NT juvenile detention: Entire political class to blame, says Plibersek

Tanya Plibersek says the entire political class has failed the children mistreated in a NT juvenile detention centre.

Acting Opposition Leader Tanya Plibersek says the entire political class has failed the children who were subjected to horrifying mistreatment in a Northern Territory juvenile detention centre.

The Shadow Education Minister said politicians from both major parties at territory and federal levels had to ask themselves what information they had about abuse of young inmates in Darwin’s Don Dale centre, and why action hadn’t been taken.

“I think that’s a very important question for this Royal Commission,” Ms Plibersek told ABC radio.

“These children have been failed by the political class.

“I’m happy to take my share of the responsibility for that.”

Ms Plibersek said systemic failures in the education, health and housing systems also needed to be examined.

“We need to ask ourselves what’s happening in our families and communities that 10-year-old children are ending up in places like this,” she said.

She said people could make their own judgments about the responses of Indigenous Affairs Minister Nigel Scullion or Northern Territory Chief Minister Adam Giles, saying the problem was bigger than any individual.

“I think it’s inadequate but he’s not the only person who’s let these kids down,” Ms Plibersek said of Senator Scullion’s comment yesterday that his interest hadn’t been “piqued” by earlier reports of the abuse.

“We each need to bear a responsibility for it,” she said, adding that Senator Scullion had been a “completely inadequate” indigenous affairs minister.

“I think there’s a number of reasons that I’d criticise this minister, but I think it is unfair to hold him solely responsible for what is obviously a deep and systemic failure that the Northern Territory government should also bear its share of responsibility for, and previous governments too.”

Ms Plibersek said previous Labor governments at federal and territory level also had some responsibility.

“I’m not shying away from that. This is the reason that a Royal Commission is the right response in this instance,” she said.

“This is a long term and deep systemic failure. We need to look at what is happening inside these institutions. We also need to look at how are we failing kids that they are ending up in places like this at such young ages.”

“I don’t want to use this as a political point scoring exercise but it is plain that if we have 10 and 11-year-old kids in lock-ups like this, if we brutalise them, if we deny them an education and then we put them back on the streets again what we are breeding are more brutal criminals who understand that if you’re strong and if you’re in a position of power, the way you use that strength and power is to be violent against people who are smaller and weaker than you.

“Is that really what we want to teach kids, who are obviously already from troubled backgrounds, from situations that I’m sure most of us cannot imagine?”

Ms Plibersek said she had written to Malcolm Turnbull urging that his Royal Commission go beyond the Don Dale facility to look at the whole juvenile justice system in the Northern Territory.

“And indeed if there is a case for other states to be involved, we are very open to other states and territories,” she said.

Asked whether there was a case for the Royal Commission to examine the detention of children in offshore centres, Ms Plibersek said Labor would do everything it could to increase transparency in such places, but that a Royal Commission could not extend to other countries.

“Our Royal Commissions don’t operate in countries that have their own legal systems so we can do what we can do to shed greater light and insist on greater accountability,” she said.