New Fraser Coast Inspector Paul Algie reveals the top issues he is concerned about

A new Fraser Coast Police Inspector has hit the ground running, visiting the region’s police stations and declaring the top issues he will be focusing on in coming months.

The Fraser Coast’s new top cop has revealed the key issues that will receive much of his focus in coming months, including rackling property crime, domestic violence, juvenile crime, road trauma and drugs.

Inspector Paul Algie transferred from Gympie to the Fraser Coast after receiving a promotion and has spent the past two weeks visiting the region’s police stations, with a visit to Fraser Island’s station planned for Wednesday.

Two weeks in and Inspector Algie has hit the ground running.

What he has seen on the Fraser Coast is similar to what he has seen in other communities across Queensland in terms of the drug problem.

“It doesn’t really matter where you go,” he said.

“It’s just endemic to the whole population that you’re going to have drug crime.

“It’s just unfortunate that’s the way it is. It’s been the same wherever I’ve worked.”

Inspector Algie said road trauma was of particular concern for him, especially with the Bruce Highway running through the region.

“Obviously, our road toll here over the past few years has been very high,” he said.

“That’s something that I’m very concerned about.”

He said there were a multitude of reasons behind fatal traffic crashes, from speeding and inattention to fatigue.

“What’s really important to us as police is to be doing a combination of high visibility patrols, that’s the stuff that you will see when you’re out and about, you’ll see marked police cars pulling people over, random breath testing, random drug testing.

“We’ve got a really good highway patrol section here supported by general duties to do that.”

Inspector Algie said there were also covert operations which included unmarked police cars, speed cameras and cameras that detected the use of mobile phone while driving.

“It’s quite sad that people aren’t changing their behaviours because we are still getting a lot of people detected using their mobile phones,” he said.

One of the main events Inspector Algie has attended since taking on his new role was the launch of a new community initiative which would allow businesses and residents to register their CCTV systems, freeing up police time considerably when it came to investigating crimes.

He said while the region had good police numbers, different activities like door knocking for footage could take up a lot of time and initiatives like the one unveiled on Wednesday would mean one less task for police, freeing officers up to do frontline policing.

Domestic violence, a lot like drug crime, was an issue faced by many communities, Inspector Algie said.

“We are not spared by it this region,” he said.

“Domestic violence is obviously another one of my priorities.

Inspector Paul Algie transferred from Gympie to the Fraser Coast region after receiving a promotion and has spent the past two weeks visiting the region’s police stations.

“It terms of what we do, it’s how we can do our job better, helping aggrieved people and helping victims, but also working with other government and non-government departments that are involved in that space.

“This is a team sport, if we’re going to get really good outcomes for victims of domestic violence, if we’re going to get outcomes for victims of property crime, people who are dying on roads, the families who have lost people on the roads, we have to work collaboratively and collegiately with other government departments, non-government departments, making sure that everybody’s got a shared responsibility that works in this space, that’s how we’ll get really good outcomes.”

Inspector Algie said he was looking forward to meeting with his counterparts in the community, including youth justice, probation and parole and groups working with victims of domestic violence to understand what the challenges looked like in the region and meeting the nuances of those challenges.

Inspector Algie has been a police officer for 20 years, most of them spent in uniform.

He has worked across Queensland, starting out in Toowoomba, then North Queensland, Atherton, Gladstone and Cherbourg.

He did covert police work as part of a drug squad, and worked in Mackay and Gympie before heading to the Fraser Coast.

His daughter is currently completing her final year of high school and his family will join him in the region when she finishes in a few months.

In the busy few weeks since he started, Inspector Algie has met with all of his officers in charge and has been impressed by what he has seen.

“The Fraser Coast is a growing area, obviously,” he said.

“You’ve got a lot of people coming into Hervey Bay and Maryborough with development, the train industry, and there’s a lot of young people moving in.

“I don’t think Hervey Bay is quite the retirement community that it once was, although it’s still got a large retired population.

“It’s a growing area and since Covid, that’s only multiplied.”

Inspector Algie has a strong background in disaster management, and helped co-ordinate emergency services during the floods in Gympie in February 2022.

He is certain those skills will be useful given Maryborough and its surrounds was also affected by the flood emergency.

“Disaster management, I’m really passionate about that,” he said, adding that it again demonstrated the importance of different agencies working together.

Inspector Algie said while the public saw the police as being reactive, proactive policing was something that was being done “quite well” on the Fraser Coast and was something he wanted to focus even more on.