POLICE cannot arrest their way out of a youth crime epidemic, a leading veteran social worker says.
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Veteran social worker Les Twentyman has called for a greater investment in resources to employ youth workers and implement youth engagement programs.
He says this is the only way the community will be able to truly crack-down on youth crime and re-engage completely disengaged youths who are not afraid of jail and will continue to re-offend.
The statistics show Ballarat’s youth crime is at its worst in five years. As the The Courier has previously reported the number of alleged incidents involved young males has increased by 159 since 2014.
Males aged 15-17 years were involved in 60 per cent of alleged youth offences from October 2014 to September 2015, Crime Statistics Agency data shows. “Youth crime is very significant and very alarming at the moment,” Mr Twentyman said.
“We see it linked with youth unemployment, fractured education, schools kicking kids out.
“This creates more problems in the community.”
Australian Institute of Criminology research from 2015 highlights economic disadvantage and geographical isolation as key contributors to high youth crime.
The paper refers to research linking poverty and adversity - including child abuse – as being linked to anti-social behaviour, educational underachievement and impaired social-emotional development.
“I recently spoke to ex-prisoners. They had all left school pre year 10 and only three had ever had a job,” Mr Twentyman said.
“Putting kids in prison is part of the problem … we need to be engaging kids to find them other options.
“These kids have been exposed to crime, come from fractured families and have fractured education. It doesn’t matter how many coppers we have, we can’t arrest our way (out of this complex social issue).”
Ballarat police Inspector Bruce Thomas earlier told The Courier police worked with many agencies to try and reduce youth offending.
“We are trying to prevent further offending through a range of initiatives such as conducting patrols of high risk areas and engaging with stakeholders on intervention strategies,” Inspector Thomas said.
