Letter to Police Commisioner - police questioning of kids

The Commissioner of Police

GPO Box 1440

BRISBANE QLD 4000

Dear Commissioner

The Council has received a report that a 14-year-old girl recently went to a North Lakes shopping centre where she was approached by police and asked to give her name and address. The police then asked the girl and her friend for their phone numbers and asked to take photographs of them. When asked by the children the reason for this, it was said to be in case they went missing.

We write to ask whether this practice is being engaged by the police and if so on what legal basis.

Australians are generally entitled to remain anonymous while walking down the street or spending time in a public space. The police have no general power to require Australian citizens to provide identifying details or information.

No doubt, the police are entitled to engage members of the public in conversation. However, when they do so, two issues arise.

The first is that they are not entitled to detain people for the purpose of collecting information. In any interaction with the police in the circumstances there is the prospect that the individuals involved will feel that because they are dealing with police officers, they are not free to leave until given permission by the police. This is as much a form of detention as if the police had directed the persons not to leave.

There is no suggestion that this is an issue in the case to which we have been referred.

However, the other issue is that in our view the police are not entitled to randomly collect information, record it and maintain it in some police database.

In anticipation that it might be suggested that this information has been collected by consent, we would point out that the individuals were children and were hardly going to say no when asked to do something by a police officer.

We also make it clear that we accept that the police are able to check up on people in need. If the police are legitimately concerned for someone's personal health or safety, that would be an appropriate reason to stop them and ask some questions.

However, on the information that we have there is no suggestion that the children in this case fell into those categories.

If this practice is being engaged in, and we make it clear we strenuously object to it, please advise what is happening with the information collected. Is it being stored? If so where, for how long and for what purpose

I look forward to hearing from you.