Queensland police union government relations chief Ross Musgrove writes:

The piece published by Crikey yesterday, alleging links between the police union and political parties, is pure fiction.

I
am particularly aggrieved by the fact that Crikey didn’t check the
facts before publishing, particularly after the ridiculous piece
published by Crikey which alleged a protestor was “bashed” by police –
even though the supposed victim made no such allegation. The most that
he alleged was that he sustained a graze to his nose whilst lying face
down being handcuffed on a hard surface.

The claim in the
piece that you tried to contact the officer to get his side of the
story is ridiculous as you are well aware that, even if you had
contacted him, he would have been unable to comment due to police
service regulations. All journalists know that the only people able to
speak on behalf of police officers are the police unions/associations
in each state, and you made no attempt to contact me. Alarm bells
should have rung at the Crikey bunker regarding the veracity of the
story when the “independent laywer’s” version of events differed
significantly from the victim’s.

Let me now address the
rubbish contained in Mike Crook’s article. Firstly the Queensland
Police Union did not financially support Peter Dutton’s campaign at the
last federal election. Ditto Mal Brough. Peter Dutton was one of three
politicians who received letters of gratitude from the Police
Federation of Australia or the QPU due to their work representing the
views of Australian police within the parliament. Both of the other
federal politicians were Labor members. Both Peter Dutton and Robert
McClelland used the endorsement in their campaigns. Peter Dutton did so
in a billboard but it was not paid for by either the QPUE or the PFA.

Mal
Brough has had no contact with this union other than over federal
issues where there has been a very significant disagreement with him
over police officers’ access to their superannuation upon retirement.
We have never been involved with him regarding Caboolture station,
although we have continually raised this issue with Police Minister
Judy Spence. We make no apology for that. One of our most respected
members was tragically murdered on duty at Caboolture and the working
conditions at the station were in need of attention. The real reason
that politicians of all persuasions became interested in Caboolture was
that there’s a big crime problem there.

Police are free like
anyone else in the community to run for state parliament. Only one
union official has done so in recent years with success, and he is now
the ALP member for Redlands. To the best of my knowledge I don’t think
any of us know Theresa Gambaro nor have we ever heard of any “sexual
assault horror stories that come from women cadets at the academies.”
To publish such a completely unfounded serious allegation is
disgraceful.

Finally, in the MOU a decade ago the National
Party did not agree to give the QPUE final say on the selection of the
Police Commissioner. We enjoy both good and bad relations with
politicians from all parties. Our crime mostly seems to be that we are
not aligned to any party and run our own agenda on behalf of our
members. That makes most politicians nervous – and from our
perspective, that’s a good thing.