EDITORIAL: Action on youth crime finally, but long-term challenges remain

Politicians on both sides will pat themselves on the back for legislation to tackle youth crime, but where is the action on the underlying, long-term causes?

• Details of proposed youth crime laws revealed

AFTER months of speculation and hints at press conferences, the NT public have finally gotten the opportunity to look at exactly what the NT government plan to do to tackle the youth crime crisis.

And despite fears the budget would dominate procedures, it seemed yesterday that youth bail was all anyone could talk about.

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The government introduced their legislation on urgency, meaning we get to see next week whether the changes will be passed into law.

At the same time, hours were spent yesterday debating the CLP’s alternative legislation, which was originally brought on in March.

The deputy Chief Minister Nicole Manison argued the CLP’s bill was too narrow for the government to support.

The opposition meanwhile are taking credit for applying pressure to the government to make changes to their own youth bail laws.

Whatever the case, it’s clear the politicians are listening to the horror stories and they’re finally willing to do something.

We all hope whatever changes are made, they work.

That doesn’t just mean stopping youth offenders from committing crimes, but also breaking the generational cycle of crime.

It’s time politicians stopped patting themselves on the back for managing the short-term and instead took aim at the bigger, tougher and harder issues that will take far longer to fix.

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