‘Wasn’t my finest moment’: Victoria’s police chief apologises for using force helicopter to fly to Hobart conference

Chief Commissioner Mike Bush spent most of Wednesday apologising after using a Victoria Police helicopter to attend a conference in Tasmania in what he described as an error of judgment that “doesn’t pass the pub test”.

Bush started the morning apologising on ABC Radio Melbourne, before issuing a statement, and later holding a brief afternoon press conference outside a Hobart hotel, where he vowed never to make the same mistake again.

“I am particularly concerned about what the public thinks of the Victoria Police. The public of Victoria must trust us,” Bush told reporters.

“We’ve got to make the right decisions. This wasn’t one of them. I am very prepared to own it, address it, and make sure it never occurs again.”

Bush and a staff officer flew to Hobart on Monday in a police helicopter – generally used for police operations such as tracking stolen vehicles or missing person searches – to attend a police conference, where the helicopter remained grounded overnight due to a mechanical issue.

The police chief said the unplanned overnight stay had added small accommodation costs for the crew, but the flight was otherwise within Victoria Police’s contracted monthly flying hours for October and would not result in additional costs for taxpayers.

He said the flight hadn’t impacted the police’s operational capacity or community safety, since it was on board a backup helicopter generally used for training flights, rather than crime-fighting.

“But still, the perception of this creates issues, and that’s why I’m here today,” Bush said.

Bush conceded he should have been more patient and put more effort into finding a commercial flight, and listed a busy schedule and a desire to maximise time with colleagues in Tasmania as some of the factors behind the decision to use the police aircraft.

He said he realised he had made a mistake when “he got on that machine” to fly to Hobart.

“I was considering, ‘Was this the best option?’ at the time. Obviously, it was too late to change that decision,” he said.

Bush, who used the air-wing once before to travel to Porepunkah in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of two police officers, said he had originally planned to travel on the force’s fixed-wing aircraft, but strong wind conditions made it unviable.

The media storm comes at a challenging time for Victoria Police. The force is grappling with a growing crime problem, an internal reshuffle, growing unrest among rank-and-file officers, and a financial crunch after the government cut its funding in the latest budget.

Bush pushed back on suggestions his officers would be disparaged by his flight and said he was not disappointed that it was leaked to the media.

“That’s always going to happen,” he told ABC. “So, I’m all up for transparency.”

He said he would be flying back to Melbourne on a commercial flight that had been booked for weeks.

Police Minister Anthony Carbines did not appear publicly to speak on the matter, with ministers Harriet Shing and Lily D’Ambrosio responding to questions on behalf of the government during separate media appearances.

Shing said the commissioner was doing an exceptional job.“We back him. We respect him. We respect the work that he does and the work that every single police officer does every single day,” she said.

On Bush’s apology, Shing said it was a hallmark of good leadership to “not only commit to continuous improvement, but to identify that things haven’t worked”.

State Opposition Leader Brad Battin, a former police officer, said it was a bad look when Victorians were facing record levels of crime and “police are being told there’s no money to cut the lawns or replace the lightbulbs at the station”.

“This is not how taxpayers expect police to spend their money,” he said in a statement. “What would you say to the victims if that helicopter was unavailable when it was needed most to fight crime?”

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