+ KIDS IN PRISON MINISTER STANDS BY ‘ON THE FLOOR’ CALL

The average person out there, a normal citizen, couldn’t care less l about the conditions

AARON HARPER (PICTURED)

QUEENSLAND’S Police Minister would put young offenders “on the floor” of detention centres if he had to.

Minister Mark Ryan made the sensational comments at a heated crime forum in Townsville on Wednesday night, after being asked if overcrowding in juvenile prisons was the reason young repeat offenders were not being locked up.

It comes less than a year after the State Government created a separate Youth Justice Department in wake of allegations of child mistreatment.

Mr Ryan yesterday told the Bulletin he stood by his comments, which are in contrast to the State Government’s own youth prison guidelines that state young people must occupy individual rooms/cells and have the right to clean, separate and sufficient bedding that is changed regularly to ensure hygiene standards. It comes amid intense community frustration that youth crime in Townsville is out of control.

“There’s always capacity” the minister told the room on Wednesday.

“In addition to being minister for police I’m also minister for corrections … in the adult system we have them sleeping on the floor, there is always space.

“We are undertaking a major expansion program in both adult prisons and detention centres. Space doesn’t come into it when it comes to incarceration. We’ll find a spot for them, no doubt about it. We’ll put them on the floor if necessary.”

In November 2018, the Bulletin reported children were being held in police watch houses due to overcrowding in youth detention centres, before a Four Corners report in May 2019 forced the State Government to act.

A separate Youth Justice Department was created, and the State Government pledged to spend millions of dollars on strategies to break the cycle of offending and reoffending, while also announcing a new $150 million 32-bed youth detention centre at Wacol.

Mr Ryan, asked by the Bulletin last year about overcrowding at Townsville’s adult prisons, said “significant investment” had been made to install bunk beds so that prisoners were “no longer sleeping on mattresses on the floor”.

Thuringowa MP Aaron Harper yesterday backed Mr Ryan, saying that while he didn’t recall what was said, he was confident Mr Ryan was referring to adult prisons before claiming; “the average person out there, a normal citizen, couldn’t care less about the conditions”.

“They are offending and making our lives hell,” he said.

Griffith University Criminology and Criminal Justice founding Professor Ross Homel said Mr Ryan’s comment was “unwise”.

“We know w that processing youth through the youth justice e system increases the crime rate through in- creased recidivist t behaviour.”