Young people in Townsville and Cairns would be subject to curfews and parents fined $250 if their unaccompanied children are found out at night "without a reasonable excuse" under an LNP election pledge that advocates say could breach the UN convention.
Key points:
- The LNP would set curfews for young people in Townsville and Cairns
- LNP leader Deb Frecklington says parents need to be responsible for their children
- Amnesty says the plan could breach the UN convention on rights of the child
Speaking in the key battleground of Townsville on day 16 of the campaign, Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington declared an LNP government would "fix the juvenile crime problem" in the two cities by trialling an 8:00pm curfew for children aged 14 and under, and a 10:00pm curfew for 15 to 17-year-olds.
Under the plan, police would be given powers to take unsupervised youths off the streets and place them in refuges for an undetermined period.
"This is about making sure that parents become responsible for their children," Ms Frecklington said.
"If you are on the streets doing the wrong thing, then you will be taken off the streets so the community is kept safe."
Ms Frecklington said parents would also be fined $250 each time the young person was picked up by authorities.
The policy is similar to an LNP proposal at the 2017 state election to trial a 10:00pm curfew on children under 16 in Townsville.
'A little bit ludicrous'
But Katter's Australian Party MP Nick Dametto said today's curfew announcement would turn police into "pound officers".
"Picking kids up off the street and taking them to a designated location until their parents pick them up where they'll give them a fine sounds like we're setting up a dog pound for kids," Mr Dametto said.
"The idea of getting kids off the street, fully support that — but there needs to be more context around this.
"What about young Sarah who's finished working across the road at a cafe walking home at 11 o'clock at night — what is her excuse?
"Are you going to set up a police special ops team just to look after stray kids? This seems a little bit ludicrous."
Ms Frecklington said "common sense would prevail" among police officers, saying if a child was already headed home they would be allowed to do so.
'Prevent childhood trauma first'
Amnesty International Australia's campaigner Joel Mackay said the policy potentially breached Australia's commitment to international law, including the United Nations convention on rights of the child.
"Curfews stigmatise, victimise and criminalise young people," he said.
"They don't do anything to bring down crime rates, all they do is entrench the marginalisation of children in our community.
"This proposal will not work."
Act for Kids' CEO Katrina Lines said young people involved with the youth justice system are often survivors of childhood trauma due to physical, sexual and emotional abuse and neglect.
"We must treat and prevent childhood trauma first before any youth curfews are likely to see success in reducing the rate of child crime," she said.
PeakCare executive director Lindsay Wegener said residents in Townsville and Cairns deserved the right to feel safe from crime, but parents should be helped rather than punished.
"Sometimes parents are struggling to care for their children and struggling to ensure they stay at home," he said.
He also believed the policy would disproportionately affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and their families.
"Most young people who engage in youth crime also have child protection needs. This will simply exacerbate the kind of issues of concern that we have about the safety of those young people," Mr Wegener said.
"If there is tension in the relationship between parents and young people, it's certainly not going to ease that tension if their parents are being fined $250."
'It's just got to stop'
Ms Frecklington said she made no apologies for being "tough on crime" and highlighted an incident where a cafe was held up by an 11-year-old with a knife.
"An 11-year-old — what is he doing on the streets at that time at night? He's got to be back at home, safely tucked into bed," she said.
"It is a terrible indictment when every time I come to Townsville, I have to meet with another community member who has had their house broken into, their car flogged … it's just got to stop."
In July, Ms Frecklington released the LNP's "comprehensive plan to crack down on youth crime", including its "three strikes and you're out" policy aimed at forcing courts to sentence young people to youth detention if convicted of a third office.
LNP candidate for Mundingburra, Glenn Doyle, said he and his police colleagues were frustrated and needed laws tightened in relation to youth crime.
At a separate press conference in north Queensland, Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said the curfew plan "doesn't really cut the mustard".
She announced a promise to build a second Bruce Highway stretching from Charters Towers to Mungindi on the NSW border to create jobs and divert freight trucks, if Labor was re-elected.
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2020-10-21 04:20:00Z
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