The New South Wales police watchdog is routinely refused access to interview rooms when officers are being questioned after critical incidents, in a practice the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission (LECC) has described as “consistent and state-wide”.
Despite the LECC Act providing power for investigators to be present as observers when officers are interviewed by superiors over such incidents, the oversight body said the power “appears to be … illusory” in its annual report handed down on Monday afternoon.
The commission received more than 4,700 complaints and conducted 56 investigations in the 12 months to June 2023.
Over the same period, it monitored 131 critical incidents. A critical incident is a police operation that results in a death or serious injury.
“In every critical incident investigation to date, involved police officers have refused to consent to the commission investigator being present or to remotely observe their interviews,” the report read.
“This appears to be a consistent and state-wide position taken by police officers involved in critical incidents. The power to observe interviews of involved officers in critical incident investigations … appears to be an illusory power.”
The commission could not offer a reason why they were refused access to the interviews “as the act does not require that a reason be provided for refusal”.
The force has come under intense scrutiny in recent months after a number of high-profile incidents involving officers and vulnerable members of the community, including Clare Nowland, Steve Pampalian, Jesse Deacon and Krista Kach.
Calls for a parliamentary inquiry into the use of force have gone unanswered by the Labor government.
The commission’s annual report revealed that over the past year, the it has investigated 84 claims of serious officer misconduct. Forty-five critical incident investigations were also monitored. Of those, 32 involved deaths and 13 involved serious injuries.
The commission’s review of NSW police’s strategy to improve relations with First Nations people, also released on Monday afternoon, found the continued over-policing of Aboriginal people was “undermining” those efforts.
The review of the force’s five-year strategy recommended the police publish a Closing the Gap delivery plan and recognise the role of Aboriginal liaison officers and First Nations staff “in improving the cultural awareness”.
The LECC chief commissioner, Peter Johnson, said police needed to be doing “everything possible to ensure their actions are consistent with the NSW government’s Closing the Gap priorities and targets”.
The review found that while a number of commands and districts had done “a great deal of work to try to build and maintain effective relationships with Aboriginal communities and organisations”, the scheme had not achieved its outcomes.
It made a number of recommendations including improving the performance and reporting framework that underpins it.
“Even with the positive engagement and commitment demonstrated by some … there are certain actions of the NSW police force that appear to undermine the goals of the ASD,” the report read.
“The commission has seen examples of continuing Aboriginal over-representation in the use of certain proactive, discretionary policing methods.”
It found there was a “level of misunderstanding” within the force about the strategy.
The report said Aboriginal community liaison officers were valuable but noted challenges in keeping people in the roles.
A new Aboriginal strategic direction was rolled out in August. The commission did not include it in the report, noting it had been supplied two weeks before report was published.
The police minister, Yasmin Catley, said the new strategy included mandatory training for all NSW police employees.
She said police had made a “conscious effort to collate and share engagements with Aboriginal communities across their police districts and commands”.
“It’s important to note the report was not critical of the work of ACLOs who do fantastic work,” she said.
“The NSW Government is committed to Closing the Gap because we all want to see better outcomes for Aboriginal people and their communities.”
