Lighter policing is earned through trust. Lederer’s letter to Wanderers fans erodes it

November 6, 2026 — 2:00am

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Last Monday, Western Sydney Wanderers chairman Paul Lederer published an open letter to the A-League club’s members, avowing that ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.

In it, he asserted the treatment of Wanderers supporters this season had been “totally unacceptable”; characterised the gung-ho policing of the club’s fixtures as “neither reasonable nor proportionate” and maintained there was “no justification” for the presence of the Public Order and Riot Squad at its matches.

Those each are robust propositions. Placed under a firm squeeze, they don’t maintain shape.

Lederer’s missive identified three grievances. That hundreds of supporters were held outside the recent Sydney derby at Allianz Stadium for half an hour; that rules governing what the club frames as “concession items” have shifted; and that at the match against Macarthur at Campbelltown on last weekend, up to 20 riot squad officers were positioned, at times, directly behind the supporter bays.

The letter infers a pattern of excessive policing that has left supporters feeling like “second-class citizens”. Which is a bit of a quantum leap, really. On the club’s own account, none of the three grievances concern an arrest, a charge or the use of force, whether excessive or not.

Cops don’t attend football matches because of a passing interest in the game. Rather, the Police Act 1990 (NSW) charges the NSW Police Force with the responsibility of protecting persons from injury and property from damage, and with preventing and detecting crime.

Lederer’s epistle proceeds as though police deployment........

© WA Today