Criminal numbers could 'explode' in NT unless system changes, inquiry hears
Updated
The Northern Territory's imprisonment rate is already amongst the world's highest but it could skyrocket in coming years unless more is done to stop "at risk" children becoming adult criminals, an inquiry has heard.
Key points:
- The number of child abuse reports have increased by 20 per cent in the Northern Territory
- Author says high rates of abused "at-risk" children could lead to an "explosion" of adult offenders.
- There are calls for NT corrections systems to introduce Indigenous-led statutory authority
Today the Royal Commission into the Protection and Detention of Children in the Northern Territory continued to hear evidence from Keith Hamburger, the author of a major report into the NT's corrections system.
He was quizzed about the increasing number of notifications to authorities under the Care and Protection of Children Act.
Mr Hamburger was specifically asked about figures from the NT Children's Commissioner, which showed in 2015/16 the number of notifications received by the Government about children who were suspected to have been abused or neglected was more than 20,000, a 20 per cent increase on the previous year.
"If those sort of figures that you are talking about are occurring, I think it is reasonably logical to say that yes, down the track there is going to be a horrendous cost to the Territory," Mr Hamburger told the hearing.
"Generally in a community if you have a large problem with at-risk children and children coming to the notice of authorities and coming into care, it does lead ... to an explosion in adult offending down the track."
Mr Hamburger said the NT had "somewhere near the world's worst imprisonment rate" and the number of notifications of at-risk children was a hugely critical issue.
"I think this is a bit of a watershed," he said.
He said the high imprisonment rate was "a huge indicator of social failure, social and economic failure or remote communities".
"It needs to be addressed, and it needs to be addressed urgently," Mr Hamburger said.
Call for new Indigenous-led authority
Mr Hamburger said a new Indigenous-led statutory authority needed to be created to become a "circuit breaker" to change the NT's corrections system.
He said the authority would include people with expertise in areas such as law, youth, child protection, health, education and business, and would give remote communities a voice, as well as representing prison officers' unions.
Mr Hamburger also called for Indigenous people to have a greater say in how minors are treated.
"By bringing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people into the driving seat so to speak, so that they can be part of planning that future.
"It is their communities, it's their children, their families we are talking about," he said.
Hamburger responds to critics
Mr Hamburger went on to respond to critics of his view of how a modern prison should operate.
"The perception in the community I guess generally speaking is that prisons should be places of punishment or places where people are not treated with kid gloves and all that sort of thing you may hear," he said.
But Mr Hamburger argued most people who ended up in detention or prisons did not come from loving, supportive families, and did not react positively to harsh treatment.
"They have been sexually abused, they have gone to school without lunch. They have had quite serious things happen in their lives.
"If you put them in jail and think another good kick up the backside or something like that is going to change their ways, you have got to think again.
"They have had far worse at home, on the street, and so that sort of punishment that people like to think out should be dished out to those sort of people ... it has no effect in that sense," he said.
Topics: indigenous-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander, youth, law-crime-and-justice, prisons-and-punishment, courts-and-trials, darwin-0800, alice-springs-0870
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