Police chief pleased overall crime figures in Warrnambool at lowest level since 2015

On Easter Saturday afternoon there was only one police officer covering the Corangamite region, which includes Port Campbell, Simpson, Cobden, Terang, Camperdown, Lismore, Darlington, Derrinallum and Skipton.

Interestingly in the past fortnight there were burglaries and attempted overnight raids in Mortlake, Skipton and Lismore that netted cigarettes valued at $30,000 in Mortlake.

Informed sources have revealed a single police officer, or a crew of two, was not an usual situation in Corangamite, or in Hamilton or Portland regions, where there are even more vacancies.

Warrnambool police station is not immune from the serious under staffing with police members from neighbouring stations, such as Koroit and Port Fairy, having to provide support during incidents like significant vehicle collisions in Warrnambool.

A large number of staff are also currently upgraded, with senior constables acting as sergeants, sergeants as senior sergeants and senior sergeants as inspectors.

When asked about police numbers across the south-west region, Warrnambool Acting Superintendent Karl Curran said it was pleasing overall crime in the city was at its lowest levels since 2015.

"The local community can be assured that service delivery is not impacted in the Warrnambool and Southern Grampians areas," he said.

"If you require emergency police assistance, call triple-zero so the nearest police unit can be tasked to assist.

"To contact police for non-urgent incidents, call the Police Assistance Line (131 444)."

The Crime Statistics Agency figures show there were 2937 crimes committed in the 12 months to the end of December last year.

That figure has been above 3000 offences, up to 3950 in 2018, since it was 2798 in 2015.

The Standard asked Victoria Police media liaison about the claimed lack of police members on duty in the south-west, covering the region which takes in the councils of Warrnambool, Moyne, Corangamite, Southern Grampians and Glenelg.

Those questions were specifically about any statistics relating to vacancies or police members off work due to WorkCover, injuries or illness.

The questions went unanswered.

It's been reported this year Victoria Police is looking to an add an extra 500 police and 50 protective services officers within the next two years.

But Victoria Police Chief Commissioner Shane Patton said the number needed to be at least 1000 to also replace those who have left.

"We are getting people in the door. We're just not getting as many in as we'd like," he said.

"As you're well aware we're in an extremely competitive job market, there's historically low levels of unemployment," he said.

"We saw obviously at the end of COVID, mid-last year if you like... when people said 'OK I can now travel overseas again', we saw large numbers leave the organisation, our attrition went up."

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