Locking up young people makes the community less safe, one of Queensland’s leading children’s advocates said, as police announced another crackdown on youth offenders in Cairns.
Guardian Australia reported on Monday that a significant number of alleged victims uncovered during a police investigation into the exploitation of vulnerable children in Cairns, are also the targets of a government crackdown on youth crime.
Natalie Lewis, a commissioner at the Queensland Family and Child Commission, said the revelations underscored a troubling reality: that in public discourse children are only seen as worthy of compassion if they are victims of crime, rather than offenders.
“If there’s a group of kids being victimised and exploited, as a society we have a capacity to respond in ways that are compassionate,” Lewis said.
“We want change for them and we want to support them.
“But when the same young people … then commit an offence, it’s automatically as if that same worry and compassion … just dissipates.”
Queensland police said on Tuesday they had arrested 29 “juveniles” and charged them with 100 offences consisting mostly of property crimes. Cairns saw a week-long operation using officers from interstate under taskforce Guardian.
The officers undertook street and bail checks and arrested people for alleged breaches of bail or on outstanding warrants.
The officers worked with the Cairns Youth Co-responder Team and Youth Justice staff.
Lewis cautioned against the enmeshing of police with youth justice workers and other people who were tasked with protecting the best interests of children.
“When they are lending that set of expert skills, you can see from the perspective of the police it would enhance their response.
“But I’m concerned with the needs of children, not the needs of police or the system.”
Lewis said, however, that there needed to be strong relationships across the youth justice sector.
Guardian Australia reported that the development of strong relationships between detectives and support agencies meant youths who previously had a negative perception of police felt they could trust them enough to come forward with abuse allegations.
Lewis said taskforce Guardian demonstrated a clear example of police portraying to the community what it expected, rather than what was needed.
It might make people feel safer, she said, but the reality was that research had repeatedly shown that putting young people in custody did not reduce their offending.
“You can absolutely protect and promote the rights of children at the same time you’re making an effort to hold a child to account for their behaviour,” she said.
“You’re much more likely to produce a just outcome where you’re promoting the rights of children who are in conflict with the law, and the rights of the victim.
“That’s an inconvenient framing for the justice system, but it’s real.”
