Dr Tyler Cawthray: Why Burleigh needs police foot patrols

Increasing the visibility of police in crime hot spots is proven to deter law-breaking. But when was the last time you saw a police officer on foot, on the beat, asks Dr Tyler Cawthray.

Dr Tyler Cawthray is Assistant Professor of Criminology at Bond University and has conducted research in the fields of criminology,policing, police legitimacy, police reform, police ethics, police integrity management and accountability, state building and post-conflict rule of law reform.

It’s time to bring back author Enid Blyton’s Inspector Plod as a secret weapon to help drive down crime on the Gold Coast.

Blyton chose the name Plod in 1960 in reference to the plodding of a policeman pounding the beat.

Today the people in Burleigh Heads and Burleigh Waters would love to hear the measured steps of the infamous inspector to help stem the flow of crime, which has risen by 10 per cent in the past 12 months.

Police foot patrols are visible on the Gold Coast inside some shopping centres like Harbour Town, but patrols on the street are a rare site.

When was the last time you saw a police officer on foot, on the beat?

I see police vans, motorcycles or highway patrol vehicles every day, but struggle to spot officers on foot in my community on the Gold Coast.

I expect this won’t be changing soon in Burleigh, at least given the recent announcement by the LNP state government of a delay in the promised Burleigh Police Beat.

This is despite promises to make this a priority during the election campaign and tackle a spate of high-profile violent crimes like the assault and robbery of a man in Rotary Park on February 8.

In the interim, will local MP Hermann Vorster deliver a mobile police beat?

This was part of a $4.1m election pledge by the then LNP candidate to establish a dedicated police beat in Burleigh and expand CCTV.

James Street in Burleigh Heads. Picture: Glenn Campbell.

Will it make a difference for scared locals? The research says yes if police engage in hotspot policing in the most troublesome high-crime areas of Burleigh.

Increasing the visibility of police in crime hot spots is proven to deter law-breaking as it makes offenders think twice about their behaviour because they perceive the risk of getting caught is higher.

A 2019 review of 65 research studies in the US found hotspot policing reduced crime in those hotpots and in surrounding areas.

This is important because it means crimes didn’t just move around the corner to a nearby location.

Police presence also helped reduce crime in the areas surrounding where they were sent to patrol.

The Queensland Police Service’s (QPS) data shows Burleigh Heads and Burleigh Waters had 513 offences occur from November 2024 until February 26 and recorded three main crime hotspots.

Of these more than half were theft-related offences at 217, and drug offences at 58.

The largest proportion was in the business and entertainment district in central Burleigh Heads where 167 total crime incidents were reported in the last quarter.

The second hot spot was Treetops Plaza with 68, and the third, with a comparatively low 36 crimes, was the Burleigh Heads Shopping Centre.

The research also shows police can make it harder for offenders to engage in crime when they aren’t around by working with locals to improve informal community control in these hotspot locations.

Burleigh Heads MP Hermann Vorster and Police Minister Dan Purdie at Burleigh Heads when they made the election commitment to establish a police beat.

A 2019 study from Missouri in the US found a reliable police presence made locals more confident to work to deter crimes themselves.

Members of the public can monitor their own streets, act as the eyes and ears of police whose consistent and fast response from local police beat or station can help deter crime in any location.

This police presence can empower a local community to take its own actions against crime, such as lighting, locked doors and car alarms.

Of course, statistics can be confusing.

Crime doesn’t occur at the same time or at the same place, routinely.

Nor does it happen evenly across the day either, such as two every hour.

But to be most effective, surveys said police needed to be around at the times crime was most likely to happen.

QPS’s crime map shows the two shopping centres in Burleigh were hotspots during the day, but they had few crimes at night.

While most crime in the Burleigh business and entertainment district occurred between 2pm and 6am with the largest portion of 20 per cent around midnight.

How many hours, how many police and how often police patrol these areas can also make a difference.

A UK study found a 15-to-20-minute, two-officer foot patrol once per day was very effective in preventing serious visible street violence in locations where it had been recorded as being heavily concentrated.

Consistency was key to the success of this work though, and it was critical to ensure officers patrols were dedicated and not pulled away to other calls during patrol.

We need to make sure frontline police are on board with using such strategies.

Foot patrols take extra work and are physically demanding — but they work.

Adequate staffing for any Burleigh police beat, permanent or mobile, needs to be a top priority to help officers manage workloads and ensure success.

Getting buy-in from local officers on the beat is also critical to its success, along with support from the community.

Queensland Police officers don’t need to be everywhere, but they do need to consistently be where it counts.

Dr Tyler Cawthray is Assistant Professor of Criminology at Bond University and has conducted research in the fields of criminology, policing, police legitimacy, police reform, police ethics, police integrity management and accountability, state building and post-conflict rule of law reform.

Originally published as Dr Tyler Cawthray: Why Burleigh needs police foot patrols