Youth crime Qld: Experts clap back at ‘adult time’ laws

“Adult crime, adult time” laws have been slammed by human rights experts as a major step in the wrong direction that would wreak havoc on courts and prisons.

Premier David Crisafulli has set a deadline of Friday for the committee to report back.

• Editor’s view: Will Premier listen?

“Adult crime, adult time” laws would wreak havoc on courts and prisons, target the most vulnerable children and make Queensland less safe, experts say.

Legal and child safety stakeholders lined up to criticise the government’s flagship election commitment during a rushed parliamentary committee hearing on Monday.

The inquiry became tense when Sisters Inside programs director Zofia Wasiak, in her opening statement, accused the government of dredging up failed law-and-order policies due to its “love affair” with locking up kids.

It prompted government chair Marty Hunt to hit back at her “rather offensive” evidence.

Premier David Crisafulli has given the committee until Friday to report back on the Making Queensland Safer Bill he has promised to make law by Christmas.

Experts criticised the move for overriding the human rights of children while doing little to improve community safety but, with the likelihood the Bill will become law, demanded they be reviewed within 18 months to test their efficacy.

Queensland Human Rights Commissioner Scott McDougall skewered the proposal as a major step in the wrong direction that would subject children to cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment in detention centres.

■ Listed: Qld’s broken youth crime promises through the years

Human Rights Commissioner Scott McDougall on Monday. Picture: Steve Pohlner

“We are forging ahead knowingly violating the UN convention against torture against children, in any other context that is called child abuse,” he said.

“There are better ways, we know children have an immense capacity to change.”

Earlier, LNP Member for Thuringowa Natalie Marr described human rights as a touchy subject.

Youth Advocacy Centre chief executive Katherine Hayes acknowledged the government took the laws to the election, but said it was without an informed, honest debate.

She argued the laws would add stress to youth detention centres, where inmates are already sometimes locked up for days without natural light and forced to urinate and defecate in a hole in a floor.

“That’s Queensland in 2024, these laws will do nothing to ameliorate that, they will simply make them worse,” she said.

“It is safe to say there will be more than this system has capacity for at the moment.”

Ms Hayes said there were no exceptional circumstances to override the human rights of children.

“Not bikies, not terrorists, the most disadvantaged and vulnerable people in Queensland,” she said.

Opposition Leader Steven Miles says the laws are more extensive than he expected.

Voice For Victims supported the proposal for its focus on people affected by criminal behaviour.

Opposition Leader Steven Miles said Labor would decide whether to support the legislation when it met on Monday, after the committee hands its report to the government.

Mr Miles said his initial sense was that the 52-page Bill was more far-reaching than the LNP’s “adult crime, adult time” election slogan.

“Somehow they took four words and turned them into 52 pages,” he said.

“Make no mistake, these proposed laws do a lot more, reach a lot further than that four-word slogan.”

The Queensland Bar Association warned imposing adult punishments on children would increase the number of kids who choose to fight a charge instead of pleading guilty early, causing delays throughout the justice system.

Queensland Bar Association president Cate Heyworth-Smith KC noted the move to remove the principle of detention as a last resort would lead to the perverse situation where the sentencing regime for young people would be more punitive than for adults.

Queensland Council of Social Service chief executive Aimee McVeigh said the laws would make the safety of Queenslanders worse in the long term, and harm some of the most disadvantaged people in our community.

“There is no evidence these measures will reduce crime,” she said.