Tasmanian criminals keeping it in the family

Tasmania's inter-generational crimes are being discussed at a national police commissioners conference in Hobart.

Tasmania's Police Commissioner Richard McCreadie says some Tasmanian families cannot shake the cycle of committing crimes and often pass the bad habits to their children.

He says police are looking at new ways to address the problem.

"If you look at the court listings and that there are names that regularly pop up, it's not hard to see that some of them are second, third and fourth generation and there's a similarity in the way they're behaving.

"We think that we can better treat that and start to pay attention to these at risk kids at a very early time, develop parenting skills to see that they don't simply become ensconced in the justice system."

The conference finishes on Thursday.