The peak body for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services has become the latest body to criticise the new Northern Territory government's plan to reduce to age of criminal responsibility to ten, arguing it will only make crime worse.
The CLP, who swept to victory a fortnight ago in the NT, have vowed to lower the age immediately, with Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro saying tougher penalties for people convicted of crimes are needed.
This despite a swathe of evidence from peak medical and legal bodies arguing ten is far too low and it should be raised to at least 14-years-of-age.
On Thursday, the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services (NATSILS), said the punitive agenda will backfire and only increase crime.
"The new Chief Minister has been elected on a platform to reduce crime but her punitive agenda will do the exact opposite," NATSILS' chair Karly Warner said.
"Law and order posturing about punishment, power and control has never worked before and it won't work now."
Currently, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people aged 14-17 are incarcerated at a higher rate in the NT than anywhere else in the country, whilst the latest Closing the Gap data saw eight metrics failing to improve - the worst jurisdiction in the country.
Ms Finocchiaro also advocated earlier this year to bring back spit hoods in youth detention and will shortly enact "Declan's Law", whereby offenders categorised as violent are automatically remanded to jail with a presumption against bail.
Ms Warner said if the Chief Minister followed through with her plans crime would only escalate, in turn making the NT a less safe place in the future. She argued governments were responsible for preventing crime, not trying to look "tough" in response to it.
"We are extremely concerned that the proven programs that actually work to keep young people engaged in the community and prevent crime, which have never been properly supported or funded anyway, will now be even further deprioritised,' Ms Warner said.
"Putting 10-year-old children in jail, bringing back spit hoods and increasing incarceration won't stop crime – it will perpetuate the cycle of trauma, violence and government neglect that led us here in the first place. We need to support young people, and their families and communities, not harm them."
Much of the coverage in the lead-up to the election focussed on crime, with two curfews in Alice Springs earlier this year only contributing to the belief the Territory needed a change in government.
Ms Warner, who has been outspoken in her criticism of the NSW government for their new bail laws - which they admit will incarcerate more young people - said keeping children locked up led to "horrific outcomes" for both them and their families and communities.
"Instead, we need early intervention and diversionary programs led by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Community-Controlled Organisations," she said.
"Our sincere hope and appeal to Chief Minister Finocchiaro is for the new government to pause, sit down with us and local communities and properly understand the things that increase crime, and what can be done to prevent crime, before locking up our children an creating a more dangerous Northern Territory."
