‘Community magistrates’ to tackle problems underlying youth crime if Territory Alliance elected

AN ELECTED Territory Alliance government would “get to work immediately” to establish new community courts to tackle the underlying problems driving youth crime in the NT.

Territory Alliance Leader Terry Mills says the party will legislate to introduce ‘community magistrates’ if it wins government in August. Picture GLENN CAMPBELL

AN ELECTED Territory Alliance government would “get to work immediately” to establish new community courts to tackle the underlying problems driving youth crime in the NT.

Party leader Terry Mills said the new system would see a “community magistrate” convene “a gathering of (the offender’s) family, victims, community members and other relevant stakeholders”.

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“That’s actually a new level of court that operates in the community and it must happen at the very beginning, that’s a critically different approach that allows us to have a line of sight on the nature of the underlying problem and to have a specific response to that particular problem,” he said.

“You bring their families in because their families are — and people may not realise this — as concerned as anybody else but the current system has them locked out and not involved.

“There is a community standard, there is a right and wrong and there also is an underlying problem, you don't have one or the other.”

Mr Mills said the court would have the power to issue binding orders once an agreement on appropriate disciplinary action was reached to the satisfaction of the judge and the victims.

“There’s got to be reparations made, if you’ve broken into some place you’ve got to go and fix the damage up, repair the damage, make the apology — but at the same time (work out) what then is the underlying problem and co-ordinate it properly,” he said.

“Now of course ultimately if the opportunity’s provided and the young offender is unwilling to change their behaviour, well there’s still going to be the tougher course which is before a (Youth Justice Court judge) and perhaps going into Don Dale.

“It’s not taking that away but it’s putting in some mechanism right at the start.”

Earlier this month the Country Liberal Party announced plans to shift responsibility for youth justice from Territory Families back to Corrections and reinstate breach of bail offences for youths.

But Mr Mills said taking a less hard line on crime than that of his former party would not hurt TA at the ballot box in August, describing the policy as “a very common sense approach”.

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“In all of my work for 20 years I know that there’s an element of good will to be involved as a citizen either directly or with their representative in an approach that is going to deal with the underlying problem and at the same time uphold the community standard,” he said.

“But it’s got to be swift and it’s got to involve the community.”