Jenan Taylor
27 August 2024
Indigenous Christian and community advocates have struggled to express how disappointed they are as the Northern Territory’s new government plans to lower the age of criminal responsibility from 12 to 10 years old.
They warn it will increase the rate of children being held in detention.
It comes as the Country Liberal Party won the NT election in a landslide victory over Labor on Saturday.
Chief Minister-elect Lia Finocchiaro vowed to reduce youth crime, including by immediately putting youth justice in the hands of Corrections, and reinstating school truancy officers.
The NT was the first jurisdiction in Australia to raise the age of criminality to 12 years old, effective in August 2023.
National Aboriginal Bishop Chris McLeod said the NT’s move would increase the rate of young people held in detention, despite one Closing the Gap target being to reduce this by 30 per cent by 2031.
Bishop McLeod said factors including lack of safety and housing were what led to criminal behaviour, and money was better spent addressing those systemic issues.
Read more: Stop criminalising children: Warning draft laws fail to treat cause of crime
He said reducing the age of responsibility to 10 years old appeared to be ill conceived, because early detention set youths on a path of recidivism.
He said the change also appeared to be done to project an image of being tough on crime even though there was no real prospect of a positive outcome.
“Sounding tough on crime is not the same as dealing with it in a way that makes important changes [that] keep our children and the communities around them safe,” Bishop McLeod said.
“Lowering the age only exacerbates the problem and ‘kicks the can down the road.’”
The CLP said during its election campaign its new legislation was part of its plan to reduce crime through early intervention, addressing the root causes and real consequences for repeat and serious offenders.
Ms Finocchiaro said in a statement the planned laws came after the murder of a 20-year-old bottle shop worker last year by a 19-year-old who was on bail at the time for a previous aggravated assault.
Anglicare NT chief executive Craig Kelly said it was distressing to see a retrograde approach to the responsibility age, and that many advocates lobbied for years to raise the age.
He said very young children would be sent to jail rather than into diversionary projects, because there was no diversionary system prescribed by the incoming government that had appropriate care.
Mr Kelly said the government’s plans went completely against an Aboriginal justice agreement that was done in consultation with Indigenous communities.
He said it included investments for alternatives to detention that would have a significant effect on prevention and intervention, and support young people in their own homes and communities.
Mr Kelly said the NT government should be tough on the causes of crime rather than on youths for whom it had a responsibility to provide a safe environment.
“This will not help reduce crime. This will actually cause crime down the track,” Mr Kelly said.
Christian social justice organisation Common Grace said the retrograde plans were like a further betrayal of Australia’s Indigenous people still reeling from the loss of the Voice referendum.
National director Gershon Nimbalker said the legislation would further sting Indigenous people and communities who were already disproportionately represented in the criminal justice system.
Read more: Queenslanders will be less safe if kids are less safe: Faith leaders
He said Common Grace would continue calling for measures that treated youth crime as a public health and social issue rather than a criminal justice problem, because such measures gave support, love and care.
“We understand the need for communities to feel safe, and we think all communities have a right to feel safe, but let’s invest in things that work and look after our children at the same time,” Mr Nimbalker said.
“It’d be a great act of reconciliation to say as a nation, ‘We care for your children. We want to see them flourish, too, and we’re going to spare no effort and no expense to see that happen’, rather than say ‘They are a problem and we’re going to see them incarcerated.’”
The NT Chief Minister-elect has been contacted for comment.
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