March 1, 2023
Member for Hill Shane Knuth welcomes the chance for a public hearing to be held in Cairns to discuss the Strengthening Community Safety Bill 2023.
He said for years the Far North has seen escalating crime rates across all communities.
"Queenslanders are now rising up and have had a gutful. They have been warning the government for eight years and now it has gotten to the point that it will take a decade to pull it back to where it was," Mr Knuth said.
"The reality is the bill in its current form will nowhere near go far enough.
"It needs to be strengthened and harsher penalties put in place to correct the issue."
Mr Knuth said there needed to be some serious changes in the bill to make a difference.
"This is why KAP will be introducing four amendments to the legislation;
Mareeba Shire Council has written in their submission that they introduced a motion at the 2022 LGAQ Conference calling on the State Government to introduce diversionary facilities on more remote state-owned properties where young people who have started falling into trouble with the law can be sent to gain both social and technical skills rather than being sent to a Youth Detention Centre.
Mr Knuth said this fell in line with KAP's call for relation sentencing.
In 2002 in the Far North there was a total of 34,146 offenses. In 2022 there was a total of 53,793 offences recorded on the Queensland Police website.
https://mypolice.qld.gov.au/farnorth/queensland-crime-statistics/
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