple of years -- we've seen around 3 ½% and most private companies would be happy with about 10% attrition. This hasn't been raised with me. I've seen the media reports. My staffing level is at 796 full time equivalent staff.
Mike Jeffreys: Is that enough?
Audrey Fagan: Look the ACT Government's actually given us 30 extra staff, there is a joint study under way and completed that the government's considering. I'm satisfied that we're meeting the community's expectations with the police that we've got and our performance indicators continue to show that.
Mike Jeffreys: Would you be happier if you had more police?
Audrey Fagan: You'd never say no, would you -- you'd never say never I suppose. But in my mind we're doing a great job and I think the Canberra community should be really happy with what the men and women of ACT Policing are doing for our community.
Mike Jeffreys: Do you have a view on the number of fatal road accidents in the Territory so far this year?
Audrey Fagan: We're up to 21 and I've been looking a lot at the traffic statistics. What that shows - our collision rates are lower, so I think a number of our strategies, which are across the Department of Urban Services and Road Traffic Authorities across Australia, are targeting people to slow down, pay attention. But there is a gap, and it is around the fatalities, so there's something happening where some people are not getting our message and that concerns me, and should concern all road users; it's a joint responsibility I think.
Mike Jeffreys: What do you think we ought to do?
Audrey Fagan: Well I think continuing the education campaigns is really important. My traffic team is continually adjusting, you know: you'll see them out working on the roads, asking people to slow down, pay attention, and it's constant attention that it's getting here.
Mike Jeffreys: There's nothing like a marked police car to make everybody behave, is there?
Audrey Fagan: I think the visibility of policing, and that's been one thing I have been pushing in the last 100 days Mike, is try to get out to the community, explain what we do, and as and where appropriate, we'll take the action and prosecute.
Mike Jeffreys: Will more marked police cars do you think, impact on the traffic accident level? If you had more marked police cars out there, would the traffic behave better, more often?
Audrey Fagan: Well as I said at the outset, I think that when you look at the messages, in the main they're getting out. There's a fatality rate and a smaller group that I really want to focus in on, and I'm asking the Canberra community to work with us on that as well, because one death is one too many in my mind.
Mike Jeffreys: What kind of response do you get from the community? Are you happy with that or do you think that people could be more involved?
Audrey Fagan: I've been so impressed and this is one of the most rewarding things I think for any community police officer. I was at a bushfire recovery event on Sunday out at Kambah at the Mt Taylor estate, and residents came up and said "Look, we see the information in the media about police…we just want to say thank you," and I think that's very rewarding and most police will get that notion of service that's important to them.
Mike Jeffreys: What about the TV campaigns and radio as well, I know we also carry some of the advertising; do you think they work?
Audrey Fagan: Well I think when you look at, and that's where I go back to our statistics, when we look at our traffic campaigns and we look that we are getting a message out to the broad community, they are hitting a chord and it's one of a number of measures, and I think advertising is important to explain that police are there as one of the tools, along with getting the police patrols, the beat patrols, the visible cars and communicating to your listeners like I am now; it all adds to a safe community.
Mike Jeffreys: l was talking to Jennifer Saunders the other day. You no doubt know Jennifer, a defence lawyer and she was talking about burglaries and she said that they're considered a volume crime and police are no longer taking finger prints and the way they do solve crimes is going on description. They can usually recognise the crim in the MO, but of course if what Jennifer says is correct then there are a number of cleanskins out there who will continue to commit crimes and won't get caught. Any comment?
Audrey Fagan: I'd love to talk about our burglary rates and the ACT Policing annual report is showing that last year we had a 25% reduction here in Canberra in burglaries, and so in my mind, it's a combined approach, its never linear Mike; you've got to look at how Operation Halite does look at recidivists, but we also target and use forensics as much as we can.
Mike Jeffreys: But what about the fingerprint comment that Jennifer makes?
Audrey Fagan: Well I think you've got to look at each case on its merits and if you imagine an outdoor situation where you may have lost forensic evidence, we wouldn't be employing it in that situation. However, an Operation Halite team on the other side may have some other intelligence or our intelligence area, and we put the whole picture together. And I suppose that's a bit my message with Crime Stoppers: if you ring it in, we keep all that information and it builds a picture that we can take action on.
Mike Jeffreys: But do you take fingerprints or not?
Audrey Fagan: Oh we do, absolutely and fingerprints along with DNA evidence along with good old detective work all add up to complete that investigation.
Mike Jeffreys: Well congratulations on your 100 days. Appreciate your time. Maybe you and I can talk again and not leave it for another 100 days?
Audrey Fagan: I welcome that Mike, really would.
Mike Jeffreys: Alright Audrey thank you for your time this morning.
Audrey Fagan: Good morning.
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