Questions remain over Queensland’s quick-fix youth prison capacity

Questions remain around the preparation of Queensland’s already stretched youth prison system to cope with an influx of children driven by rushed and controversial new laws.

Parliament voted on the suite of changes on Thursday after three days of debate and just three weeks after they were introduced by Police Minister Mark Ryan under disputed claims of an “exceptional crisis”.

A still from CCTV footage of a young person being held on the ground in a Queensland youth detention centre, contained in a report.

Despite crime rates declining, Queensland locks up more children than any other Australian jurisdiction, with its youth prison pressures causing kids to be held for weeks in watch houses.

Brisbane Times asked the government this week whether it had carried out any modelling to gauge the scope of increased pressure it admits will be placed on the system because of the new laws.

In a written response, Ryan said only: “While the independent discretion of the courts needs to be noted, it is expected that the amendments on their own would lead to more offenders in custody for longer”.

Further clarity was not provided, with a government spokesperson saying he could not disclose what “may or may not” have been discussed in cabinet.

Ryan also said those changes could not be considered “in isolation”, with the government investing an extra $332 million in intervention, diversion and rehabilitation programs.

The laws include criminalising technical bail breaches by children, an expansion of a presumption against bail to new offences, and a scheme to make bail even harder for any young person declared a “serious repeat offender”.

Each requires the government to override its own human rights laws, a move heavily criticised by the state’s two Greens MPs and most expert submissions.

That feedback also warned the measures were likely to drag more young people into the criminal justice system, largely First Nations kids and often with complex and traumatic pasts, and ultimately harm community safety.

While some measures were announced after the killing of North Lakes mother Emma Lovell in December, more controversial elements were only revealed with the introduction of the bill in late February.

Departments declined to respond to a number of concerns about these raised as part of committee consideration of the laws – including the breach of bail measure which even Youth Justice Minister Leanne Linard conceded was not based on evidence – describing them as “policy matters determined by government”.

While the government is planning to build two smaller “therapeutic” youth prisons after an unreleased business case completed last year – closer to the 32-bed West Moreton site than the larger Brisbane and Townsville centres – other interim capacity measures are being considered.

None of the new facilities or temporary fixes are laid out in the government’s expired or expiring youth justice strategies.

Ryan and Linard have repeatedly said more detail would be given once decisions were made. The union representing detention centre staff has warned of “extreme resistance” if corners are cut.

Across the 2021-22 financial year, an average of 275 of the state’s 288 permanently funded youth prison beds were occupied each day – most by children on remand. On February 7, Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll said there were also 88 kids in watch houses.