Speaker 1: A week ago in the evening, the readA wait. It
Speaker 1: was getting ready for a momentous occasion.
Speaker 2: Because the following day in the afternoon, I would be
Speaker 2: signing as an Assembly member Victoria, in fact Australia's first treaty.
Speaker 1: The reader was a Yorda order and marrying jurywoman. She's
Speaker 1: a member of the First People's Assembly of Victoria and
Speaker 1: Treaty co Convena. She's also the CEO of the Victorian
Speaker 1: Aboriginal Legal Service. That night, as she prepared for the
Speaker 1: day ahead, her phone rang. It was Victoria's Attorney General
Speaker 1: ringing to let her know that the government was set
Speaker 1: to announce new laws that would allow children as young
Speaker 1: as fourteen to be tried in adult courts and face
Speaker 1: life sentences.
Speaker 2: So it is a very unique circumstances which should be
Speaker 2: advised that Victoria is going to proceed to lock up children,
Speaker 2: some for life. When you are looking forward to something
Speaker 2: that was supposed to be transformative, that was supposed to
Speaker 2: feel that Victoria was ushering in a new era, and
Speaker 2: then to be somewhat slap in the face by rather
Speaker 2: regressive action, it leaves you reeling. Daniel.
Speaker 1: The proposal was rushed in the Cabinet with little warning.
Speaker 1: Ministers were given just minutes to read it before the
Speaker 1: meeting began. Only a year ago, Labor promised to raise
Speaker 1: the age of criminal responsibility. Now in response to tablot
Speaker 1: Ourt cry, it's taking a sharp turn, following Queensland and
Speaker 1: adopting adult time for adult crime. If it goes ahead,
Speaker 1: it means more First Nations children would be locked up
Speaker 1: in Victoria than ever before.
Speaker 2: Their lives are on the line. These are children that
Speaker 2: won't receive any hope of a future. They're going to
Speaker 2: spend the remainder of their childhood, Daniel, in a prison cell.
Speaker 2: They're going to spend their early adulthood in a prison cell.
Speaker 2: And as we know, the more you entrenched child in
Speaker 2: the criminal legal system, the more often they are likely
Speaker 2: to be caught up in a cycle of offending.
Speaker 1: I'm Daniel James and you're listening to seven AM today
Speaker 1: Nriita wait on how the premier's new laws could devastate
Speaker 1: vulnerable kids and what it says about the kind of
Speaker 1: state Victoria is becoming in a time of treaty. This Tuesday,
Speaker 1: November eight e Naurita, thank you so much for joining us.
Speaker 1: Can you describe exactly what these new youth justice reforms
Speaker 1: will allow and why you and the Victorian Aguinal Legal
Speaker 1: Service see them as such a dangerous change.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think it's important to note that
Speaker 2: these so called reforms were done without consultation with anyone
Speaker 2: in the sector. This appears to have been dreamed up
Speaker 2: by a cabinets of working group comprising of the Premier,
Speaker 2: the Attorney General, the Corrections Minister and the Minister for Police.
Speaker 3: I today want to acknowledge, as Premiere that everyone of
Speaker 3: these violent youth crimes has a victim, a family that
Speaker 3: has had their life disrupted, a person that was shaken,
Speaker 3: a person who was hurt, and we are all horrified
Speaker 3: by these violent, brazen youth crimes and the devastating impact
Speaker 3: they have on its victims.
Speaker 2: What they've decided to do is that children aged fourteen
Speaker 2: to seventeen years old found guilty of committing aggreda burglary,
Speaker 2: of aggreta carjacking could be sent to a life in
Speaker 2: prison that is literally equivalent to murder.
Speaker 3: There are too many victims and not enough consequences. It's
Speaker 3: why Victoria will introduce adult time for violent crime, where
Speaker 3: the courts will treat children for these crimes like adults,
Speaker 3: where jail will be more likely and sentences will be longer.
Speaker 2: The government also planned to send children who allegedly commit
Speaker 2: a fe including aggravated and an aggravated home invasion and carjacking,
Speaker 2: to the county court rather than the Children's court, who
Speaker 2: are the specialist when it comes to dealing with children.
Speaker 3: Currently in the children's court, thirty four percent of children
Speaker 3: and young people sentenced for aggravated home invasion or aggravated carjacking.
Speaker 3: For those offenses, thirty four percent go to jail. When
Speaker 3: those offenses are before the county court, the adult court,
Speaker 3: ninety seven percent go to jail.
Speaker 2: And this means that children are going to have a
Speaker 2: very alienating experience within the court. They're going to be
Speaker 2: seen by a judge who has no idea how to
Speaker 2: interact with children, no idea about the complexities in which
Speaker 2: these children are often suffering under other traumas, the neglect
Speaker 2: often by the state in fact, but also often the
Speaker 2: fact that these children are very very young, Daniel, these
Speaker 2: are not people who are equivalent to an ad don't
Speaker 2: making a decision, they have very low executive function, and
Speaker 2: it's just absolutely horrific that we have decided that deprivation
Speaker 2: of property is equal to costing someone their life.
Speaker 1: So what do these laws mean for the children you
Speaker 1: represent three, your legal service, and for the absoinal community
Speaker 1: more broadly?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean look, after hearing that news Tuesday night,
Speaker 2: I went back and looked at our Blittano lou clients
Speaker 2: and blatnall lose our specific option of children's legal service,
Speaker 2: and these reforms Daniel will affect two thirds of our
Speaker 2: clients two thirds. This for us is really difficult to
Speaker 2: swallow because when we see these kids, we know that
Speaker 2: they are young people with disability. They're young people who
Speaker 2: have been coursively forced to engage in risk taking and
Speaker 2: offending behaviors. Young people who are and whose families are
Speaker 2: entrenched in poverty, young people who have often been removed
Speaker 2: from their families care before. Therefore, and those who have
Speaker 2: been found at the state at every step in their lives,
Speaker 2: they don't have an anchor Daniel. Often enough, they be
Speaker 2: moved from place to place. There's no consistency in their education,
Speaker 2: no consistency in their supports, there is no stability for them,
Speaker 2: and that's how they get caught up in these behaviors
Speaker 2: and sometimes you know, Daniel's not people who are actively
Speaker 2: participating in the crime. Sometimes they're just being coerced to
Speaker 2: be a lookout. But they will still be charged if
Speaker 2: they had done the carjacking themselves or the home invasion.
Speaker 2: Right now, when this is in Victoria's history, the first
Speaker 2: time that we've had such high imprisonment rates of Abiginal people,
Speaker 2: we are only going to increase that trend. We're not
Speaker 2: doing anything to detract from it. There is no investment
Speaker 2: in early prevention diversion, there is no investment in alternative responses.
Speaker 2: All Victoria knows how to do is be cruel and
Speaker 2: unforgiving and put people in jail.
Speaker 1: Cell coming up how to stop violent crime without locking
Speaker 1: up more kids, the government says this is about community
Speaker 1: safety and making sure that there are serious consequences for
Speaker 1: serious crimes. And it's coming in response to the fact
Speaker 1: that in Victoria, youth crime is sparking. Crime is committed
Speaker 1: by children are up by almost eighteen percent, and children
Speaker 1: are overrepresented in serious and violent crimes like robbery and
Speaker 1: aggravated burglaries and car theft. So what would a good
Speaker 1: response to arise in youth crime look like.
Speaker 2: And good response to youth crime is one that is holistic,
Speaker 2: that takes a right space approach rather than a punity
Speaker 2: of one. So that's prioritizing prevention, welfare, addressing the root
Speaker 2: causes of offending. It means making sure that children have
Speaker 2: easy access to neurosycs, to social resu wellbeing care, to healthcare.
Speaker 2: They have access to education, they have access to activities
Speaker 2: and an ability to create healthy relationships because these are
Speaker 2: also children Daniel who spent many years cycling through COVID
Speaker 2: lockdowns and as part of their formative development didn't really
Speaker 2: develop those healthy relationships or cohesive social networks. And in
Speaker 2: terms of acknowledging that there is a problem, of course
Speaker 2: there is Daniel, and this has happened in other countries.
Speaker 2: You can see what happened in Scotland many years ago.
Speaker 2: They were having similar problems and what they did instead
Speaker 2: was treated as a public health issue, an input into
Speaker 2: early prevention and diversion, input into holistic and integrated therapeutic
Speaker 2: support because they understood wrapping around a child rather than
Speaker 2: putting in a sulm throwing where the key was the answer.
Speaker 1: You've played an integral role in negotiating Australia's first treaty.
Speaker 1: I know it for a fact. What does this announcement
Speaker 1: say to you about the government's preparedness to work seriously
Speaker 1: with Aboriginal communities to address three causes of crime?
Speaker 2: Look for me, it was incredibly difficult to sign that
Speaker 2: treaty Wednesday night because the state had an opportunity here Daniel,
Speaker 2: to act in good faith with the treaty. At an
Speaker 2: earlier point, they could have decided to engage with the sector,
Speaker 2: to engage with Aboriginal voices and experts, to implement long
Speaker 2: term solutions to make sure that we will all be safe. Instead,
Speaker 2: they chose to contradict early on the principles of the
Speaker 2: treaty and take their own unforgiving and disastrous path. What
Speaker 2: I will say is that I would hope that the
Speaker 2: next First People's Assembly, which they'll take their positions on
Speaker 2: the first of May twenty twenty six, will util all
Speaker 2: of the powers and functions of all three arms of
Speaker 2: the Going Wall to not only ensure that they are
Speaker 2: taking our concerns and our kiosks to government, but that
Speaker 2: we are holding them accountable for their poor decision making.
Speaker 1: Given that can the Aboriginal community have any faith in
Speaker 1: the government's commitment to treaty when it does something like this.
Speaker 2: At the same time, can I say that I think
Speaker 2: there's a difference between Aboriginal community having faith in their
Speaker 2: own representatives utilizing the treaty to advocate and create transformational change,
Speaker 2: as compared to them having faith that the Victorian government
Speaker 2: will at all times out in accordance with the treaty.
Speaker 2: If we believe that to be true in any instance,
Speaker 2: then we wouldn't have created Ningma Nunya Wara as the
Speaker 2: accountability mechanism. We wouldn't make sure that we had the
Speaker 2: ability to represent in Cabinet, to engage with Parliament, to
Speaker 2: press weighed them, to engage in the juty, to consult
Speaker 2: to create these good outcomes.
Speaker 1: And finally, Narita, what do you want Victorians to understand
Speaker 1: about the kind of state we're becoming if these reforms
Speaker 1: go ahead?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think to understand the state we're becoming, it's
Speaker 2: good to take you to a specific example, and the
Speaker 2: one that comes to mind for me is Lily. So.
Speaker 2: Lily was charged with aggravated burglary and aggravated home invasion.
Speaker 2: They were charged with these violent offenses despite only playing
Speaker 2: a secondary role, so basically being a lookout Daniel. She
Speaker 2: was particularly vulnerable, as many young children of contact with
Speaker 2: the youth just system are for things like we mentioned earlier, disability,
Speaker 2: mental health care protection. Our lawyers were able to strongly
Speaker 2: advocate for her and to keep her out of youth's
Speaker 2: detention and the charges were reduced. She then received a
Speaker 2: sentence which didn't include spending the rest of her life
Speaker 2: in prison, and baalistic legal and social supports were put
Speaker 2: in place by Blitna Lou which meant that she was
Speaker 2: diverted from the criminal legal system and Lily hasn't had
Speaker 2: any further contact with the legal system. If Lily was
Speaker 2: charged under these proposed new laws, her matter will be
Speaker 2: heard in the county court, not the children's court, not
Speaker 2: with the experts. She would then have been exposed to
Speaker 2: an adult jurisdiction which lacks understanding and protective factors for children,
Speaker 2: and also its sentencing is motivated by punishment not rehabilitation
Speaker 2: like this within the children's court, and she would have
Speaker 2: undoubtedly been subjected to further harms which come from the
Speaker 2: imprisonment of children. That instance should show you that we
Speaker 2: are on the path to not only being cruel and unforgiving,
Speaker 2: but to ensuring that it is our children who pay
Speaker 2: for the state's mistakes.
Speaker 1: Narita, thank you so much for speaking of this.
Speaker 2: Not a problem, Daniel.
Speaker 1: Also in the news, Donald Trump says Republicans should vote
Speaker 1: to have the Epstein files released to the public, a
Speaker 1: major reversal of position for the US president. Members of
Speaker 1: Congress are set to vote this week and where the
Speaker 1: files related to the convicted sex offender should be published.
Speaker 1: The President had spent months trying to convince his colleagues
Speaker 1: not to vote for their release, but as more Republicans
Speaker 1: look set the break with his order, Trump reverse course,
Speaker 1: saying it's time to move on from this Democrat hoax
Speaker 1: and Susan Leezy will not lose focus on her role
Speaker 1: for one minute, as Poland showed her ratings preferred Prime
Speaker 1: Minister at just ten percent, compared with Anthony Benezi, who
Speaker 1: was at forty percent. In the wake of scrapping that zero,
Speaker 1: the Liberal Party has received its worst polling since federation,
Speaker 1: with One Nation experiencing a surge to a record high
Speaker 1: of eighteen percent. We'll have a foot report on the
Speaker 1: rise of One Nation and what it means for the
Speaker 1: country tomorrow. I'm Daniel James. This is seven am. Thanks
Speaker 1: for listening.