OZschwitz: Queensland government to victimize the homeless with on the spot fines

CIVIL libertarians are concerned that new police powers to issue on-the-spot fines for public nuisance offences will unfairly target homeless people in central Brisbane.

In January authorities will begin a 12-month trial allowing police to issue fines of $75 to $300 as an alternative to arresting offenders and to help unclog the state's overloaded court system.

However, Australian Council of Civil Liberties president Terry O'Gorman said police could unfairly target homeless people in Brisbane's CBD who failed to follow a direction to move on.

''This will result in further over-policing of society's marginalised,'' Mr O'Gorman said.

He said homeless people sleeping rough or in squats in and around the inner city were most susceptible to fines and believed police had to fill unofficial quotas for the number of fines issued, dubbed ``pinches'' under the ticketing scheme.

''Police under pressure to come up with `pinches' will issue homeless people with fines,'' he said.

The trial follows a May 2008 Crime and Misconduct Commission report on Queensland's public nuisance offences, which recommended on-the-spot fines.

Police Minister Judy Spence said the new approach would significantly reduce the number of people entering the court system.

However, Ms Spence said serious offenders would still be arrested and charged.

''By giving police the power to rapidly deal with public nuisance offences on the spot, the new approach will also allow police to spend more time on the beat responding to the needs of the community,'' Ms Spence said.

But Mr O'Gorman said behaviour that constituted a public nuisance offence was so vaguely defined people would be victimised by police partisanship.

Meanwhile, NSW Police are being encouraged to target so-called squeegee men and bill posters in a crackdown on ``quality of life'' infringements.

In an internal notice, police officers have been encouraged to issue fines of $200 to people putting up posters on power poles. Fines for individuals washing windscreens at intersections are $53.

But NSW Police Commissioner Andrew Scipione, who is championing the initiative, said it was not a revenue-raising exercise, instead insisting it was what the community wanted to feel safe.

Mr Scipione said he ranked this with other ''quality of life issues'' such as noise, car hoons and alcohol-related crime.

People being approached in their cars at intersections or walking through streets ''just covered'' in posters might feel in a dangerous situation, he said.

So the crackdown was about ''making people feel like they are being looked after''.

LNK

OZschwitz: Queensland government to victimize the homeless with on the spot fines

OZschwitz: Queensland government to victimize the homeless with on the spot fines

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