SMLS is joining the call to raise the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14 years old
Politicians must raise the age to give every child the chance to learn from their mistakes and grow up to contribute to our communities.
Every child should be free to go to school, have a safe home to live in and learn from their mistakes. But right now children as young as ten years old can be locked away in prison. Australia kept almost 600 children aged 10 to 13 in detention last financial year, and more than 60 per cent were Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. Children belong in schools, playgrounds and with their families, not behind bars.
Locking children away in prison can cause them:
- Lifelong harm
- Increase their risk of mental illness,
- Disrupt their education and even increase their chance of premature death.
Every child deserves the chance to learn from their mistakes in a safe and supported way. The medical evidence is clear – children who are arrested by police, sent to court or locked away, are more likely to develop mental illness, disengage from school, become homeless and even die prematurely.
If a child does something serious, we need to help them learn from their mistakes so they can grow into responsible members of our community. There are alternatives to prison that are already working. We just need politicians to fund them. Politicians currently spend the majority of their youth justice budgets on locking children up. Instead, they should be investing in community programs that help children learn from their mistakes and keep children in their communities.
We are calling on politicians to invest in the services and programs that work, instead of just building new prisons to lock children up
Politicians have the power to change the laws to keep children safe from prison and invest in the solutions that work. Alternatives to prison that help children learn, and take responsibility, already exist – but politicians are pouring millions of dollars into prisons instead of funding the solutions that actually work.
