Former National Children’s Commissioner Anne Hollonds has warned a Senate inquiry that Australia is slipping backwards on the rights of children in custody, as advocates renew calls for the Commonwealth to take a stronger role in youth justice reform.
Appearing before the Senate Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee inquiry into Australia’s youth justice and incarceration system, Ms Hollonds described watching children held for prolonged periods in police watch house cells and placed in isolation, conditions she said the public would not accept elsewhere. She told the committee some of what she had seen inside youth detention and police cells was horrific and argued reform was being stalled despite decades of inquiries and evidence.
The warning comes amid continuing overrepresentation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in detention. Recent national reporting by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare shows First Nations young people aged 10–17 are around 21 times as likely as non-Indigenous young people to be in detention and First Nations children make up more than half of those detained nationwide.
Ms Hollonds linked today’s policies to long-running failures highlighted by inquiries such as the Don Dale Royal Commission. She said “We are literally back to where we were prior to the Northern Territory royal commission which began in 2016” pointing to renewed concerns about punitive practices and deteriorating standards in some jurisdictions.
A central question for the Senate inquiry is where national responsibility sits when youth justice is largely administered by states and territories. Submissions to the committee argue the Commonwealth still has leverage through funding arrangements, national standards and international human rights obligations. In a joint submission, the Human Rights Law Centre and Change the Record called for enforceable minimum standards across the child justice system and greater investment in community-led diversion programs, warning that political pressure for tougher approaches continues to drown out evidence about what works.
The Australian Human Rights Commission’s landmark Help way earlier! report has also urged earlier, evidence-based intervention that addresses unmet needs, trauma and disadvantage before children become entrenched in the justice system.
National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Service chair Nerita Waight said the federal government should not dismiss national responsibility. “Not only does Prime Minister Albanese have the power to act, but he also has the moral obligation” she said.
The Senate committee’s reporting date has been extended to 30 June, with the inquiry tasked with examining effective alternatives to incarceration and seeking input from young people with lived experience. For First Nations families and organisations, the stakes are immediate: they argue stronger, coordinated action is needed to reduce the use of detention and prevent further harm to children who are disproportionately caught in the justice system.
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