Barron River MP Craig Crawford and Cairns MP Michael Healy on youth justice reforms

Far North MPs say stronger youth justice laws are needed, but are only part of the solution to curbing youth offending across the state.

FAR North MPs say stronger youth justice laws are needed, but are only part of the solution to curbing youth offending across the state.

Barron River MP Craig Crawford and Cairns MP Michael Healy said they wholeheartedly supported the suite of initiatives announced on Thursday by Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk.

Mr Crawford said while he was all for tougher laws, the problem needed “the kitchen sink” thrown at it to come up with a genuine solution.

“We need tough sentencing for the tough kids, but we can’t just arrest our way out of this and lock them up and throw away the key,” Mr Crawford said.

“We have to ask: What puts kids armed with a knife in someone’s bedroom in the middle of the night looking to steal a set of car keys?

“Why is a 12-year-old child in the back of a stolen car doing doughnuts in the street at 3am when they should be home in bed?”

State MP for Barron River Craig Crawford. Picture: Bronwyn Farr.

Mr Crawford said what occurred in the Lovell house in North Lakes was unfathomable.

“The whole public from Cairns to Coolangatta share the grief, anger and frustration … that there are kids out there allegedly prepared to do that kind of crime,” he said.

“But we’ve also got to look at ways of curbing youth offending by getting them into school and addressing broken homes, mental health and drug rehabilitation.”

Mr Crawford said he supported the proposal for a youth detention centre for the Cairns region, given its proximity to the Cape and the Gulf.

“If we want to deal with and rehabilitate young offenders, we’ve got a better chance in Cairns where they are closer to family and home than sending them another 400km down the

road to Townsville.

“We got to throw the kitchen sink at this and give these juveniles a fighting chance to turn their lives around.

“I think we’ve got take politics out of it, and we’ve got to manage this as a community.

“We need tough laws, we need increased maximum penalties, we need the courts to do their job, we need kids in detention to get wraparound services quicker, and we need early childhood intervention, social and community programs to deter kids from a path of crime.”

Mr Crawford said criminals boasting about their crimes on social media deserved heavier penalties.

“Social media has a massive part to play in why we are seeing this big spike in brazen car thefts,’’ he said.

“Cars have been getting stolen by criminals for decades, but until social media came along, there was no forum for these kids to brag about flogging a car.

“Now they cover their face, and post videos of themselves driving stolen cars at ridiculous speeds, waving around cash, and flaunting their criminality in some warped contest with

their criminal mates.

Member for Cairns Michael Healy said he welcomed the raft of new measures to tackle youth crime. Picture: Brendan Radke

Cairns MP Michael Healy said he welcomed the raft of new measures to tackle youth crime.

“There is no one solution. This is complex,” Mr Healy said.

“Juvenile offenders need to be dealt with by the courts more efficiently.

“We need to have community and social programs, and in this announcement, we’ve benefited from the success of the Cairns Safer streets and midnight basketball.

“Deterrents like putting in car immobilisers is something me and my parliament colleagues have been pushing for.

“Youth detention centres unfortunately are a necessity, and I look forward to working with relevant agencies to identify where in the Cairns region this would be most appropriate.

“The community expects us to be tough on criminals, we know locking people up is not the solution, but we also know that if you break the law, you pay the consequences.

Mr Healy said the extra resourcing for police, like the ongoing Operation Uniform Theta to focus on hot spots with high police visibility, also worked.

“We launched a police crackdown on youth crime in Cairns 10 days ago and that will run to the end of the school holidays.

“Police report early success and there’s been a 20 per cent drop in the rate of car thefts in Cairns, and in total, in Cairns, Mt Isa and Townsville, there has been action against 200 juveniles on about 600 charges.”

Originally published as Barron River MP Craig Crawford and Cairns MP Michael Healy on youth justice reforms