Toowoomba South MP David Janetzki grills government over crime

Families selling up and traumatised kids. Toowoomba South MP David Janetzki calls on the State Government to act on youth crime “crisis.”

Shadow Treasurer David Janetzki. NewsWire / Sarah Marshall

Toowoomba South MP David Janetzki has painted a harrowing picture of the lingering trauma left in a wake of youth crime and called on the State Government to act.

The comments were made in the Queensland parliament on Thursday and come after Middle Ridge resident Ken Cunliffe presented the accounts of 29 victims of crime to Youth Justice Minister Leanne Linard earlier this month.

“I know these 29 entries have been forwarded to the Youth Justice Minister and I implore the Minister to read them and to take them seriously,” he said.

“I want to talk about the impact of crime on people who are going to bed with garden tools under their beds because they are fearful.

“They are selling their houses because of the repeated crime in their streets and against them individually.

“I want to talk about the scale of the problem when children cannot go to sleep; children are needing to see psychologists.

Mr Janetzki pointed to a 599 per cent increase in unlawful use of a motor vehicle charges in the Darling Down in the past six years as evidence of an out of control problem.

Source: MyPolice.qld.gov.au

“This is extraordinary! This is Toowoomba,” he said.

“It is a crisis and my people feel like they are at war in our streets.

“This government is not listening.

“They are not changing the law.

“They are not strengthening police resourcing.”

Toowoomba businessman Ken Cunliffe estimates car thieves have cost Darling Downs residents about $36 million in the past 12 months.

He based his figures on a simple conservative equation of two cars stolen each night with the vehicles costing an average of about $50,000.

It is a staggering figure that betrays the collective trauma visited on the city each night and it has motivated Mr Cunliffe to take matters into his own hands.

“Every single day a couple of cars get stolen, houses broken into, some are becoming violent or at least threatening violence,” Mr Cunliffe said.

“If we don’t get control of it then it is going to overtake the city.

“The same offenders get caught and then released, caught and then released.”

Earlier this month he had a phone meeting with the Youth Justice Minister Leanne Linard and argued for tougher penalties and more police resourcing.

That petition is currently with the Minister who is drafting a response.