George Christensen (Dawson, National Party) Share this | Hansard source

The Queensland Premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, says she is protecting Queenslanders from COVID-19 with her business-destroying border closures, but her government has failed miserably to protect Queenslanders from skyrocketing crime rates. Under the Premier's watch, crime—in particular, juvenile crime—has spiralled out of control. The statistics from 2015 to 2020 show that juvenile assaults are up by 47 per cent, juvenile break-ins are up by 51 per cent, juvenile robberies are up by 183 per cent and juvenile motor vehicle offences are up by 158 per cent. Sadly, our regional towns are bearing the brunt, with the numbers showing that juvenile assaults are up by 78 per cent in Townsville and by 98 per cent in Mackay.

The Queensland government has had more than six years to fix this issue, but it keeps getting worse. Queenslanders are fed up; we have already seen that playing out through acts of vigilantism. Our people are just not being protected. We need policies that support the victims, not the perpetrators. We should be aiming, first, to protect the community and, second, to reform the individual. Boot camps would remove juvenile criminals from the community, instil discipline and teach the value of hard work and productivity. If the Premier can build a quarantine facility near Toowoomba to imprison people for the crime of travelling within their own country, why is she not willing to build a boot camp for juvenile criminals who are destroying our communities and, in some cases, taking lives? (Time expired)

See this speech in context