Minister to target crime

Youth crime, police resources and combatting drugs on mine sites were high on the agenda for Police Minister Liza Harvey when she visited Port Hedland last week.

During a meeting with Ms Harvey, Town of Port Hedland Mayor Kelly Howlett said the rise in youth crimes needed "out-of-the-box thinking" and called for more action to be taken against parents of young offenders.

But Ms Harvey said the State Government's focus would continue to be on diversion.

"Diversion is what you want to look at first with children and obviously the consequences come when the system fails to divert them," she said.

"There are quite a lot of funded youth programs in Hedland and the Pilbara district and really it's those sorts of programs that we need to engage the young people in and keep them off the streets.

"The South Hedland Police Station has put together a youth team to try and work on some strategies with the young offenders, but they are also looking at some of the families that are causing the most demand for police and doing some work with those families and trying to connect them to services."

During a visit to Fortescue Metals Group's Christmas Creek site, Ms Harvey praised mining companies including FMG, Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton for working with local detectives to stop drugs from entering the Pilbara.

"Even though they do the alcohol and drug testing, (mining companies) would be naive to think there weren't drugs still getting into the sites," she said. "We are looking to set up a system where they can collect intelligence and direct that through to police so that police can work with them."

Ms Harvey also acknowledged the shortage of police officers in regional areas and said the State Government was working on its commitment to recruit and train 400 new police officers as quickly as possible.