Parents of a man who was arrested on Friday after a dramatic police pursuit have spoken out, expressing disappointment in their son and praising the actions of police.

The 36-year-old Point Cook man was seen driving an allegedly stolen van in the Melbourne suburb of Footscray, prompting the pursuit.

Dramatic vision emerged of the wild chase, which ended with the man leaping from the moving vehicle then being hit by a police car.

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The van had reportedly been stolen earlier that morning from St Kilda Rd about 5.40am.

Police allege the man was driving the van “erratically” through several suburbs including Melbourne, Port Melbourne, Spotswood, Carnegie, Sunshine, Dandenong and Point Cook — crashing into both moving and parked vehicles along the way.

Footage captured by 7NEWS shows the badly damaged white van — with flames sparking underneath — tearing through traffic as the driver fled police.

The Point Cook man’s parents have now issued a statement to 7NEWS, clarifying they will not pursue any legal action against police after earlier comments appeared critical of their response.

“We acknowledge that some of our initial comments, particularly regarding the police response, were not reflective of our position as his family. We regret any misunderstanding and wish to be clear about where we stand,” the statement reads.

“We wish to clarify that as a family we will not be pursuing any legal action, complaints or compensation in relation to the police response. It was never our intent to do so and we regret that we gave the impression that we did.

“We want to make it unequivocally clear that we do not condone, defend or minimise our son’s actions in any way. What he did placed hundreds of lives at risk, instilled fear in the community and could have easily ended in tragedy. He is lucky that no one was killed and we are painfully aware of how narrowly that was avoided on Friday.

“We thank Victoria Police for their actions and for removing him from the streets before further harm could occur. We would like to clarify that we are not shifting blame nor is anyone but our son responsible for what happened on Friday.

“While we love our son, we are devastated and heartbroken by what has occurred. We accept that this is now a matter for the justice system.

“We would like to once again extend our deepest apologies to anyone affected by the aftermath of our son’s actions.”

The man was taken to hospital under police guard with non-life-threatening injuries.

The man is expected to be interviewed by police and is likely to face a string of significant charges.