Seizing youths off Townsville streets under a curfew proposed by Queensland's Liberal National Party will pipeline indigenous children into the prison system, critics say.
Opposition Leader Tim Nicholls on Thursday pledged to trial the curfew in the regional town for six months if he wins the state election on November 25.
Mr Nicholls says the $1.3 million trial will enable police to take children under 16 caught outside after 10pm to emergency accommodation shelters until they can be safely returned to their parents.
"The shelter will be staffed with a counsellor and nurse to ensure the wellbeing of the child, while ensuring the community is protected," he said.
Mr Nicholls says he will also work with the federal government to freeze the welfare payments of parents whose children are behind bars.
Sisters Inside chief executive Debbie Kilroy says the LNP's curfew would do nothing more than "criminalise" Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and pipeline them into the prison system.
The social justice campaigner says children who do not have a positive relationship with police will inevitably be charged and end up in the watch house.
Ms Kilroy also criticised Mr Nicholls for "cherry picking" elements of Iceland's curfew, which he claimed had helped the country have "some of the world's cleanest-living teens".
"They do not use the police to scoop up children off the streets and dump them in a so-called safe house," she said.
Mr Nicholls's own north Queensland-based LNP colleague, Burdekin MP Dale Last, said in January he did not believe a curfew was the answer to reducing Townsville's crime rate.
His comments were made in response to a petition from almost 6000 residents who wanted a nightly time limit imposed on young people.
Attorney-General Yvette D'Ath slammed the LNP policy as lazy and accused Mr Nicholls of running "a fear campaign around crime".
She said the Palaszczuk government already had developed initiatives to pick up youths wandering the streets and give them support and accommodation.
Ms D'Ath also took aim at plans to freeze welfare payments.
"What does that mean for the rest of that family, and how on earth will that reduce crime?" she asked.
The LNP's youth crime announcement was Mr Nicholls' first chance to take his campaign to the regions after being grounded this week by his party's inability to source a plane.
North Queensland has a host of marginal seats, making it one of the most hotly contested regions, with residents battling rising unemployment and high crime rates in the wake of the mining downturn.
