‘Youth crime tough love a flop’, says NT Attorney-General Chansey Paech

Northern Territory Attorney-General Chansey Paech says locking up children does not work and that he is proud he has lifted the age of criminal responsibility.

Northern Territory Attorney-General Chansey Paech. Picture: Che Chorley

Northern Territory Attorney-General Chansey Paech says locking up children does not work and that he is proud he has lifted the age of criminal responsibility, in a rebuke of Labor colleague Marion Scrymgour’s call for a “tough love” rethink of youth crime laws.

It comes as the National Children’s Commissioner said states and territories were yet to pick “low-hanging fruit” to help alleviate youth crime, such as operating schools like one-stop community hubs, and making drug and alcohol programs available to kids under 12.

Commissioner Anne Hollonds called for a national youth crime taskforce so the “wellbeing of children (isn’t) flicked back and forth” between the commonwealth and states/territories.

Mr Paech said he was “proud” the Northern Territory was the first Australian jurisdiction to raise the minimum age of criminal responsibility and that it would help break the cycle of youth offending, following an extraordinary intervention by Ms Scrymgour, who said the decision to raise the age of criminal responsibility was not working.

“It’s important that children who do the wrong thing are held accountable, regardless of their age, under appropriate therapeutic interventions,” Mr Paech told The Australian.

“If children are taken home and head back out on the street, the relevant authorities have the legislative power to take those young children to a residential safe place and hold them until a responsible adult or agency is identified.”

But he added: “We refuse to be a part of punitive, retrograde and politically expedient policies that have clearly failed. We refuse to fail children who have been failed over and over again.”

Ms Hollonds, who has been travelling the country speaking to children who have had contact with the justice system, and their parents, for a project on youth justice reform, said it was “clear the justice system isn’t the solution” to the youth crime problem, which exists nationwide.

“Harsh punitive measures, or even harsher sentences, don’t fix it. Kids aren’t getting up in the middle of the night thinking ‘I won’t steal that car because of a sentence I might get’. Their brains don’t work like that.”

Ms Hollonds said steps could be taken immediately to address the youth crime epidemic, including redesigning basic public service systems that are “mid-last century in design”.

She said there were “absolute gaps” in other areas, such as access to mental health programs and drug and alcohol treatment facilities for kids under 12, even in Sydney and Melbourne.

NT independent MLA Mark Turner, a former police officer, said he wanted to see the department responsible, Territory Families, “doing their job”, alongside more proactive policing.

Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney said the federal government was working with the NT government, Alice Springs Town Council and the Central Australian Aboriginal community to address the challenges in Alice Springs, but acknowledged there was “much work to do”.