KEY POINTS:
Police Commissioner Howard Broad has thrown himself on the mercy of public opinion for being a party, albeit an unwitting one, to an embarrassing lark early in his career. A muckraking magazine has been told he hosted a film evening for a police rugby team at his Dunedin home 26 years ago and somebody put on a spool of pornography featuring an act of bestiality.
In their job police officers see the worst of society, the saddest, sickest, most cruel and depraved behaviour to which people can descend. To do their job they probably have to develop a degree of intestinal resistance to sights that would turn the stomach of most people. Sometimes, among themselves, they need to be able to make light of it.
Mr Broad says he was not amused at the material shown in his home, that he was in another room at the time, and that when he heard about it he complained to two senior members of the rugby team. But he wishes now he had reported it to his senior officer, which is what he would want his staff to do today.
Mr Broad is in the throes of devising a police code of conduct covering behaviour expected of a member of the police off duty as well as on. The need for a code was a central finding of the commission of inquiry into police handling of sexual complaints against officers, which was triggered by accounts of groups of policemen having sex with women who, much later, pressed charges of rape against them.
The inquiry has confirmed, to nobody's surprise, that until a few years ago police attitudes to women and sexual complaints left a lot to be desired. The incident in Mr Broad's home sounds like the sort of silliness the inquiry would have cited had it known about it. Mr Broad says it should dispel any impression that he is "holier than thou" when he sets higher standards of behaviour for police today.
He is right. The fact that he was caught up in the police culture of the time is no reason to disqualify him from the task of implementing Dame Margaret Bazley's recommendations and leading a police force with a modern outlook. Public opinion might go further and say that the film incident, far from discrediting him, discredits those who are pursuing the subject of police sexual ethics far beyond reason.
How shocking is that incident, really? The Prime Minister said it was "appalling" to think police would watch this kind of thing for fun. Really? Where has she been? The film contained material that was, and is, illegal under New Zealand censorship laws, and long may it remain so. That is probably how it came to be in police possession. Strictly speaking, the police should not be entertaining themselves with illegal items but let's keep a sense of proportion. It is not appalling, it is demeaning for those who watched and embarrassing for the unwitting host. That is how serious it was.
We are in danger of succumbing to moral panic on any sexual subject these days. Society is much more sensitive to sexually exploitive images of women, though not of men, than it was 20 or 30 years ago and overt displays of sexuality have become less acceptable. The change is all to the good and owes much to the advancement of women in politics and other professions. The police have lagged behind the trend somewhat and the masculine requirements of the job might mean that they continue to do so.
Moral campaigners need to cut them some slack. If the rugby fundraiser in Mr Broad's house is the worst that can be said of him, his detractors must be desperate. The manner in which he has handled the disclosure does him great credit. He has faced the public with candour and courage. When he asks whether he should continue to lead the police we say, most definitely. He has become a model of their improvement.
