Qld crime: David Crisafulli says there’ll be fewer victims under LNP

A pledge on Queensland’s crime rate by Opposition Leader David Crisafulli has sparked a ferocious backlash from the government.

Queensland would have fewer crime victims under an LNP government, Opposition Leader David Crisafulli has pledged, sparking a ferocious backlash from the state government.

Australian Bureau of Statistics data last week revealed Queensland was the nation’s crime capital, with 289,000 victims in 2023.

Mr Crisafulli used it to pledge, under his government, that number would fall once his “Making Queensland safer” laws were introduced.

“I’m not going to suggest that overnight things will magically be better, but they will improve day on day, and there will be fewer victims,” he said.

Mr Crisafulli, however, would not be drawn on comments from Acting Assistant Commissioner for youth crime Colin Briggs, who on Sunday said the rate of crime was starting to turn around.

Despite Mr Briggs reporting good results from proactive policing operations, Mr Crisafulli said the ABS figures proved the state remained engulfed in a huge crime crisis.

“Look at the number of victims since 2015, year-on-year there has been a rise and the figures that the state is leading through at the moment are still a groundbreaking levels,” he said.

“Nothing has changed despite all of the promises, despite all of the lip service after a decade of watering down the laws, nothing is changing.”

Opposition Leader David Crisafulli on Monday. Picture: Steve Pohlner

Premier Steven Miles slammed the pledge, and questioned whether an LNP government would change how crime victims were counted.

“For the LNP to say that they will use the number of victims as their measure, you can only assume that they intend to go back to their approach when they were in government, which was not to include domestic violence victims in those reports,” he said.

“I thought it was extraordinary to see the Leader of the Opposition today say that he doesn’t believe the police when it comes to crime statistics.

“They stood up at the weekend and outlined how thanks to their efforts, including their high visibility, high intensity policing, a range of key crime-related data had turned a corner and was reducing.”

Health and Women Minister Shannon Fentiman said the biggest issue Queensland police responded to was domestic and family violence.

“The number of call-outs for domestic and family violence and sexual violence continues to increase,” she said.

“Part of that is about the increased awareness, people do understand what domestic and family violence is, coercive control is now more understood in the community.”