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Anthony Albanese has been called out for not knowing how much “carnage” youth crime has inflicted on Alice Springs by a local advocate.
Anti-crime campaigner Darren Clark met with the Prime Minister on Monday afternoon when Mr Albanese returned to the outback town for the first time in more than a year.
He visited organisations in Alice Springs after a spate of social unrest led to the Northern Territory imposing a three week youth curfew on the town.
The riots occurred after a ceremony and funeral for an 18-year-old who died in a car crash.
Mr Clark, a bakery operator, is the founder of the Action for Alice Facebook page which has drawn national attention because of its coverage of crime issues plaguing the town.
Speaking with Sydney’s 2GB, Mr Clark said he calmly explained to Mr Albanese “what we’ve been through” over the last five years.
He said that included people having “machetes held to their throats in their beds”.
“He actually didn’t know how bad this was,” Mr Clark said.
“This place is absolute carnage and it continued all last year, and it hit a peak again a few weeks ago.”
The business owner noted “things have calmed down” during the period following the lockdown but raised concerns it will pick up again when “the weather heats up again”.
“They’ve got to be ready,” he said, referring to authorities.
In March, the Northern Territory government declared an emergency and imposed a curfew on children under 18 from entering central Alice Springs between 6pm and 6am.
Mr Albanese said while the curfew had worked he did not think it was a “one size fits all approach” when asked if it could be implemented in other towns.
“We need to not be ideological about this. We need to look at what works and if it works we’re up for it. It is as simple as that. Quite clearly, this has made a positive difference,” he said.
Asked earlier about his meeting with Mr Clark, the Prime Minister described it was a “constructive discussion”.
“He had a lot of thoughtful insight … he said that the curfew had been a game changer here in Alice and he welcomed that,” he told ABC Alice Springs.
“He welcomed the engagement and increase in investment. He’s someone who’s very passionate about this town.”
An additional $14.2m was committed by the government on Monday for policing and community safety support in Alice Springs as part of an extension of an agreement between the federal and NT government.
Alice Spring mayor Matt Paterson, who also met with the Prime Minister on Monday, said Mr Albanese did “a lot of listening”.
“I know there’s a national conversation going on about that at the moment, but the extra resources at the moment are clearly having a positive impact in the community,” he said.
On Tuesday, Mr Albanese committed an additional $8m to the Top End’s public school infrastructure.
Schools will get funding of at least $250,000 to build or upgrade infrastructure.
But Mr Clark said he wanted to see more work done to try and get children back in education and suggested changing school hours might help.
“Stop trying to get kids in remote communities into school at 8.30, 9 o’clock in the morning … because it’s never going to happen,” he said.
“How about trying to get these kids into school at 11 or 12 o’clock.”
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