A new campaign calling for enforceable national minimum standards to protect the human rights of children in custody has been launched.
Coming in the wake of Closing the Gap data showing the rate of Indigenous children in custody has failed to decline, the Kids Need Better campaign, launched by Amnesty International Australia, is calling for reform of Australia’s youth justice system.
Despite the practice breaching Australia’s international human rights obligations, children as young as 10 can be held in custody in all but two states and territories.
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Speaking at a First Nations justice reform conference in Sydney last week, Justice and Equity Centre chief executive Jonathon Hunyor said the effects of imprisoning children as young as 10 are clear.
“We know this damages children,” he said. “It causes trauma in their psychological [and] their social development. It makes them less likely to finish school. Makes them less likely to find a job. It makes them more likely to commit crime.”
The organisation is coordinating the New South Wales campaign to Raise the Age with a partner network of more than 150 peak bodies, charities, community services, human rights and civil society organisations. Mr Hunyor said evidence shows setting the age at 10 disproportionately impacts Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, as well as children with disability.
“We criminalise children who experience poverty, who experience mental illness, and who experience homelessness,” he said.
“We keep treating our children like criminals, and then we complain when they behave like criminals. We keep hurting children, and then we wonder why they act out.”
