Building safer communities the focus for symposium

The fifth Future of Policing Symposium is being held today at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre, co-hosted by the Queensland Police Service and the Griffith Criminology Institute.

Police Minister Mark Ryan MP and Commissioner Ian Stewart were there to welcome the select group of Australian and international academic scholars in the field of policing, as well as law enforcement leaders from Australia and New Zealand.

The focus of this year’s symposium is ‘Safer Communities’.

Minister Ryan said building safe and resilient communities is of the highest priority and a challenge that will be met through innovation, collaboration and multidisciplinary approaches.

“The Palaszczuk Government is committed to building important and sustainable partnerships, not only within Government but most importantly with the community.”

“Challenges confronted by police are complex and multi-faceted and no one agency is capable of resolving these issues in isolation.

“This symposium is important in emphasising the value of such partnerships and collaboration,” the Minister said. 

Topics that will be discussed include understanding communities, victimisation and recidivism, learning from US cases about how systemic failure increases youth recidivism, barriers and facilitators affecting community wellbeing, the contribution of maltreatment and mental health to youth offending, building resilient communities and discussing different jurisdictional perspectives.

Commissioner Stewart said the longstanding partnership between the Griffith Criminology Institute and the QPS provided a collaborative opportunity between researchers and police leaders to interact and discuss key problems.

“The focus of this symposium is the importance of building and sustaining safe and resilient communities and ascertaining the role and approach of policing within that,” Commissioner Stewart said.

“What this symposium highlights is that the future of policing is around partnerships, which is critically important now, and will be more so in the future.”

Media contacts 

Minister Ryan’s Office: 3035 8300

Police Media: 3015 2444