Tate’s blue-sky thinking

TEENAGE gangs brawling at train stations across the Gold Coast would be better off burning energy with “kite fights”, Mayor Tom Tate says.

Cr Tate’s comment came as he talked yesterday about a string of violent incidents at Coast stations, including the savage bashing of a 17year-old girl near Helensvale Railway Station.

“Yes, our youth are pretty high energy at the moment,” he said.

Cr Tate put the violence down to “bravado” between “their own youth groups”.

“Back in the day when you’re a teenager, you want to act tough, and that’s how they’re expressing it,” he said.

“There’s other ways of doing it. Back in Thailand we used to do kite fights. You know, buy some kites, go out that way and see who’s better.”

Cr Tate urged disaffected young people to be “braver” and to “take a minute and walk away” from conflict