Crisafulli Government's discriminatory laws will send more children to prison and override human rights
Change the Record and the Human Rights Law Centre strongly condemn the Crisafulli Government for ramming the Making Queensland Safer Bill 2024 through Parliament tonight.
The laws will lock up even more children in Queensland’s overcrowded and unsafe police watch houses and youth prisons. The laws will disproportionately imprison Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, and children with disabilities. The United Nations, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations, and legal, health and criminology experts have slammed the laws which will:
Subject children to ‘adult time’ by at least doubling the maximum sentence for numerous offences, including children as young as ten.
Increase some sentences to life detention.
Disregard the international requirement that children should only be detained as a last resort, even though detention as a last resort is a consideration when sentencing adults.
Remove restorative justice orders, a victim-centred approach to repairing harm and reducing reoffending, as a sentencing option.
Vastly expand what is included in a child’s criminal history and allow these expanded records to be used in adulthood.
The Crisfafulli Government has overridden Queensland’s Human Rights Act for five years, admitting that the laws will have the biggest impact on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and are more punitive than necessary. It has ignored stakeholders’ calls for an independent review requirement.
The laws follow a sham Parliamentary Committee inquiry into the Bill. Stakeholders had under three business days to lodge submissions and the Committee tabled its report three days after submissions closed.
Change the Record and the Human Rights Law Centre strongly oppose the laws as well as the complete disregard for parliamentary process. We call on the Crisafulli Government to immediately fund community-led solutions that prevent children from having contact with the legal system by addressing the root causes of offending and keeping young people connected to their families and communities.
Our submission to the fast-tracked Committee inquiry is here.
Quotes attributable to Blake Cansdale (he/him), National Director, Change the Record
“The Queensland Government’s rushed approach to this Bill, allowing Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations minimal time for consultation, shows a blatant disregard for our voices.
“This debate has been framed as a choice between protecting victims and protecting children. This is a false dichotomy. Many children in the justice system are victims of crime themselves, and the cycle of incarceration only leads to more harm. We urge the government to reject fear-driven politics and commit to evidence-based reforms that create lasting safety and justice for everyone.
“Tough on crime” measures, like “Adult Crime, Adult Time,” are deeply flawed. These policies do nothing to address the root causes of youth crime – intergenerational trauma, poverty, systemic racism, and inadequate access to culturally safe support services. Instead, they reinforce damaging stereotypes and entrench cycles of disadvantage that harm First Nations children and families for generations.
“The reality is that First Nations children are not inherently more likely to offend. They are targeted by discriminatory policing practices, often receiving harsher penalties for the same behaviours as their non-Indigenous peers. With these new laws, the government has compounded these injustices, perpetuating a system that criminalises our children instead of providing the support they need to thrive.”
Quotes attributable to Maggie Munn (they/them), First Nations Justice Director, Human Rights Law Centre:
“Times like this make me wonder how the Premier can sleep at night knowing he is condemning Queensland children to an unbelievably bleak future, especially when those children are predominantly Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander kids, and kids with a disability.
“It is appalling that the Crisafulli Government has overridden the Human Rights Act and blatantly disregarded international law about the treatment of children in the criminal legal system.
“The government is playing political football with the very real lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, who now more than ever need our support and care, not cages and adult sentences.
Quotes attributable to Rachana Rajan (she/her), First Nations Justice Associate Legal Director, Human Rights Law Centre:
“Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are growing up behind bars. They are being subjected to irreversible harm – and dying – in custody. This cannot go on.
“The Crisafulli Government has overridden Queensland’s Human Rights Act to lock up even more Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and children with disabilities, for longer. This is an international disgrace.
“Queensland already holds the shameful title of locking up the most children in the country. These laws will unjustifiably exacerbate this crisis of mass incarceration.
“Prisons are not places of rehabilitation and it is completely disingenuous for the Crisafulli Government to claim that this can change. Instead of these dangerous laws, the government should be urgently investing in community-led programs which address children’s needs and keep them connected to family, education and culture.
“We call on the government to immediately boost funding for the many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations doing this work and to listen to what they need to meet demand.”
Media contact:
Chandi Bates
Media and Communications Manager
Human Rights Law Centre
0430 277 254
chandi.bates@hrlc.org.au