BMW has announced it will supply 80 BMW 530d sedans to Victoria Police by the end of 2018 as highway patrol cars for that state.
WITH HOLDEN, FORD AND TOYOTA ending local production, the race has been on to find a replacement highway patrol car with models like Ford Mustang, Subaru WRX and Kia Stinger all in the picture. But, in the end, for Victoria Police, at least, BMW’s 530d has won the race.
BMW Australia has announced it will supply up to 80 BMW 530d sedans to Victoria Police’s highway patrol fleet by the end of the 2018. The vehicles will be supplied in fleet, entry-level trim with a factory-fitted ‘police pack’. It’s believed that this ‘factory-fitted police pack’ is one of the reasons that other brands lost out, expecting the police services to fit their own equipment, but Victoria Police has said it is keeping the lines of communications open with other manufacturers.
Road Policing Command Assistant Commissioner Doug Fryer said, “BMW has come to the party and worked with us on making sure their cars are as fit for purpose as possible.
“They are the only company to date that has been able to provide a factory fitted ‘police pack’ making the commercial agreement an extremely attractive value for money decision.
“This is a great opportunity, where together with BMW, we can deliver more integrated solutions for policing through technology and innovation while still meeting our performance needs.
“The BMW 530d meets our safety and performance standards as it has been subjected to the evaluation tests that underpin our vehicle safety classification system.
“We are looking forward to their delivery and the opportunity to enhance the operational and performance needs of our members.
“BMW has a proven history, used widely throughout Europe as police vehicles, and most importantly is one of the world leaders when it comes to safety in cars.”
And the fact they are luxury sedan would not weight into it aye … BMW why the hell didn’t you just go porche or bloody ferrari i bet no one considered cost to the tax payers!
You do not need a BMW to catch crims, look at the real cops of the bloody 80’s like good old Roger Rogerson…. yeah that cop was tops..
thats because BMW is only a luxury brand in Australia, in Germany, this is a Ford Falcon, and costs as much.
Entry level trim is something we dont have available in Australia, for any model sold here. We get very expensive versions of every car brought here. In the car world, Aust is a low volume high profit destination.
Don’t get so worked up about the car. Its not costing anywhere near as much as you think.
WE should be informed of the cost of these cars.These cars for the normal consumer are about $119,000 not including on the road costs.As far as I am concerned,they are at least a $100,000 car,unless the Vic Police or Vic Government say otherwise.
I fail to see the value proposition on a whole of life basis. What about after sales service in remote areas? What Bogan is going to line up to purchase an Ex “Bavarian Money Waster” Patrol Car?
Seems fair enough. I am not a BMW fan, but I’m sure they’ll do the job. Maybe it will help to get the price down of the normal cars! They will no doubt be stripped back to standard and resold second hand, once they’ve reached end of service with the cops. I doubt that they will end up in remote areas. “Up to 80” Not exactly flooding the market.
Monty, will that eventually mean remote areas will not have highway patrol cars? I don’t think so!
Try getting support for Euro Trash in remote towns. When these vehicles have ‘issues’ in the bush they will most definitely need to be trucked far from their remote patrol work to BMW Dealers in cities. Very expensive & time consuming.
Remote areas tend to use 4 x 4 ‘s, not sedans. What other high performance vehicle would have service facilities in the real country? Try finding a Ford dealer in the bush. Not so many. They won’t give the software to independent mechanics so servicing is an issue for Fords also. Oh, diagnostic software for a Ford is around $11,000. My former mobile mechanic is semi retired because he cannot afford to fix the newer cars.
Some good points you raise Monty. I concur about the issue of independent workshops not having access to factory info & software – the anti-competitive & cartel like behavior of the FCAI is not helpful in this. Many independent workshops in regional & remote areas simply will not work on brands that have no local support. The Australian Gov needs to make it law that manufacturers have to supply info & software to independent workshops – as is the case in Europe & America.
The mentality of requiring a pursuit car to catch up to high speed law breakers is outdated – speed kills! Law enforcement agencies flaunt that idea & speed recklessly anywhere any time in hot pursuit, killing & maiming as they go!! Then have the cheek to rake in huge $ from safe motorists driving to the conditions doing 5% over the speed limit – Go Figure! That is a double standard!!
Police already have the technology to read licence plates & later “catch up” with the errant motorist in a safe, controlled & positive manner. Police don’t require go-fast exotic & expensive BMW’s that will certainly cost huge sums to keep on the road.
I am not so sure, Ed. Many offending drivers are in stolen cars or with stolen number plates. Our police drivers are trained in high speed pursuits. I am 100% in agreement with the deceptive and dishonest “speed kills” mantra. I don’t like the idea of crooks with zero conscience driving in a manner almost guaranteed to get someone killed just being allowed to get on with it until they crash. Society has bred a bunch of kids that have zero respect for anyone, even themselves. In some areas it is a war zone and Mr and Mrs average are the targets. I’d like see some effort made to rein in these kids. On the issue of number plates, surely it is not so hard to make them impossible to remove with normal tools? My year old Tiguan has that kind of number plate screws.
Anti-theft licence plate fixings – great idea.
What about this… Why not chip vehicles like we do pets – No licence plate to steal then? Though some folk might have trouble finding their car in the car park!
We are mostly all chipped in a broad sense already with mobile phones etc.
It may happen eventually. The biggest problem is the range at which the chip could be polled to identify the vehicle. It also would make it hard should an accident occur. People could could easily just drive off as there would be no easy way of identifying the owner of the vehicle. And Vicroads would lose a fortune in custom plate sales…….