Australian police deny "risk averse" accusation in wake of Bourke Street tragedy

Victoria Police have denied that they have become "risk averse" after the Bourke Street Mall tragedy in which five people were killed.

Graham Ashton, chief commissioner of Victoria Police, said that it's a myth that police are anything but tough on crime.

"There's a bit of a myth around that the fact that we're somehow soft on crime - nothing could be further from the truth," Ashton said in comments published by The Guardian on Monday.

"People can talk about being hard, people like to think they're hard and tough - the fact is we have been hard, we have been tough and we've been consistently like that since I've been in this role."

Dimitrious Gargasoulas, 26, was formally charged with five counts of murder in January after he allegedly drove his car into the pedestrian-only section of the Bourke Street shopping mall in Melbourne's CBD, killing five.

It has since been revealed that Victoria Police officers had multiple opportunities to stop Gargasoulas' vehicle earlier in the day, requests that were denied by police chiefs.

Former chief commissioner Kel Glare, who ran Victoria Police from 1987-1992, became the latest former police chief to attach the state's response to a law and order "crisis."

Glare's group, the Community Advocacy Alliance, said modern policing is not working.

"We're being dismissed as dinosaurs that don't understand modern policing," Glare told Melbourne radio station 3AW.

"But modern policing has got us to this point."

The group says policing has become "risk averse" and chases needed to happen.

"In my view, in most instances, you have to chase," Glare said.

"There will be accidents and the community and the police will just have to accept that." Endit