Victoria Police Commander Wayne Cheesman, with his bald pate and forearms the size of Christmas hams, is the sort of no-nonsense cop we could all use on our local street corner.
So when the Big Cheese declares Melbourne’s had a gutful, any politician attuned to the public mood should understand he is speaking not just on behalf of police dodging rocks thrown by left-wing agitators, but a city desperately in need of a break.
A visibly frustrated Commander Wayne Cheesman with rocks protesters threw at police.Credit: Victoria Police
Instead, Premier Jacinta Allan is either deaf to what Cheesman and other police are trying to tell her or blind to what has been going on every Sunday in Melbourne for the past two years.
Allan’s insistence that only a “small number of people” were responsible for Sunday’s violence and claim that this was a “different pattern of behaviour” from other demonstrations overlooks key facts.
The first is that the violence was not an unfortunate outcome but a design feature of what was promoted as a counter-protest to stop an anti-immigration rally organised by another group. When activists declare there is “no room for racism and fascism”, you know they are coming into the city looking for a stoush.
The second is that other rallies don’t descend into violence because there is no one there to fight against.
Police at the protest on Sunday.Credit: Paul Jeffers
These people are a stain on the social fabric of Melbourne, and if it was up to Cheesman, we would cart the lot off to the laundromat.
Identifying the problem should be the easy part. The more difficult question is what to do about it.
Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan on Monday.Credit: Chris Hopkins
Prominent restaurant owner Chris Lucas wants the CBD to be declared protest-free for the rest of the year. While this would temporarily impinge on the right to assembly guaranteed by Victoria’s Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities, it would protect the countervailing rights of business owners, residents and ordinary visitors to the city.
Opposition leader Brad Battin baulked at this idea on Monday but wants police to be given greater powers so they can move protesters on and ban those who break the law from returning to the city.
The opposition, the Police Association and Jewish community groups want a permit system to regulate protests.
This idea was last debated within the cabinet at the end of last year. Some ministers supported the establishment of a designated protest area in a public park outside the CBD. The premier remains opposed to a permit system, and there appears to be no appetite within government to reopen a thorny debate.
Which brings us back to Allan.
In December, after the Adass Israel Synagogue was destroyed by arson, Allan announced a series of measures to “stamp out extreme and radical influences in public protests”. These included outlawing terrorist flags and symbols and banning face masks at protests.
At the time, she said: “Peaceful protest is protected in this state … but the right to protest is balanced against the right of people to live safely – free of danger, discrimination and harassment.”
The right to peaceful protest wasn’t unlimited then and isn’t now.
Nearly a year later, legislation required to bring in these promised measures has not been introduced to parliament. The premier says we will see the proposed laws next month. We can judge their utility if and when we do.
But first, the premier needs to accept Melbourne’s protest problem goes beyond a small number of demonstrators.
On Sunday night, Cheesman repeated what his boss, Chief Commissioner Mike Bush, has made clear – the police manpower required to indulge the regular weekend antics of protesters, peaceful or otherwise, is soaking up resources otherwise needed to fight crime.
At a time when carjackings, aggravated burglaries and incidents of domestic violence are being perpetrated at an alarming rate, the true cost of Melbourne’s “peaceful” protests is potentially deadly.
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