The Shortland subbranch of the Prison Officers Vocational Branch (POVB) has passed a motion demanding more regular firearms training for Officers.

The motion pointed out that while Officers were required to regularly update their training with firearms, “there has been a failure by local and senior management at Shortland Correctional Centre to implement adequate systems to monitor compliance or to ensure that the prescribed training is delivered within appropriate and defined timeframes”.

“As a consequence, Officers have continued to be deployed to firearm-related duties while not meeting the mandatory training requirements,” read the motion. “This circumstance gives rise to a foreseeable risk to the health and safety of officers and others and exposes both the organisation and individual officers to regulatory and legal liability.”

The POVB is liaising with the PSA CPSU NSW Workplace Health and Safety Office on the issue.

The subbranch said the poor rate of retraining has been attributed to “operational requirements”, a description it described as “overly broad and lack[ing] sufficient precision to constitute a defensible basis for the ongoing suspension of a mandatory risk control”.

Authors of the motion have pointed out the current framework does not specify a maximum period an Officer can work without updating their training.

“The absence of a defined recertification interval creates an unacceptable gap in assurance, whereby Officers may be considered operationally deployable for indefinite periods without having demonstrated continued firearms proficiency under live fire conditions,” reads the motion.