Prospective criminals in the People's Republic of Point Piper will have to lift their game since the thin blue line of Rose Bay took possession of its brand new toy – a BMW i8 series.
Three-hundred thousand dollars worth of German-engineered hybrid supercar is now parked outside the Rose Bay cop shop as part of the force's soft diplomacy effort with the locals (working, presumably, on the premise that the natives will be less flighty in the local constabulary's presence if it is among them disguised as one of them).
On a six-month, fully-extendable loan from BMW Sydney – which police media are at pains to point out comes at "no cost whatsoever" to the taxpayer – the car, sadly, is mostly for show. With nary a siren or set of flashing lights, it's wheeled out for school fetes more often than it is for the otherwise serious local-area policing business of resolving neighbourhood disputes over private firework displays on the harbour and whose mooring is technically closer to the Royal Prince Edward Yacht Club.
In keeping with the neighbourhood's most notable resident – Malcolm Turnbull – and his hybrid-car predilections (he and Lucy have been known to drive a Prius) the i8 is one of those nifty electric/combustion engine numbers (albeit a 1.5-litre turbocharged three-cylinder one). Which would account both for the extension lead running out the police station window and what we can only imagine will be a hike in the cop shop's electricity bill this quarter.
'Community engagement'
The loan of the Beamer follows the loan to North Sydney police of a Porsche – for the same "community engagement" purposes.
So, we were moved to ask a police media spokesman, has the scheme been replicated in Sydney's west? And has the Mt Druitt Local Area Command been similarly loaned a top of the range Beamer?
"I think it was a Subaru," came the reply. And damn right too.
