Monthly Social Justice Reflection 15
Submission to the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee Inquiry into Australia’s youth justice and incarceration system
The political climate in which this submission was made underlines the importance of its recommendations. Serious law breaking against children in many States, including gang violence, the theft of cars and breaking into homes had received much publicity. State election campaigns fanned public concern about this behaviour. Political parties promised a punitive response that would keep people safe, it included lowering the age of criminal responsibility, imposing heavy penalties for the breach of bail, and extending the incarceration of children in Police Stations and other places.
The Jesuit Social Services submission, based on its extensive work with young people in the justice system, endorsed the findings of the National Children’s Commissioner’s 2023 Report Youth Justice and Child Wellbeing across Australia. This had insisted on respect for the human rights of Children, which it believed to be widely disregarded in Australia.
The submission insisted on adherence to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child to which Australia is a signatory. Australia must also observe the International Convention against Torture. This is violated by housing children in adult jails where they are at risk of abuse and by submitting them to solitary confinement. The submission also insisted the importance of a National Human Rights Act with an appropriate, flexible structure for its implementation. The treatment of children should be guided by strong evidence-based research, particularly into the needs of Indigenous children, and supported by monitoring and transparent processes.
To implement these changes will demand considerable reform. The age of criminal responsibility must be raised to 14. The criminalisation of behaviour by children and of breaches of bail places responsibilities on children that their mental development makes it impossible to observe. It leads to so prolonged incarceration and violation of the dignity of the child. Bail must be a last resort.
Further reforms called for included making alternative responses of diversion and restorative justice more available; respecting the development of responsibility in children by raising the minimum age of criminal responsibility to 16; prohibiting the holding of children in adult prisons; prohibiting the use of isolation and other forms of torture; ensuring that children have access to good healthcare; responding to the over representation of young people in the Justice system (they are 28 times more likely to be in detention than non-Indigenous children). This will demand involving Indigenous communities in addressing the social conditions that lead to offending and in finding better ways to respond to it.
At the heart of all these proposals lies the demand to respect the dignity of children, to recognise the conditions of their growth that limit their responsibility for their actions, and to support their families and communities in addressing the conditions that lead to unsocial behaviour.
These reflections are drawn from one of many submissions made by Jesuit Social Services to Government enquiries on current issues. The submissions always focus on the needs of people, especially young people, whom our Jesuit Social Services staff accompany and whose experience and needs we seek to understand. You can find the submission here.
Fr Andrew Hamilton SJ writes for Jesuit Communications and Jesuit Social Services.
