If that blue line gets any thinner, it’s going to vanish.

Front page of yesterday’s West.

PerthNow provides additional details:

465 sworn police officers resigned last year and 97 retired – the highest number of resignations and retirements in the force’s 189-year history.

From the comments:

Dave G:

…I became a cop to protect the community from criminals and spent my career locking up all kinds of crooks from burglars to pedos, drug dealers to bikies. I didn’t join to check people’s personal health details or bully small business owners about masks and logs .

Richard N:

How do they expect recruits from the UK and Ireland to work here when there is nowhere to house them? Rented accommodation is a huge problem for those who want it! Then there is the issue of placement in country districts. I can just imagine our British and Irish recruits being overwhelmed with a posting in Meekatharra, Leonora or Rravensthorpe.

Or Halls Creek, which is an absolute palace of fun after sunset. Just ask a nurse.

Police, like WA nurses, have been negotiating over a pay rise with the government for several months. Last news I heard was that both had rejected Masky’s latest offers. There is certainly no love lost between either group and the Premier.

Untold years of experience are being lost with these senior police (and again, senior nurses and senior lots of professions) quitting or taking early retirement. We’re losing out at the other end of the arc too: In this interview former QANTAS pilot Graham Hood reports that new recruits gave the Flying Kangaroo the middle finger. They simply didn’t turn up for work on their first day and never bothered to call or explain why. Turns out that unvaccinated Australian pilots have been getting snapped up by American airlines.

From Lockdownunder back to the land of the brain drain. Last one out – well, that’s probably going to be me.

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