Nicole McKee
ACT’s Justice spokesperson
Chris Baillie
ACT’s Police spokesperson
Gang members shouldn’t be able to take over our public places and intimidate members of the public.
No other members of the public can just take over a public road and get away with it. Under Labour, we have a lot of law and not much order.
How can Police allow several hundred patched gang members to just take over a public highway? Their bikes and cars overflowed into the lane of oncoming traffic forcing motorists off the road.
To allow this to happen is dangerous and intimidating. We can’t allow there to be one set of rules for the general public and another set of rules if you have a patch.
We have a soft on crime Government that has allowed this to happen. Gang numbers have increased by 50 per cent since 2017, from 5343 to 8006.
We should be empowering Police to shut down gang activity. Instead, they’re being encouraged to coddle them. The Police Commissioner said they are working with gangs – we want police to arrest them.
As a former frontline police officer myself, I hear from Police all the time that they want to arrest dangerous criminals – but that’s not the direction they get from the top.
ACT would hit the gangs where it hurts, in their pockets. Our policy increases the power of police to seize assets connected with gang activity and illegal firearms owned by gang members by introducing a new threshold for Police to seize assets. The threshold to seize assets would now be triggered if a gang member was found with an illegal firearm, therefore, committing an offence.
If we don’t stand up to the gangs now, it’s only a matter of time before an innocent member of the public gets caught in the crossfire.
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