The Canberra Liberals had set up the Chief Police Officer to make a case for a larger budget and more officers "on the frontline". This was unsurprising; oppositions almost always complain that governments are neglecting "law and order" and that, as a result, crime is rising, regardless of whether it actually is.

The opposition was backed by the cops' union, the Australian Federal Police Association, which says ACT Policing "desperately" needs 200 more officers due to an alleged "severe lack of frontline police". Its president, Angela Smith, points out that the ACT has the lowest ratio of police to citizens of any Australian jurisdiction – an entirely meaningless metric that assumes that policing Canberra is essentially the same task as policing Alice Springs, the Sydney CBD or Palm Island. It's not.

Ms Smith also says ACT police "are stretched so thin and feel that their own safety and welfare is in a dire situation". She may be advocating well on behalf of her members, but government policy, and budgetary decisions, should be based on more than mere anecdotes like this.

On this point, it's worth noting that ACT Policing's latest annual report makes only one mention of rising threats to its officers: that posed by nebulous, unquantifiable national-security matters, not by increased lawlessness on Canberra's streets.

Indeed, the latest surveys show Canberrans are more likely than other Australians to feel safe at night, both at home and on the streets, and less fearful of becoming a victim of physical or sexual assault. The number of property offences – which make up the vast majority of crime – fell last year and have been stable over the past five years, despite the ACT's growing population.

There was an increase last year in the number of reported assaults in the ACT, though much of this involved family violence. No number of "frontline officers" will prevent these assaults, which are very much a whole-of-community problem, rather than a matter of effective or ineffective policing.

ACT Policing's own data shows it is working effectively with the resources it has, and is doing a fair job in keeping Canberra safe. To her credit, Assistant Commissioner Saunders said that while she would welcome more officers, modern policing was more complicated than that. "[It's] not as simple as throwing sworn police at this issue," she said.

And she's right. There are many opportunities to improve not only policing outcomes but policing efficiency; for example, through intelligence-directed operations and patrols.

Conservative politicians regularly demand that government agencies do more with less – and often for good reason. It's odd, though, that they continue to exempt from these economy drives any government agency that happens to have uniformed staff.