The head of the New South Wales police union has denied any suggestion that patrolling weekly pro-Palestine protests is making it difficult to respond to or investigate crime across the state.
Kevin Morton’s comments came as the premier, Chris Minns, was forced to deny he had lost control of the Labor caucus after several of his MPs expressed alarm at his statement that police should be able to reject a protest permit based on the cost of patrolling it.
Minns said on Thursday he had “absolutely not” lost control and his government had “made it very clear” its priority was “peace and security and social cohesion”.
“I believe the vast majority of my parliamentary party are completely behind, not just the government’s policies, but that sentiment,” he said.
Minns stirred division within Labor this week when he said taxpayers would want NSW police to deal with roadside breath testing, domestic violence and knife crime instead of patrolling weekly pro-Palestine rallies which he said had cost $5m in 2024.
“We have to make decisions about where police are spending their funds, and if this is taking place every single weekend, it’s coming at the expense of some other law enforcement across the state,” he told 2GB radio on Tuesday.
At a press conference later that day, Minns said “crime doesn’t turn off because a protest is taking place in Sydney”.
“We still have to have police to investigate serious crime in NSW, that’s proven to be incredibly difficult if our resources are tied up policing marches and protests,” he said.
The Police Association of NSW president said while the protests were putting a strain on resources, it was not accurate to suggest the demonstrations would prevent officers from responding to crime.
Guardian Australia asked Morton if it was accurate to say the ongoing protests meant “police potentially weren’t responding to other types of crime”.
“I wouldn’t say that at all,” the union president replied.
Morton said some officers who patrolled the pro-Palestine and Lebanon protest in Sydney’s CBD on Sunday were on operational shifts and their attendance at the rally could have left their area commands short-staffed – but the vast majority were not.
He said most of the officers he spoke to at the protest were performing “user-pays” or “cancelled rest day” shifts – which pay penalty rates and do not take police away from their usual operational duties.
“There were a few officers that elected to do an operational shift, but the vast majority of them were doing user-pay or cancelled rest day,” he said. “We had in excess of 900 officers on the ground that otherwise would have been on rest days.”
Organisers of protests in NSW must submit a “public assembly” application to police to avoid potential prosecution for obstruction offences such as blocking traffic.
Under the state’s user-pays policing system, major sporting events, festivals and concerts are required to pay for police resources. They are usually staffed by officers who would otherwise be on rest days, according to Morton.
Morton said protests were treated as a user-pays event in terms of police staffing, but the government picked up the bill. He said he would support legislative changes to make organisers cover the cost.
“We would support any change that saw it entrenched, that any sort of protest would be a user-pay,” he said.
“It would be difficult sometimes to get the organisers of these protests to comply with that, and that’s something for the government and the NSW police force to work through with them.”
Morton said the police union was concerned about officers becoming fatigued by having to work on their rest days to staff continual protests, especially when the force was about 2,500 officers short.
But he said the union was more focused on stopping police doing work meant to be the responsibility of other government agencies and councils – such as animal-related complaints and truancy checks.
Minns has ordered a review of policing resources that have been used on Sydney’s weekly pro-Palestine protests.
The secretary of Unions NSW, Mark Morey, said this week that “democracy should not be monetised”.
“Adding a financial hurdle to the freedom to protest undermines that very freedom,” he said. “We might not like every protest but we should uphold the right to conduct them in a safe and coordinated fashion.”
The premier and NSW police declined to comment when asked about the police association’s position.
