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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2025-10-28 Daily Xml
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Grievance Debate

Youth Crime

Mr BATTY (Bragg) (15:10): Unfortunately, another day, another example of how the Malinauskas Labor government has lost control of law and order on our streets and in our suburbs. We are now seeing the failings of our system play out most acutely, unfortunately, at the local pub and the local bottle shop at everywhere from The Highway to the Arkaba. We have been hearing really horrific stories over the past days and weeks about groups of often young people going into these establishments, stealing alcohol, running riot, terrorising employees and really putting community safety at risk.

The fact of the matter is, as a young person you should be able to go to work at your local bottle shop without fear that some crazed group of kids is going to come in and start throwing rocks at you or punching you in the face multiple times. You should be able to go to work at your local pub without fear that someone is going to come in and bite you. It is entirely unacceptable behaviour. The core business of any government should be keeping its citizens safe, and the Malinauskas Labor government is failing this every step of the way.

Unfortunately, it is far more than just the shocking statistics that I could tell you about. What it is really about in all of these instances is the victims of these horrific crimes. I want to read some of the words of those victims into Hansard. Just a couple of weeks ago Peter Hurley, who is the proprietor of the Arkaba Hotel, wrote a letter to the editor following a really concerning incident where someone allegedly committed wilful damage and assault following a violent rampage at his hotel. Mr Hurley said:

Despite three hotel employees being assaulted—one of them bitten—and damage to gaming machines exceeding $80,000, Magistrate Davis offered Mr Ajal words of comfort, assuring him he was a 'good person' who had done a stupid thing.

We frequently hear of the right of workers to feel safe in their workplace. Yet in this case, those rights seem to have been disregarded.

Mr Ajal received a suspended sentence, was placed on a good behaviour bond and is not required to compensate the Arkaba for the extensive damage caused.

This outcome falls well short of community expectations for such serious offences.

The staff, the Arkaba Hotel and the wider public have been let down by a justice system that appears to prioritise the offender's comfort over the victim's wellbeing.

Damning words from a victim of crime. This morning, we heard on radio the general manager at another hotel, The Highway hotel, reflecting on his experience with crime. This follows just this week an incident where about a dozen youths, some of them aged as young as 10, came into the place. They began throwing rocks, they smashed windows, one youth held a metal star dropper at a staff member and another punched a staff member several times to the face. Mr Symonds, the general manager there, said:

…that is so unfair on our staff...you can reasonably expect to come to work [for] a four hour, six hour, eight hour shift in a bottle shop and have the right to feel safe and that's just not the case right now, particularly for night staff…

He went on to say:

…at some of our other venues where young kids…12, 13…who we had continuous problems with and the coppers told me at the time that some of these kids have been arrested over 200 times and let off 200 times because the system doesn't allow anything to happen to them and the kids know.

These are the victims, the very real victims, of these crimes describing in their own words the impact and describing in their own words the failings of this system. These sorts of crimes are not happening by accident; they are happening because we do not have enough police, they are happening because we have weak laws and they are happening because we have a government that is just never interested in law and order.

In contrast, what you have seen from the Liberal Party over the past week or two is the announcement of a new police attraction and retention policy. We have demanded tougher laws. We see the government coming to parliament this week seemingly forgetting that they had promised to introduce all these laws in the police portfolio. They forgot that they promised laws about 3D-printed guns two years ago.

It was not the last minister and it was not the minister before that, it was the minister before that who told us they were going to introduce legislation about 3D-printed guns, and the new attack dog, the new minister, comes in today finally remembering—only after question time, I might add—to introduce those laws. It is the same with copper theft, and we have weak laws that still allow kids to commit crime time and time again being introduced by the Attorney in the other place. It is not good enough.

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