"Police ministers from across the country will discuss remote engine immobilisers after a Queensland police officer was hit by an allegedly stolen car last month.

Constable Peter McAulay was mowed down at Booval, west of Brisbane, while trying to stop it with road spikes.

He was critically injured and faces a long recovery.

The Queensland Police Union has been campaigning for high-tech immobilisers, which can kill the engine of stolen cars remotely, to be fitted in all new cars for several years.

"Every time we have one of these instances it prompts us to try harder to get these safety measures in place," union president Ian Leavers said.

"ABS and airbags at one stage were out of the reach of many people, now you can’t buy a car without them.

"There's still a long road ahead however we in Australia really need to embrace technology to assist in fighting crime, stopping terrorism and keeping the community safe.

"This remote engine immobiliser technology is available right now and if we mandated it in all new cars sold, as we have previously done with ABS brakes and airbags, then it a few years' time, most cars on the road would possess this technology, so I call on all governments across Australia to support our proposals."

http://www.9news.com.au/national/2018/10/18/18/48/immobilisers-queensland-police-ministers-meeting

What think ye?

Every car or truck, bus or bike every state as soon as possible, innocents die in police chases

Belly,

It may be a good idea but there are sure to be some downsides.

Would the police have to be in visual contact at the time?

Shutting off the engine also shuts off the power steering and brakes, so the steering suddenly becomes excessively heavy and very high pressure is needed on the brake pedal.

If the vehicle was immobilized out of visual contact an accident might be precipitated.

//What think ye?//

I don't see why they think we need some fancy new hardware for this; our current level technology already allows them to do this to a lot of modern vehicles.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK0SrxBC1xs

Obviously it's not going to work on older cars, but they wouldn't have the remote immobilisers either. The police just need to hire themselves some decent geeks.

Not much point if they were fitted to new cars only. It's easier to steal older cars too. How many officers are killed by drivers of stolen cars? How many officers have been run down by any motorist. Fair bit of emotion involved in the police union's call. It would not be a good political move for any government; new car buyers are paying too much for cars in Australia already.

A knee jerk reaction to an unfortunate, but very rare, incident. No a goer in my view.

ttbn - "A knee jerk reaction to an unfortunate, but very rare, incident."

It is not about the incident.

It would prevent a lot more incidents of car chases turning into deaths of people and damage to property also car thefts.

But if the police can stop a car so can someone with the know how and skill it could be used for criminal purposes.