Queensland’s opposition calls for tougher youth crime policies

The LNP has revealed the first of its youth crime policy proposals for next year’s election, stating that detention should not be a last resort.

Opposition Leader David Crisafulli announced the LNP’s new plans to tackle youth crime as Queenslanders have ‘run out of patience’ with the Palaszczuk government’s ‘weakened’ legislation.

Mr Crisafulli said the LNP would remove the provision of detention as a last resort, introduce harsher punishments for breaching bail conditions, and bring in ‘gold standard’ early intervention methods for young people at risk of committing crimes.

Queensland’s Youth Justice Act 1999 states that children should be detained ‘only as a last resort and for the least time that is justified in the circumstances.’ But Mr Crisafulli believes this needs to change.

“Queenslanders are demanding change. Everywhere we go and listen to the community, people are telling us they have had enough,” Mr Crisafulli said.

“By removing the provision of detention as a last resort, it enables the courts to be able to impose the sentence that they believe is adequate… It will enable a second chance. It will also enable those people who should not be out on the streets to be dealt with without that provision in place.”

However, Terry O’Gorman from the Queensland Council for Civil Liberties does not agree with Crisafulli.

“They’re putting that message out there that if a juvenile breaches bail there’s no consequence — there is,” Mr O’Gorman said, stating that the children’s court has the authority to deny bail to young people who are already out on bail, and that it often does.

Detective Superintendent Brendan Smith, South-eastern regional crime coordinator, said the LNP’s new policies are unfair, as the vast majority of Queensland’s youth are innocent.

“It’s a very small cohort of repeat offenders,” Smith said.

“I think it’s wrong that we’re tarring all these good kids with a brush because of the actions of very, very few.”