Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Opposition Leader Lia Finochiarro on what the Government should be doing about out of control crime in the NT

Transcript

Opposition Leader Lia Finochiarro on what the Government should be doing about out of control crime in the NT · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: That the pressure is mounting on the government to take
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: action when it comes to crime, from youth crime to
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: alcohol fueled antisocial behavior and domestic violence. It's an issue
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: which is being raised a lot right now. The leader
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: of the Opposition, Lea Fanocchiro, says the Chief Minister's ongoing
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: in action on urgent law and order reform has seen
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: crime in central Australia skyrocket to ten year highs. Lea
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Fanocchiaro joins me on the line this morning live from
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: Alice Springs High Leah, Good.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: Morning, I'm literally still at the airport.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Oh well, Lea, we appreciate your time today. Now, before
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: I get into the issues in Alice. Yesterday in Palmerston,
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: we know that a man was allegedly shot by police
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: after threatening them with a spear. It was certainly a
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: frightening time for residents in Palmerston. Leah, you must have
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: been shocked when you heard what had unfolded.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: Oh, of course, you know. And it's always really difficult
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: and really concerning when you know, we send our police
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: to incredibly dangerous circumstances every single day, and so our
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: thoughts are obviously with the family of the person injured.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: But particularly our police who need our support right now, Leah.
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: Some who live in that area have said that it
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: was only a matter of time before something serious happened.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: Has there been issues with crime and anti social behavior
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: there before?
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Oh? Absolutely, It's a well known area for anti social
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: behavior and criminal behavior. I used to be the local
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: member in that area when I was first elected, Katie,
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: and it was certainly a very challenging time. Police would
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: be very familiar with attending those units, and you know
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: nothing has really been done about it over the last
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: six or so years.
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: Well, look, you know, there's not a huge deal more
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: that we can say about that incident. We know that
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: a full police investigation is currently underway, so we'll keep
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: listeners up to data as any further info comes to hand.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: But Lea, we certainly know that there are a few
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: issues happening around the Northern Territory right now causing a
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: lot of concern for a lot of people. You're in
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: Alice Springs and you claim that the crime there has
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: skyrocketed to the highest it's been in ten years. What
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: figures have you got to support that claim.
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: Well, it's terrible, Katie, and that's why I'm down here
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: I'll be meeting with businesses and members of the community
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: all day today making myself available. But you know, when
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: you compare the crime statistics from twenty and fifteen to
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: twenty and twenty one, home break ins in Alice Springs
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: are up one hundred and five percent and commercial break
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: ins are up ninety nine percent. I mean, these are
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: astronomical numbers. You've got thousands of people being victimized every
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: single day, and if you're an Alice Springs resident, you
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: are five times more likely to have your home or
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: business broken into than you are actually live in Darwin.
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: So things are terrible down here.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: What needs to happen, Leah, because I feel as though,
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: you know, you and I have had so many interviews
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: over the years we do the week that was almost
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: weekly with the COLP person, a labor person and into
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: and it feels like this is something that we continue
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: to talk about. What needs to happen in this space.
• 3:07
  Speaker 2: I think the first thing is the Gunner government need
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: to acknowledge that there is a problem. You know, they
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: have continued for the whole six years they've been in
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: government to just bat this away. We saw the Chief
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: Minister you know, say it wasn't a crime crisis and
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: just pretend this issue isn't here. I mean, the first
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: way to start to fix the problem is to acknowledge
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: you have one in the first place. And I think
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: more than anything else, territorians need to hear their governments say, yes,
• 3:31
  Speaker 2: there is a problem. You're not just making this up
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: in your head. Once they say there's a problem, they
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: then need to outline their short, medium and long term plan.
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: People need to know that there's something that's going to
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: happen immediately to deal with this revolving door of people
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: in and out of our prisons, people breaking in to
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: their homes and businesses and being let out the next day.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: There needs to be a medium term solution around skills training,
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: providing rehabilitation, and of course then the long term is
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: that generational change. But until the gunn of government comes
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: forward and acknowledges the problem, nothing is going to change.
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  Speaker 1: And Leah, I mean, at the moment, it seems to me,
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  Speaker 1: and we've spoken about this a lot over the last
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  Speaker 1: couple of weeks, it seems to me as though we've
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: got the issue with youth crime. We know even over
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: the course of the weekend that Stripeforce Trident.
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: We spoke to Mark Bland on the show yesterday.
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: We know that Stripeforce Trident was out making a series
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: of arrests following on from a number of pretty terrible incidents.
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  Speaker 1: You know, there's one where a couple of older women
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: were allegedly held up in Malac for example. That's just
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: one of the things that we heard about yesterday from
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Mark Bland. We know that there's that serious issue with
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: youth crime, but then we also know right now we've
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: got a really serious issue with alcohol misuse and a
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: lot of people in town from various other communities. So
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  Speaker 1: you know, there's two things happening right now. Firstly, I mean,
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: how do we deal with this issue of youth crime.
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  Speaker 2: Well, youth time has just been completely out of control
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  Speaker 2: because the Gun government warded back, wound back all the
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: laws to be able to deal with it. They started
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  Speaker 2: putting the rights of the criminal above the rights of
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  Speaker 2: the community and since then we have just seen disaster
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: after disaster. We've been really firm for both adult and
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: youth offenders that you need to start with the position
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  Speaker 2: of no bail if you're a repeat offender, Why do
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  Speaker 2: we keep giving the same people several chances, if not
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: twenty thirty forty chances to go and destroy other people's lives.
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  Speaker 2: I mean, it just it doesn't make any sense to us.
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  Speaker 2: The thirty five million dollar payout to use criminals. I mean,
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  Speaker 2: the government has just handed that money over without making
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: those views pay for the damage that they cause which
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: put them in prison in the first place. I mean,
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  Speaker 2: the government's priorities on this issue are just so wrong.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: And what we're seeing with alcohol fueled violence, domestic violence,
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: youth crime, all of the property offending is a systemic
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: failure in policies around alcohol policy, territory, families, youth justice, education,
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  Speaker 2: and the government just has to realize it can't put
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: a foot right on this issue. It's got to stop
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  Speaker 2: and give Territorians a plan and some hope that this
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: is going to be dealt with.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: Leah, I didn't hear it yesterday, but apparently the Chief Minister,
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: Michael Gonna said on the ABC that there's been a
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: decrease in repeat offending in news since Labour's bail laws
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: came in.
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's absolutely garbage, Kadie. The number of his
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: quoting actually came from written questions that we asked, and
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: I'm sorry because I've just gotten off the plane. I
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: don't have them right in front of me. But when
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  Speaker 2: you look at the whole statistics, it was something in
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: the order of one hundred and sixty seven news were arrested.
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: Seventy seven of those went on to reoffend, which means
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: they were arrested again whilst on bail, and then a
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: proportion of those went on to be re arrested three time.
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: So the Chief Minister is certainly cherry picking the data here,
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  Speaker 2: and we've got all of that information which we can
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: make available to territorians of course. But you know, again,
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: it just goes back to the fact that they keep
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: bearing their head in the sand. They don't want to
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: acknowledge as a problem when they come down to Alice Springs.
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: They pick and choose who they see. They don't make
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: themselves available for community meetings or liaisons with people in
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  Speaker 2: the community. It's all very scripted and ultimately is territories stuff.
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  Speaker 2: For I mean, no one should be a victim of crime,
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  Speaker 2: but to be five times more likely, yeah, be a
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  Speaker 2: victim of crime and Alice Springs, that's just plain role.
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  Speaker 1: Oh look, there's no doubt about it. People are incredibly
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  Speaker 1: frustrated right now, and I can't imagine how frustrated they
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  Speaker 1: are in Alice Springs. Leah, Let's talk about this issue
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  Speaker 1: of alcohol misues and what we are seeing on the
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  Speaker 1: streets of certainly of Darwin and Palmerston. At the moment,
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  Speaker 1: I'm assuming that it's the same situation in Alice Springs
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  Speaker 1: and in Catherine, but I'm happy to stand corrected if
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  Speaker 1: it's not.
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  Speaker 3: But we have certainly got an issue.
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  Speaker 1: Right now where there is some terrible behavior that we're
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: seeing on the streets. We caught up with Travis Wis,
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  Speaker 1: the Assistant Police Commissioner, last week. This is what he
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  Speaker 1: had told us when we talk about some of the
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  Speaker 1: crime that we're seeing related to alcohol on the streets.
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  Speaker 4: We've changed some borrn behavior by territories in the last
• 8:02
  Speaker 4: seventy two hours. Actually standing back to last week as
• 8:05
  Speaker 4: a serious assault in parrapp we had another series of
• 8:07
  Speaker 4: assault at Watibi Holts overnight that those people were living
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  Speaker 4: rough than a camp in that area. We know of
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  Speaker 4: the behavior in Karma and Casarina, and obviously we had
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  Speaker 4: the assault Fanny Bay shops. The fear and apprehension that
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  Speaker 4: place is in our community, who are the majority community
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  Speaker 4: going about our lives and trying to live peacefully, and
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  Speaker 4: we've got this behavior that generally is fuelled by alcohol.
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  Speaker 4: There are a number of factors here that make this
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  Speaker 4: even more troubling for us. So I've already called on
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  Speaker 4: all our partner agencies to come together and work on this.
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  Speaker 4: There's a meeting happening right now in darn As chaired
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  Speaker 4: by the Superintendent of dah And Police who's delivering a
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  Speaker 4: coordination meeting around how we can better address this issue
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  Speaker 4: for the greater Dahalen community.
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  Speaker 3: So Leah. That was last week.
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  Speaker 1: We now also obviously yesterday prior to that really critical
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  Speaker 1: incident unfolding in Palmerston, we were having a discuss with
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  Speaker 1: the Health Minister, Natasha Philes and.
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  Speaker 3: Also with the CEO of.
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  Speaker 1: Hospitality here in the Northern Territory about this issue, but
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: also about the potential for looking at liquor licenses in
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: some communities. Now. Natasha Philes said that it might be
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  Speaker 1: time for us to look at these alcohol measures in
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  Speaker 1: some communities and allow alcohol where those women and families
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  Speaker 1: feel it can be safely managed. Is it time for
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: us to start looking.
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  Speaker 3: At doing this.
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  Speaker 2: It's past time, Katie. I mean we've been talking about
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: this for years. The Gunner government have been promising that
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: they were looking at this and working with communities for years.
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: I mean, the Stronger Futures legislation has expires in the
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: middle of this year. Everyone knew that were coming. This
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: government's been around for six years. I mean, what has
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: it done. We've been very strong on this in saying
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: it must be community led. We wouldn't want to see,
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: you know, community clubs just popping up left, right and
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: center when people in the community don't want it. But
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: where they do and there's proper community ownership and control
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: and decision making around what that looks like, then it
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: can be incredibly effective. But what we're forcing people to
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: do by making sure that all no remote communities can
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: have alcohol is that people are engaging in really risky
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: behavior to get their hands on growth, and that means
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: people are more likely to be drink driving to drive
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: long distances to get alcohol secondary supply. We've seen explode
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: of an issue. So it's not a silver bullet, but
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: it's a really important part of the conversation in around
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: normalizing alcohol instead of making it something incredibly difficult to
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: access and therefore drinking to access.
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: I mean, do we also need to look at, you know,
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: more space for people to sober up. Do we need,
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: you know, to ramp up the return to country program?
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: What do you think we should do immediately?
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: Well, I think one of the biggest issues is we
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: have severe duplication and service deliverty delivery across the EDGO
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: sector and there's not enough coordination at a government level
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: around who's doing what and what's actually worked. King We've
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: got silly measures like a minimum law price. We're not
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: doing anything but pushing people away from things like wine
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: into spirits. I mean I did clean up Australia Day
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: on Sunday and basically all I picked up from the
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: park in this discarnment and gun was Bundy bottles. You know,
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: we've got major issues with rehabilitation. This government came to
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: government and within six months scrapped mandatory alcohol reabilitation citing
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: it was too expensive. Well, I challenged Natasha Files and
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: the rest of that government. What is the cost on
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: our health system? What is the cost of people's lives
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: and their livelihoods. What is the cost to business on
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: the women and children and even the men being victimized
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: from domestic violence, what is the actual cost of that?
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: And we need to be looking a lot harder at
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: rehabilitating people targeting amos chronically affected by alcohol and providing
• 11:49
  Speaker 2: them to support and the opportunities to change their life
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: so they stop perpetrating misery on themselves and people around them.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: Well Leaf and Okiara, I think it's a discussion that
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: all of us do need to to make sure that
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: we're having. There's got to be some change in this space.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: You know, we've spoken to one of the other police
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: commissioners or assistant commissioners last week as well, who said
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: those domestic violence rates and the highest he's seen in
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: ten years. However, you look at this right now, we've
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: got an issue.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: We do. The domestic violence is up over thirty eight
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: percent territory wide, and when you look in areas like
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: Alice brings even higher than that. It's an absolute you know,
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: it's an absolute disgrace that those numbers continue to grow
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: and it shows that there is failure in policy. You know,
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: this government has just set and forget. It's like we
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: had the Riley Review when they first came to government,
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: and they feel like that's absolved them for all responsibility
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: going forward. Well, it's not. You have to measure the
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: success or failure of your program and invest money in
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: what works, and pull but money back on areas that
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: don't work and reinvest it somewhere else. You know, everyone
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: should be having a crack. I'm not criticizing government for
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: having a try, but from trying something, and I'm forgetting
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: about it. That's not acceptable because it's literally people's lives there.
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: Is Well, Kcchiaro, we really appreciate your time this morning.
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: Let us know how things go in Alice Springs, and
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: please feel free to tell the people of Alice if
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: they want to get in contact with us.
• 13:09
  Speaker 3: We're always happy to hear from them here in Darwin.
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: I will do Katie, no worries.
• 13:13
  Speaker 3: Thank you,