“The way we’ve performed in South Australia is a credit to the community of South Australia and I don’t think that can be overstated”.
South Australia Police, Commissioner, Grant Stevens APM praised the efforts of the Public Sector and the broader community in their response to the COVID-19 crisis. Commissioner Stevens also shared with us his calm and diligent approach in managing this pandemic in his key role as State Coordinator.
With the easing of restrictions, the Commissioner also reflected on the three elements of the SA COVID response which have paved the way to where we are now, which is;
- What the community have done;
- The moderate approach we took to start with;
- How we as a police service have worked with the community rather than force it upon them.
Commissioner Stevens was interviewed by Imelda Alexopoulos, Partner, PwC where they explored the below questions:
- What were your key focus areas when you set about tackling the task and what has been the biggest challenge in having to undertake that role?
- What do you think are the key leadership qualities and behaviours that leaders really need to be displaying in times of crisis?
- Having experienced [the loss of Superintendent Joanne Shanahan] firsthand and not being able to pay your respects in the usual way, has that given you a different perspective on the impact restrictions are having on the broader community?
- Given the current restrictions regarding isolation has SAPOL seen an increase or impact in the numbers of crime in general?
- What other factors do you think contribute to the success [of the approach to COVID-19 restrictions in SA]?
- Has SAPOL had to innovate or do things differently in order to serve the community?
- What does the three-stage plan mean for SAPOL and how do you feel about the outlook in terms of being able to implement and executive that three-stage ease of restrictions?
- We have now seen over 5.2 million downloads of the COVID-SAFE app nationally. What does that mean in terms of being able to ease restrictions and being able to move back to normality?
- Policing the borders must be extremely difficult. What measures have you put in place for areas where there are less police officers?
- What was the SAPOL experience [of flexible work] during COVID-19 and do you think this will continue?
- How prepared were we as a state, for the pandemic?
- If you were to stay somewhere in South Australia on holiday where would that be?
Disclaimer: This video contains an unedited transcript
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