We must ‘help way earlier’ – united call to address systemic failures of Australia’s youth justice systems

Joint media release: Justice Reform Initiative and Australian Human Rights Commission 

Law and justice leaders, parliamentarians, First Nations leaders, child safety advocates, community service providers, peak organisations, and people with lived experience of child imprisonment from around Australia will come together for a landmark parliamentary event in Canberra on Thursday.

Amid an increasing national spotlight on the systemic failures of harmful youth justice practices across the country, more than 120 representatives – including former Governor-General Dame Quentin Bryce and Members of Parliament from all sides of politics – will converge in Canberra to recognise the urgent need for systems reform and for child justice, safety and well-being to be made a national priority.

Co-hosted by the Justice Reform Initiative and National Children’s Commissioner Anne Hollonds, the meeting comes as submissions for the first Federal Senate Inquiry into Australia’s child justice system are set to close on Thursday.

The event will include a panel discussion featuring four remarkable speakers who have experienced incarceration as children and have critical insights into what needs to change. They will be joined by Anne Hollonds (National Children’s Commissioner who will also provide a brief overview of her report), and Natalie Lewis (Commissioner for the Queensland Family and Child Commission).

The event follows the tabling in Parliament of the National Children’s Commissioner’s major report ‘Help Way Earlier!’ How Australia can transform child justice to improve safety and wellbeing, and her address at the National Press Club last week.

Among its 24 recommendations, the ‘Help Way Earlier!’ report specifically calls for:

• a National Taskforce for Child Justice Reform
• a National Cabinet Minister for Children
• a Ministerial Council for Child Wellbeing reporting to National Cabinet 
• legislation to protect the human rights of children.

Comments attributed to National Children’s Commissioner, Anne Hollonds:

“Our ‘Help Way Earlier!’ report finds that in Australia we have misunderstood the problems we are trying to solve – that the criminal justice system is not able to reduce offending by children and make the community safer.

“The evidence shows that the younger you lock up children, the more likely it is that they will go on to commit more serious and violent crimes. Making the justice system more punitive through longer sentences, tougher bail laws, and building more children’s prisons is the wrong approach.

“That’s because offending by children is a symptom of underlying causes and needs that we are failing to address. Instead we need to pivot towards the solutions based on decades of evidence, to transform our approach and work together across the federation to address the underlying causes of crime by children, and that will make communities safer for everyone.’

Comments attributed to Chair of the Justice Reform Initiative, Robert Tickner AO:

“Australia is failing its children every day with a failed approach to youth justice. As the National Children’s Commissioner’s report makes abundantly clear, it’s time for the Commonwealth to step up and show national leadership, working with the states and territories for a better approach.

“The social factors which drive the crisis in youth justice have been allowed to worsen over time without adequate attention from either side of politics. The unanimous Senate support for an inquiry, set to be tabled in November, is acknowledgment of the need for major systemic change and national leadership to drive that change.

“Too many children around Australia are managed in prisons, rather than receiving the support and care and opportunity they need in the community. Imagine if schools across the country failed two-thirds or more of their students, or if our hospitals had a death rate of two-thirds of patients or higher. About two-thirds (66%) of children aged 10 to 16 who are released from sentenced detention receive another supervised sentence within 6 months, and more than 4 in 5 (85%) within 12 months.

“We are paying an enormous price for this failure – both socially and economically. Locking up children across Australia now costs more than $855 million each year at a cost of $2,827 per child per day, equivalent to over $1 million per year per child.

“This is an issue which should be on the agenda of the National Cabinet. As the Prime Minister has noted, we need state and territory collaboration to develop a national model of best practice based on the evidence of what works to turn young lives around. As a cross party national organisation, the Justice Reform Initiative is calling for youth justice to be taken out of the hothouse war zone of party politics and for our political leaders to come together to support evidence-based policy which reduces crime and makes our communities safer."

MEDIA NOTE: The event will be held at 7.30- 9.30am in the Mural Hall. National Children’s Commissioner Anne Hollonds, Justice Reform Initiative chair Robert Tickner AO, Law Council President Greg McIntyre and Australian Medical Association President Danielle McMullen will be available for comment immediately following the event.

Media contact: Pia Akerman 0412 346 746

The Initiative respectfully acknowledges and supports the current and longstanding efforts of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people to reduce the numbers of Indigenous people incarcerated in Australia and, importantly, the leadership role which Indigenous-led organisations continue to play on this issue. We also acknowledge the work of many other individuals and organisations seeking change, such as those focused on the rate of imprisonment for women, people with mental health issues, people with disability and others.