The Commonwealth Government must take a more active role in holding the Northern Territory Government accountable for youth justice outcomes, according to the Territory's largest provider of Aboriginal legal services.
In a strongly worded second submission to the Senate's youth justice inquiry, the Northern Australia Aboriginal Justice Agency (NAAJA) expanded on its 2024 evidence, highlighting rising incarceration rates, extended periods on remand and violent assaults in custody across the NT.
Since October 2024, NAAJA said the Country Liberal Party (CLP) government has introduced legislative reforms — including lowering the age of criminal responsibility from 12 to 10 — that have driven higher youth detention rates. The organisation also criticised the reintroduction of practices such as spit-hoods in youth detention, which directly contravene the Don Dale Royal Commission recommendations.
The submission argues the system lacks evidence-based therapeutic supports, while oversight and accountability have been reduced.
These changes have led to "worsening youth justice outcomes, unmet care needs, and the further criminalisation of Aboriginal children and families", the organisation said, "all of which are widening the gap, not closing it".
"At the same time this is occurring, the NT Government is refusing to genuinely engage with Aboriginal leaders, communities or Aboriginal Community-Controlled Organisations (ACCOs) on legislative or policy decisions affecting youth justice," NAAJA submitted.
"Aboriginal Territorians hold the long-term solutions to address youth justice issues and every day, NAAJA staff witness firsthand the impacts and harm the failure to implement a consultative approach has."
They added: "None of the reforms noted were developed in consultation with the legal sector, ACCOs, or the communities most affected."
NT Department of Corrections data shows the youth detention rate in the Territory has doubled over the past year, alongside a sharp rise in the number of children and teenagers held in police watch houses.
Last week, the United Nations Human Rights Council, in its five-yearly Universal Periodic Review of Australia, raised concerns about the "almost constant increase" in the number of people held on remand and the country's "very low age of criminal responsibility".
In its submission, NAAJA noted "Almost 400 Aboriginal young people were held in NT police watch houses over a six-month period in 2025, despite the widely reported human rights issues concerning the operation of these facilities".
Most were held on remand, with the average remand period reaching 56 days. Many were never convicted.
One child aged between 10 and 14 spent more than 238 days on remand before the charges were ultimately dismissed.
NAAJA also raised concerns about the centralisation of youth detention, with most children transferred to Darwin's Holtze Youth Detention Centre (HYDC), often more than 1,500 kilometres from their home communities in Central Australia.
The organisation said HYDC's capacity has increased from 44 to 86 beds by converting single rooms into shared rooms rather than building new infrastructure.
Under the former Labor government's reduced-capacity plan for the Alice Springs Youth Detention Centre, most children on remand or sentenced are moved to Darwin. Last week, the Territory's Children's Commissioner, Shahleena Musk, said relocating children away from family, culture and Country "directly contradicts best practice for reducing risks linked to re-offending".
"This decision is at loggerheads with community safety objectives the Government seeks to achieve," she said.
NAAJA wrote: "This forced relocation disconnects young people from family, community, culture, language and Country, all of which are crucial to the rehabilitation of Aboriginal young people."
"It also undermines practical access to legal and therapeutic supports and creates delays in the repatriation of young people and risks to safety when they are released in Darwin without family supports."
The submission detailed one case in which a young person from Central Australia was assaulted by multiple detainees and later hospitalised in intensive care, only days after a separate child was told by HYDC staff to change their behaviour to "remain safe" after they flagged that staff were failing to safely manage known conflict between young people.
NAAJA said the child's legal representatives were not informed by Corrections after they were hospitalised, and only learned of the incident from another detainee.
"When NAAJA made initial enquiries, the incident was denied. While the young person remained hospitalised in Darwin, the young person's lawyer and Central Australian support services advocated for their parent to be assisted to travel to Darwin to provide essential cultural and emotional support," they said.
"Corrections declined to provide practical assistance beyond permitting a visit if the family could make their own way to Darwin, and an ACCO ultimately sourced emergency funds due to the urgency and the family's distress."
In their recommendations, NAAJA called for "enforceable minimum national youth justice standards" and greater Commonwealth funding for Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations (ACCHOs), and urged the federal government to play a stronger oversight role.
"Commonwealth funding provided to the NT is being used to build and sustain these punitive systems," they said.
