“Eleven years old. And in this country, that’s old enough to send me to prison. That still happens to black kids now.”
These are the words of Miranda Tapsell’s character, Kelly, in last Thursday’s episode of Summer Love on ABC television.
But these are not just words from a scriptwriter – they are based on fact.
Currently, the legal age of criminal responsibility in Victoria is 10.
This means that a child as young as 10 can be incarcerated – kept behind bars on remand or sent to prison.
And it is not only in Victoria.
Except for the ACT – where the legal age was raised to 14 in August 2020 – every state and territory in Australia has 10 as the legal age of criminal responsibility.
So how does this translate into numbers?
In just one year across Australia, close to 600 children aged 10 to 13 were locked up, and thousands more were hauled through the criminal legal system.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are disproportionately impacted by these laws and pushed into prison cells at even higher rates, accounting for 65 per cent of these younger children in prisons around the country.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are also less likely than non-Aboriginal children to receive a caution from police, and more likely to be charged with a criminal offence.
Ten years of age.
An age where children are still in primary school.
When their abstract thinking is still developing.
An age where their bodies are changing.
Ten years of age.
The four years between 10 and 14 in a child’s development is a time of enormous change, including in a child’s understanding of responsibility, empathy and the difference between right and wrong.
This is supported by a substantial body of medical, sociological and criminological evidence.
Medical science shows that children below the age of 14 lack the maturity to fully comprehend the impact of their actions and meet legal standards of culpability.
Children in this age group are going through significant growth and development.
Treating them like criminals through early contact with the criminal justice system can lead to irreparable harm and long-term damage.
Depriving young children of their liberty at such a formative age is not only depriving them of their childhood but also putting them at risk of great harm to their health, well-being and future.
As the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service points out in its document, Raising the Age of Criminal Responsibility, conditions in youth detention “re-traumatise children, compound mental illness, further disrupt their development and make reoffending more likely. For Aboriginal children, detention also removes them from their families, communities, Country and culture. Detention is harmful for all children, but particularly children as young as 10 years old.”
The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child recommends that “no child be deprived of liberty, unless there are genuine public safety or public health concerns, and encourages State parties to fix an age limit below which children may not legally be deprived of their liberty, such as 16 years of age.”
Countries such as Laos, Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Poland already have 15 as the minimum age.
There has been an ongoing chorus of national and international voices raising their concerns about the current situation in Australia.
The Raise the Age campaign, involving numerous Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations, expert United Nations bodies, Human Rights organisations, medical and legal bodies, educators and academics is continuing to advocate strongly for a change.
The Raise the Age campaign is calling on all state, territory and Commonwealth governments to raise the minimum age of criminal responsibility in Australia to at least 14 — immediately.
As the Raise the Age alliance states: “Ten-year-old kids belong in schools and playgrounds, not placed in handcuffs, held in watchhouses or locked in prisons away from their families, community and culture.”
VALS, a long-time advocate of raising the age, believes: “Every child should be free to go to school, have a safe home to live in and be supported to learn from their mistakes. But right now, politicians are sending children as young as 10 years old to be locked away in prison.”
We all know that children do best when they are supported, nurtured and loved.
The best way to create safer communities is keep young people out of the youth justice system, including by supporting them, and their families and communities, to address their needs.
Community-led, place-based, data driven, collaborative, economically sustainable solutions — as demonstrated in the NSW town of Bourke’s Maranguka Justice Reinvestment program — lead to positive social and financial impacts.
The KPMG Impact assessment of the Bourke program calculated that the changes in Bourke in 2017 improved family strength, reflected in a 23 per cent reduction in police recorded rates of domestic violence; increased youth development, which included a 31 per cent increase in Year 12 retentions; and adult empowerment, including a 43 per cent reduction in days spent in custody – and saved the NSW economy $3.1 million – five times Maranguka’s operating costs in the same year.
Justice investment is a long, evolving process that improves service co-ordination and collaboration to build stronger communities.
It recognises the power of placing communities in the driving seat to identify problems and lead solutions to reduce the number of Aboriginal people, including young people, contacting the criminal justice system and thereby being imprisoned for minor offences.
Incarceration has huge costs to communities and to young lives.
All children should be supported to reach their full potential.
Leaving the age of criminal responsibility at 10 is putting already at-risk children at greater risk of further harm.
Raising the Age of criminal responsibility is one vital step the Victorian, and other Australian governments, can take to make a difference – now.
As VALS sums up in Raising the Age of Responsibility: “The Victorian Government must recognise that the Aboriginal community and Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisations (ACCOs) are experts in how to best support Aboriginal children and families. They are best placed to ensure that protective factors – such as connection to culture, Country, family and community – are nurtured and that children have the opportunity to thrive. Respecting Aboriginal self-determination would lead to improved outcomes for not only Aboriginal children, but more broadly for community safety”.
In Victoria, you can support this campaign.
Make your voice heard.
Visit the Raise the Age website and sign the petition www.raisetheage.org.au
To read the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service Raising the Age of Responsibility Policy Brief visit www.vals.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Raising-the-Age-of-Criminal-Responsibility-Policy-Brief-August-2022.pdf
For information about Justice Reinvestment NSW and Maranguka in Bourke visit www.justreinvest.org.au/about-us/
Watch Summer Love (episode two) on ABC’s streaming platform, iView.