2 days ago
ACT raises the age of criminal responsibility to 14
The sound of leather pounding leather punctuates the cold Canberra night.
In an unassuming gym next to a church, young people have found purpose and a safe haven through boxing.
Some are "doing it tough", others have been in and out of the criminal justice system.
"Boxing is all about discipline, respect and working hard. If you can develop those here and then you can take those out into life," Cuz Boxing founder Joe Hedger said.
"When they come to the gym, we can just see their confidence and self-esteem build."
The Bundjalung and Yorta Yorta man has been running boxing classes for two decades and knows the power of diverting kids away from detention.
"Young people don't belong behind bars," he said.
The ACT will make history tomorrow as the first Australian jurisdiction to raise to 14 the age at which a child can be held responsible for a crime.
The move has been applauded by experts and advocates, who say locking up young people only entrenches crime and disproportionately impacts First Nations families.
But already-stretched services in the territory warn that without more funding, they will struggle to support the volume of children diverted their way.
Across Australia, children as young as 10 can be imprisoned.
The ACT first raised the age of criminal responsibility to 12 in November 2023, with the intention to increase it again to 14 this July.
Rather than facing charges, children will be referred to a therapeutic support panel to help address the causes of their offending.
There will be exceptions for serious crimes, including murder, intentionally inflicting grievous bodily harm and specific sexual offences.
National Children's commissioner Anne Hollonds commended the ACT's approach, at a time when she said the political will to raise the age had mostly disappeared.
"Criminalising young children really does no-one any good," she said.
"It doesn't help the children – in fact, it harms the children – but also it doesn't keep communities any safer.
"You can see that all around Australia now, where the age is 10, there are huge problems and unfortunately a lot of governments are really struggling with these issues."
In Queensland, the LNP Crisafulli government recently introduced "adult crime, adult time" legislation, aimed at cracking down on young offenders.
The Northern Territory's CLP government passed legislation last year to lower the age of criminal responsibility from 12 to 10.
The Victorian Labor government also backflipped on its pledge to raise the age of criminal responsibility to 14.
Lawyer Adrian McKenna from the ACT Law Society's criminal law committee, which consulted on the reforms, acknowledged the new system was "not going to be perfect".
"There's going to be some growing pains for police and others involved in dealing with the real-world effects of not being able to charge 12 and 13-year-olds for most offences," Mr McKenna said.
"It's not going to be easy … but I think the time is right and it's time to take a chance for some good.
Earlier this month, ACT police raised concerns about support services not being "fully in place" in time for the change.
Since then, Chief Police Officer Scott Lee said he had been given assurances that the Safer Youth Response Service would begin operating as a 24/7 crisis service.
Mr McKenna said the ACT Law Society had ongoing concerns about how police would frisk search and detain young people under the age of 14.
"The last thing we want is to have some sort of alternative regime that's quasi-policing without the charge, that still allows them broad, sweeping powers to – in all but name – arrest and detain young people for periods of time or harshly search them," he said.
The Canberra PCYC, which runs intensive crime diversionary programs for young people in the ACT, said it was not prepared for the influx of referrals it was expecting to receive.
Chief executive Cheryl O'Donnell said police had advised the organisation it would be "slammed", rapidly adding to the more than 220 children aged between 12 and 14 already on its waitlist.
"There is concern [among organisations] because the financial resources haven't been put into services that are available so that they can actually increase the intake of young people," Ms O'Donnell said.
She said the organisation had been "pleading" for funding for many years to duplicate one of its key programs.
"You'd like to think that ACT … can be a shining example of how to provide support to those young people – but again, it comes back to investment in programs," Ms O'Donnell said.
Mr Hedger agreed, pointing out that his boxing gym does not receive any government funding.
"A lot of those kids have been in and out of the [justice] system and we know that when we support them, it's very rarely that they go back into the system."
