Lindt siege: Monis was the murderer but face it, our system failed too

Amid the cloud of excuses and challenges raised by the inquest into the Lindt Cafe siege, there was one refreshing response.

In simple language, the newly appointed NSW Police commissioner, Mick Fuller, solemnly admitted that officers should have stormed the Martin Place building earlier than they did.

In this, he knowingly went further even than NSW coroner Michael Barnes who had noted the inordinate delay between the pre-determined "trigger" moment for "emergency" entry - when Man Haron Monis discharged his shotgun - and 10 minutes later when police went in.

Critically, in that 10-minute window, cafe manager Tori Johnson was coldly executed by Monis - a self-declared Islamic State devotee - whom police had mystifyingly assessed to be at core, a non-violent grandstander.

And it was in the chaos of that "emergency action" that another hostage, Katrina Dawson was fatally shot by fragments of an errant police bullet.

Fuller's statement is likely to have been one of the few outcomes of clarity for the grieving families, and the traumatised survivors of the ordeal.

While the coroner was critical of the 10-minute delay, and of the dogged adherence of police to the "contain and negotiate" strategy despite mounting proof that it was failing, he was at pains to lay the entire blame for the deaths at the feet of Monis. This was in a sense, a political point, being neither literally true as he subsequently concluded in respect of Ms Dawson, nor sufficiently cognisant of the contributory role of police decisions made (or deferred) throughout the siege's 17-hour duration.

Let's be clear, contain and negotiate had, as its intended objective, the non-violent resolution of the stand-off. It failed. Leaving aside the fatal collateral wounding of Ms Dawson in the police raid, it must be acknowledged that waiting-it-out may itself have increased the likelihood of homicide by gradually ratcheting up the anxiety and fatigue factor in the cafe. In any case, the waiting period concluded with the unprovoked firing of Monis' shotgun and then the callous murder of Mr Johnson.

From the mind-set of patience - apposite for domestic siege situations but demonstrably ill-suited in the case of a suicidal terrorist - everything else flowed, including a refusal to properly weigh the first-hand warnings of imminent murder provided by hostages who had just escaped, and of course the fact that negotiations had signally failed to progress at all. Remember, no direct police-to-terrorist conversations took place at any point.

Moreover, as a result of this mind-set, considerations about: military assistance; the use of police or possibly army snipers; clear lines of fire; using "bonded" rounds for piercing commercial grade plate-glass versus standard police ammunition; and the legal bases of all of the above, were never progressed either. Nor were detailed contingency plans seriously developed.

The coroner dismissed claims that the military's actual experience of storming strongholds might have been accessed, citing Part IIIAAA of the Defence Act.

While it is true that this 1903-dated act allows the military to intervene domestically only at the invitation of a state or territory, this is a circular argument because, plainly, NSW Police never believed it was out of its depth. Thus it never advised the NSW state government accordingly. Why would it, given it was proceeding on the incorrect assumptions detailed above?

Perhaps these legal and cultural rigidities may now change.

Fuller's qualified admission of tardiness on behalf of NSW Police, however, carries another harsh reality. If the future police response is to seize the initiative, to have police move pre-emptorily and with deadly intent to rescue hostages, there are obvious risks.

There is no non-violent way of storming a venue. No guaranteed surgical kill. If police are to be licensed to act solely in the interests of saving innocents, collateral deaths are always possible. And it will have been police who started the shooting.

The community must confront this fact, lest police once again allow inaction to play the predominant role in the outcome.