By Sunset Wignall-Blackman
HOBART -- An informal alliance has been formed between the police, the state Liberal government and retailers in an effort to promote business in the Hobart CBD by pushing young people out of the area.
The government is moving to introduce a range of anti-youth measures, including establishing an all-night police booth in Elizabeth Mall and increasing the number of police on patrol; laws enabling police to disperse groups of three or more people; bans to stop young "offenders" from returning to that area for up to three years; and a midnight street curfew for under 18 year olds.
These measures follow a $1.5 million budget increase for the state's police force to fund surveillance cameras to monitor business areas, and increased police presence on the streets.
A local youth worker told Green Left Weekly said that, considering the government, police and business sectors' participation in the Hobart Youth Summit in May, it is bizarre that they cannot see the causal link between inadequate youth facilities and street crime.
Shane Brazlen, one of the so-called street kids in the mall, told Green Left "We wouldn't hang out in the mall if we weren't so bored. There's a youth centre in Glenorchy, but its only open for three days a week and they don't have much stuff there".
Nathan, another "street kid", told Green Left that cops regularly harass young people in the city; even for just standing on a footpath they can be charged with "loitering". He also said that before the changes in the mall, up to 80 young people used it as a meeting place after school.
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