Over 100 organisations call on Attorneys-General to raise the age to at least 14
A joint statement signed by over 100 health, legal, social, community services providers, advocates and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Community Controlled Organisations today reiterated calls for Attorneys-General to stop jailing 10 year old children and raise the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14 years old, with no exceptions.
No child in Australia should grow up in a prison cell. Tomorrow on Friday 1 December 2023, the Standing Council of Attorneys-General (SCAG) can change this when it is expected to decide on the minimum age of criminal responsibility in Australia. This decision comes after five years of delays and glacial progress.
Previously, a report prepared for SCAG by the Council’s own Working Group in 2020 recommended that “the Commonwealth, State and Territory governments should raise the minimum age of criminal responsibility to 14 years of age, without exception”.
Raising the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14 with no exceptions is the absolute bare minimum to be in line with medical expert advice and international standards for child development. Any commitment coming out of SCAG to raise the age to 12 falls short of this.
The current low age of criminal responsibility disproportionately impacts Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, children with disabilities and is a key driver of contact with police and the criminal legal system. Raising the age to at least 14 will reduce the overrepresentation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in prisons and help governments meet their Closing The Gap targets.
While governments refuse to act on the significant evidence gathered by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations, medical and legal experts, and human rights organisations which support raising the age and alternatives to youth prisons, hundreds of children are spending their childhoods behind bars in Australia right now.
We call on Attorneys-General to raise the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14, with no exceptions, so that every child can grow up healthy, happy and connected with their friends, families, and communities.
Quote from Maggie Munn, Gunggari person and National Director at Change the Record:
“Advocates, families and communities are all fed up with having to plead with governments for the bare minimum. We have waited years and years for governments across this country to act on the advice from experts across legal, medical and psychological fields to raise the age to at least 14, and yet here we are still waiting to see change. Children need care and support, not cages. Attorneys-General have an opportunity to finally act in accordance with human rights standards on this issue, and we urge them to do the right thing. Raising the age to at least 14 can’t wait, and neither can these kids.”
Quote from Nerita Waight, Co-Chair of the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Service (NATSILS):
“Across Australia, Aboriginal children are massively overincarcerated by a discriminatory and punitive system. We should be investing in the support these children need, not stealing their futures by putting them in prison.
“It’s almost a decade since the Attorneys-General agreed to develop a plan to raise the age and they still have not delivered. It’s time to get this done.
“Aboriginal communities have been advocating for this reform for so long, and we’ve just had a year where politicians promised to listen to us more and to implement the policies we need to reduce the discrimination we face – this is the right time for governments to fully back raising the age.”
Quotes from Monique Hurley, Managing Lawyer at the Human Rights Law Centre:
“Children should not be in prisons. Children belong in playgrounds and schools, supported by friends and family in the community. Every day that governments refuse to act on this straightforward reform, is another day of failing a generation of children who are being harmed and locked away behind bars
“For years, governments across Australia have sat on their hands and failed to act on advice from medical experts, independent parliamentary inquiries and their own justice departments that the age of criminal responsibility should be raised to at least 14 years. The Standing Council of Attorneys-General must do the right thing by children: raise the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14 years, for all children.”
Quote from Professor Steve Robson, President of the Australian Medical Association:
“The health advice is crystal clear – jail has terrible impacts on the health and wellbeing of children. It is not appropriate to hold children criminally responsible at this cognitive developmental stage. All children have a right to feel safe, secure and go to school – jail is not the place for this. The AMA calls upon Australia’s Attorneys-General to abandon the current piecemeal approach and ensure that the minimum age of criminal responsibility is set at 14 years across the country, with no exceptions.”
Media contact: Laura Hayes, Change the Record: laura@changetherecord.org.au 0488 165 526