OWNER BACKS CRIME STANCE
LNP WANTS KIDS ON BAIL MONITORED 24/7
A TOWNSVILLE business owner w who is no stranger to crime says the LNP’S new crime plan gives her hope, despite an MP attacking the proposal as “complete rubbish”.
The owner of Sami’s Place at Heatley, Sami Kinglsey, said she hoped the tough proposal would ease the pain of being a victim of crime after having her store b broken into 11 times in six years.
Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington announced the bold proposal on Tuesday. Under the plan, b bail houses would be scrapped and there would be 24/7 youth justice monitoring of children on bail if she was elected on October 31.
Labor MP for Thuringowa Aaron Harper took aim at her proposal for a community payback farm program, which would be established at five farms s across the state, saying it was a “dusted off” ver- sion of Campbell Newman’s failed boot camps.
He labelled the idea a “dismal failure”, saying g his government had d already put in place a newly-selected on-country program and reversed the Youth Justice Act after community pressure.
Ms Frecklington brushed off the claims, saying the program was nothing like her predecessor’s.
“It’s about rehabilitation … it is important we teach them life skills so we break the cycle of grief,” she said. “I won’t apologise for being tough on crime.”
The opposition proposes to scrap youth bail houses statewide, unlocking a $70m investment as a “great start” for funding the new plan. The proposal includes tougher laws against recidivists, with a three-conviction policy before of offenders were detained. The potential rise in d detainees could mean ov overcrowding in the st state’s two detention ce centres; an issue that ca caused the government to loosen youth of offender laws in D December in a bid to ke keep children out of flooded centres.
Ms Frecklington did not address overcrowding threats, instead hoping the tough plan would deter young offenders enough that they would not end up in detention.
Opposition police spokesman Dan Purdie said he would expect the Youth Justice Department to pick up the slack in a proposed 24/7 monitoring of children on bail. Mr Purdie said 44 police officers at the Townsville Rapid Action Patrol Group were currently monitoring the children. “Night after night, what they are doing is checking on kids who are on bail or on curfew … those officers should be cracking down on crime gangs who are dealing in the community, they should be stopping houses from being broken into, from cars being stolen, from keeping people safe,’’ he said.
“We need the Youth Justice Department to step up and start actively monitoring these kids that are out in the community on bail because (the) police shouldn’t be babysitters, they’ve got more important things to do.”
Mr Purdie did not indicate if more staff would be hired for the around-the-clock patrolling, but said they were already adequately trained to deal with the issues.
Other promises in the plan include bringing back breach of bail as an offence, changes in sentencing of a previous child offender and a justice reinvestment program, where a portion of the cost of detention would be redirected into local community groups.