Brent Potter confirms police reinforcements ahead of lifting of Alice Springs youth curfew

The Alice Springs youth curfew has been lifted with police praising the community’s response, however the CLP opposition have stated it should have lasted longer. Latest.

NT Police Minister Brent Potter speaks to media.

The Alice Springs youth curfew came to an end early on Tuesday morning after 20 days, however the CLP has raised questions as to why it had not continued until the end of the month.

NT Police thanked the Alice Springs community for their support and cooperation since the emergency declaration and curfew was announced in late March.

NT Police Commander James Gray-Spence, who oversaw Operation Grimmel, said officers recorded 338 interactions with youths in the curfew area.

Around 200 of those were logged in the first seven days, which he attributed to the need for education around the new rules.

“Anecdotally, what the beat officers are telling me is that the youth responded to that and engaged with families, and we saw a good presence of families in the last two weeks of operation,” Commander Gray-Spence said.

Although Alice Springs saw two violent home invasions since Sunday morning, Commander Gray-Spence said there was no indication that crime was being “pushed out into the suburbs” from the declared area in the CBD.

Police patrols on the streets of Alice Springs. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

The police presence remains in Alice Springs, encompassing both the CBD and surrounding suburbs, to ensure safety.

“This was a collaborative emergency management arrangement involving multiple government and non-government agencies, all working towards the common goal of community safety,” he said.

“We thank the additional Northern Territory Police stationed in Alice Springs for their support, as well as the South Australian Police officers who will remain in town until next week.

“We continue to call upon senior leadership in our community to work together in combating crime in Alice Springs.”

Member for Braitling Joshua Burgoyne said a number of “heinous crimes” had taken place in his electorate over the weekend, during the curfew.

He said he and the CLP opposition wanted the curfew to continue until the end of the month.

“This comes as the youth curfew came to an end, these sorts of incidents which are escalating need to stop,” he said.

“We need to ensure there are laws in place to discourage people from taking part in this sort of behaviour, and we need to ensure people across the NT can feel safe.

“We wanted to see the curfew continue into the end of the month, we need to ensure we have a range of data to ensure whether this is working or not.

“Right now the government are running by press release and everything is changing day by day, we need to actually get to bottom of what is working so people can feel safe.”

Police urge the public to contact police immediately if they witness crime or anti-social behaviour on 131 444, or in an emergency call 000.

‘Everything is on the table’: Curfew ends but fresh cops on the way

The youth curfew may have been lifted, but the police presence in Alice Spring is set to heighten, with 25 police graduates to take up posts in the troubled town.

On Tuesday, Police Minister Brent Potter confirmed that of the 68 police officers who will graduate in June, 25 would be sent straight to Alice Springs.

Mr Potter said the reinforcements were Police Auxiliary Liquor Inspectors who had been fast-tracked to become constables.

“I’ve been trying to explain this from day-dot; this is exactly why I wanted to convert PALIs and have been supportive of (Police Commissioner Michael Murphy’s) plan, because we need more constables and it makes sense to convert those PALIs,” he said.

“They’ll go back on the bottle shops, you won’t have a loss of coverage, but the best bit (is) they’ll be doing stuff before the bottle shop opens, they’ll be doing stuff after the bottle shop closes and it’s a better outcome for Alice Springs residents.”

In February, NT Police announced that an expedited training program had been developed to convert PALIs to constables, with the intent to improve law enforcement beyond the bottle shops.

Mr Potter said he and Commissioner Murphy would seek to improve the career pathway of PALIs in the hopes it would entice more applicants.

“We need to find a robust way to recruit more people and that’s what (Commissioner Murphy) will do and that may mean doing the PALI course in Alice Springs so that there’s not 16 weeks where people have to come to Darwin and (instead) they can stay with their family,” he said.

Police Auxiliary Liquor Inspectors will be sworn in as constables in June. (AAP Image/Gregory Roberts).

Asked if crime levels could be kept down after the curfew lifted, Mr Potter said there was “a lot of work to do”.

“I would say that we’re going to have peaks and troughs,” he said.

“We know that crime will peak (and) police will do a huge body of work … and then you’ll see a lull.”

Mr Potter said he was pleased with the curfew’s effectiveness but was disappointed with the “contestability” of “certain people”.

“I think that it’s too easy to criticise government when we make and take strong action,” he said.

“It would have been better to see those people come to the table and say ‘what can we do to help you’, but also to best represent the people that may have been caught up in this.

“I think there was too much commentary and too much time spent on a potential legal contestability – (the Territory government) just got on with the job, we had good legal advice and it’s worked out really well for Territorians.”

After the curfew had been announced this month, the legality of the decision had been questioned by the Northern Territory Police Association, who advised its members the emergency declaration may have been unlawful.

Mr Potter said the matter was for the NTPA to “explain” to its members.

“Why they weren’t supportive? Not for me to comment – I couldn’t tell you why behind closed doors they weren’t supportive of it.”

Mr Potter wouldn’t rule out another curfew being imposed at a future date.

“Everything’s on the table – we’ll do whatever we need to do to keep Territorians safe and I make no excuses or apologies for it.”