The youth crime issue

The lefty Australian twitter accounts I see have been going off about the new conservative Northern Territory government saying that they decrease the age of criminal responsibility to 10.   [Although, I now see that the previous Labor government had raised it to 12, and that was only a year ago!   The reaction on the lefty side had given me the impression it had been 12 for some time, but in fact it is just a reversion to something from a year ago?]

No doubt, most of those caught by that will be indigenous offenders.

I agree that it does sound pretty extreme [ahem, but note, I hadn't realised it had been this until recently], but thinking more about it, perhaps the following points make it potentially useful:

*    it doesn't necessarily mean that the kids will be given a custodial sentence, but that is how all lefty advocates are treating it.   Given the difficulty that all States in Australia have with running "successful" youth detention facilities (from what I can gather, no one wants to work in them, and the behavioural issues with the offenders is often ultimately down to poor parenting - including fetal alcohol syndrome, which has permanent developmental effects), I can't see that the Northern Territory is going to easily create decent custodial facilities for 10 year olds.  I'm not sure what other sentencing options there may be - but it may that the legislation change needs to add new ideas to sentencing too.

*  If the sentencing options are going to include an ability to take the kids from parents, is one benefit that parents might be encouraged to take greater responsibility for their kids?   I mean, whenever we see stories on remote aboriginal communities, we are shown kids out on the streets at night, often with services that offer to pick them up and take them home (at least if it is safe to do so.)   It's clear that the problem is often that there is no parental culture of kids staying at home at night to do homework or entertain themselves indoors.   Would parents in those communities react to the threat that if your (say) 12 year old does something criminally wrong, he will be instantly taken away for it, create any incentive for them to keep the kid at home?   Sounds pretty optimistic to think so, but seems to me we are running out of ideas.

I will add to this later...

Update:   Hmmm.  According to The Guardian:

Finocchiaro wants to introduce “boot camps” among mandatory diversionary programs for young offenders.

I wonder if these have ever worked all that well anywhere?   Again, I can well imagine the difficulty in getting them staffed.   

Other ideas:

Finocchiaro’s campaign platform also promised to reintroduce truancy officers to police school absences and vowed to hold parents accountable for their children’s criminal behaviour by threatening to have government benefits restricted.

“If parents are not caring for their children’s basic needs they will be referred to commonwealth income management like the basics card,” the CLP platform said.

 Update 2:  Well, this shows how little I know about what's been tried in the past with the youth criminal justice system.   Here's a report from 2017 on the success of "boot camps" that were tried before in the Queensland system (under a previous Liberal National Party government).   It talks about their success or failure in other jurisdictions too.    And here's a more recent paper (2021) about them in Queensland, as well a 2006 paper by the Australian Institute of Criminology called Wilderness Programs and Boot Camps - Are They Effective?  (A quick look indicates the answer is "not very".)  Here's the synopsis:

Wilderness programs that include adventure activities and 'boot camps' involving military-like discipline are often promoted as effective crime prevention measures for young people in contact with the justice system or those at risk of criminal involvement. However, research reviews show mixed results for such programs.

One recent systematic review of boot camps showed no overall positive effect from the military type and physical activity aspects of these programs when recidivism was used as the measure of success (Wilson & MacKenzie 2006). This review found that camps might be more effective if the primary emphasis is therapeutic rather than militaristic and physical. Other reviews agree that it is the therapeutic elements of such programs that are crucial to success (AIC 2003; Wilson & Lipsey 2000). In a review of the crime prevention effect of wilderness challenge programs with delinquent youth, Wilson and Lipsey (2000) found the recidivism rate was eight percent lower for program participants (29%) than for control subjects (37%). In particular they found that established programs were more effective, indicating the need for ongoing core funding to assist programs to be more effective.

The following components are likely to increase successful outcomes for programs:

• thorough assessment and ongoing monitoring of participants
• a risk management assessment of activities and screening of program staff
• multi-modal treatments with a cognitive-behavioural orientation, e.g. behaviour modification techniques, drug and alcohol programs (Lipsey & Wilson 1998; Singh & White 2000)
• addressing specific criminogenic needs, e.g. attitudes supporting offending, peer groups, family problems, drug and alcohol use, anger and violence problems (Singh & White 2000)
• meaningful and substantial contact between participants and treatment personnel, and
• inclusion of an aftercare component (AIC 2003).

Programs for Indigenous or culturally and linguistically diverse youth should engage significant others, be culturally appropriate, and have staff who can relate to the clients (Singh & White 2000).

 Oh, and here's an article from late last year about a Queensland politician who wanted to reintroduce boot camps, which explains what happened with the last attempt:

Bolton raised the possibility of reintroducing the Newman-era youth boot camps – scrapped by Labor in 2015 – as one solution to what is being portrayed as a youth crime crisis.

Created by the then attorney general, Jarrod Bleijie, in February 2013, the boot camp trial allowed for convicted children to be sentenced by a court to spend a month in a remote location. Targeted at children already in the youth justice system, it was designed to offer an alternative to jail.

The program immediately ran into problems, with far fewer children sentenced to the orders than initially anticipated, until the government made them mandatory for some children repeatedly convicted of stealing a car.

Bleijie’s trial was closed by the Palaszczuk government in 2015 after a cost blowout. An independent report by KPMG found the program was more than twice as expensive as traditional youth detention while reoffending rates were the same. The auditor general also found the Newman government’s choice of tender was flawed. The camps were criticised by some academics as being “mean spirited”, for taking a military approach to discipline, and being too punitive.