CHILDREN as young as 10 are roaming the streets of Wyndham on booze-fuelled drinking binges.

Community leaders told Star that shattered beer bottles strewn across parks and footpaths were now common eyesores.

Mayor Shane Bourke said the council would launch a crackdown on the alcohol abuse that was plaguing the municipality.

It comes as the council reaped almost $7000 over the past year from unruly drinking behaviour.

More than 30 revellers were fined for consuming liquor in public places, with the majority caught drinking on roads.

The notices were issued at various locations across the city.

Cr Bourke said drinking to excess had become an epidemic.

“Alcohol is at the face of a lot of problems,” he said.

“We will step up to fight this … it ruins peoples’ lives and it can’t go on.

“We see young people getting beer bottles smashed in their faces and people being punched outside or being king-hit.”

The council’s substance abuse action plan identifies alcohol as one of the key health issues in the Wyndham community.

It revealed that alcohol abuse by males in the Western Region was the highest in Victoria.

Heathdale Neighbourhood Association’s Janet Murphy said she only had to walk outside her front door to witness the intoxication.

“I have seen 10 and 11-year-olds who are drunk,” she said.

“We see more and more young people going to the parks and the wetlands to drink.

“I have spoken to an 11-year-old who has been drunk, and have taken a bottle out of their hand.”

The council has identified the Heathdale Neighbourhood Renewal zone as one of the most disadvantaged inside the Melbourne metropolitan area.

“If you go for a walk down by the river or public places you will find evidence of bottles and cans everywhere,” Ms Murphy said.

She said excessive alcohol consumption and child abuse were normally intertwined.

“These kids are in a catch-22, they are in a home life that is not hot and their parents don’t know where they are half the time,” Ms Murphy said.

“It (alcohol) is cheap and most people have it in their house and kids are not averse to pinching it.”

Ms Murphy said a massive amount of liquor licensed outlets had set up shop in Wyndham.

“Within a 2km radium of Heathdale there are 30 licensed premises,” she said.

Werribee Police Senior Sergeant Dagmar Andersen said a high number of offending was due to alcohol abuse.

“If you have an area that does not have a lot of transport nor a lot of social outlets for the under 18s, then you have more public issues,” she said.

A public outcry followed the approval of a bottle shop in Rosella Ave last month.

The Heathdale Association is holding a community event this Friday to challenge the opening hours of the shop.

Residents will be asked to sign a cardboard message in a bottle at Cassowary Reserve from 7.30pm.