Our submission argues criminalising young children is a failure, which does not address causes of offending and does not make the community safer.
Our submission to the NSW Select Committee Inquiry on Youth Justice calls for measures to reduce the number of children and young people in detention. We emphasise that criminalising young children is a failure. It does not address causes of offending and does not make the community safer.
We recommend that the NSW Government:
- raise the age of criminal responsibility to 14;
- adopt community-led and designed place based approaches;
- invest in foundational services, such as housing; and
- stop the use of pre-emptive policing tools on children and young people, including by reforming bail compliance checks and firearms prohibition order searches.
We also make recommendations to improve conditions for young people in detention, including increased availability of disability supports and stronger safeguards to prevent the use of solitary confinement.
We supported Kim and Lincoln, two people with lived experience of the criminal legal system, to make their own submission.
