Nuance vs no nonsense

The NSW government's view:

TONY EASTLEY: The New South Wales Premier, Bob Carr, is happy with the police response and he's not worried that it took until last night to make the bulk of arrests.

Mr Carr, is John Brogden right when he says that you've been too soft on these people at Macquarie Fields, and why weren't the arrests made sooner?

BOB CARR: The police had only one request from the Government, that is from me and from the Police Minister, and that was to make arrests, and they did. And they arrested 19 people overnight, and police are not going to stand there as targets, their job is to arrest the wrongdoers in difficult circumstances where up to 30 people are moving from a crowd of about 130, throwing things and then vanishing again into the crowd.

TONY EASTLEY: But why let it go to a fourth night?

BOB CARR: Well, no one let it go to a fourth night, there are wrongdoers and at the core of it is serious criminal behaviour, and that's the challenge the police face.

The police have got our total support, they've handled this responsibly and well.

TONY EASTLEY: John Brogden's argument is it was left to overnight to make some of the arrests that could have been made earlier, and all the while it was damaging the police reputation, that they were going soft on the people out there.

BOB CARR: Tony, this might come as a blinding revelation to you and the Opposition leader, the police need to have reason to make arrest, and that is, they need to identify people who've been throwing bricks on video or catch them in the act of doing it. That's the way the criminal law works.

TONY EASTLEY: But blind Freddy would have been able to see that people were throwing bricks or people, they were standing 20 feet or less away from the police, surely they could make the arrest on the spot.

BOB CARR: Tony, you sound like an armchair general. I've got police in the frontline in a difficult circumstance with one understanding from the Government, and that is, that we want them to arrest the wrongdoers. The police did that last night. There were about 100 people there last night, about 30 people, 100 observers there last night, about 30 people emerging from that crowd and to throw rocks and to engage in other illegal behaviour.

How the opposition see it:

JOHN BROGDEN: Look, I still have a concern about the fact that by the Premier's own words there were 30 people rioting last night who were not arrested last night. I still think the Government is concerned about how the media management of this riot goes more than they are about the matters relating to law and order. I think the police should be given the power by the Government to go in and arrest these rioters in the middle of the riot. I think seeing night after night, now four nights in a row, people defying police, throwing objects at them, bits of concrete, lit bottles, Molotov cocktails and the like is simply unacceptable.

MICHAEL VINCENT: By all accounts though any rioting last night was over by 10 or 11 o'clock. It appears to be quiet now. Does that not say that the police did get the situation under control?

JOHN BROGDEN: Well, the time the rioting starts and finishes is irrelevant. The fact that there was another riot now for the fourth night in a row is what I regard as completely unacceptable.

People around the world are watching vision of Sydney as a city suffering from an urban riot. That sort of footage around the world does us enormous damage. The footage within our own country of riotous idiots deciding to really effectively defy police orders, throw things at our police, is unacceptable, and the fact that the police have to stand there and cop it, once again I think is very dangerous to them.

MICHAEL VINCENT: What's wrong with the tactics that police have used to stand back, take the abuse and then make the arrests later based on video footage?

JOHN BROGDEN: Well, it's very clear to me that the Government, as they did in Redfern, wants a softly, softly approach, they don't want to see a response in terms of violence. The concern I have is that as we saw at Redfern, yes, there was footage tape of the riot, there were some arrests made afterwards but many people remain unidentified and not pursued by the police. My concern is the Government is pursuing a softly, softly approach, and I frankly don't think that is doing the people of Macquarie Fields or the state of New South Wales any good whatsoever.

MICHAEL VINCENT: So, what do you think will deter these sorts of riots in the future?

JOHN BROGDEN: Well, I think they need to know there'll be a swift response. I think they need to know that they won't be walking away and going home and being arrested a couple of days later but they will be dealt with immediately. They shouldn't be allowed to run away after having thrown a flaming bottle of petrol at the police, screaming and standing there for the cameras and running away, they ought to be arrested instantly. It's an insult to the police, and it's an invitation to other hoodlums in that community to turn out the next night and do the same thing.

Screw the measured approach, kick arse and take names.