EDITORIAL: Labor weakness on mandatory sentencing is its shame

IT has been 35 months since Attorney-General Natasha Fyles first said a review of the Northern Territory’s much-maligned mandatory sentencing laws was underway

Attorney-General Natasha Fyles has failed on mandatory sentencing Picture: Justin Kennedy

IT has been 35 months since Attorney-General Natasha Fyles first said a review of the Northern Territory’s much-maligned mandatory sentencing laws was underway.

At the time, she said that review was likely to take up to 18 months.

Yesterday, she again said that review was underway. Again, she said it would take 18 months to complete, conveniently taking it past the 2020 election.

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Mandatory sentencing is universally abhorred by those in the legal and justice fraternities.

It results in grave injustices, such as the tragic case of J Wurramarba, the skinny 15-year-old who was incarcerated for stealing textas and liquid paper. He killed himself in Don Dale. Had the judge who sentenced him had discretion over his sentence, he never would have been there.

Anecdotally, mandatory sentencing sometimes results in criminals receiving shorter sentences than they would have, with judges simply applying the minimum. Mandatory sentencing doesn’t work.

Ms Fyles and the Labor Government know this. That’s why they gave an undertaking before the 2016 election to abolish mandatory sentencing.

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The Law Reform Committee review is a farce. As lawyer Marty Aust says, it’s akin to commissioning a report to find out if water is wet.

This is a government that came to power promising it wouldn’t be afraid to do the right thing, even if it was not popular. On this question, it has failed.