Youth crime

I want to thank Kathy Adams for her measured, compassionate letter on youth crime (1/9).

She covered the ground well and asked the key question: What is the answer?

Kathy, on my desktop I have over 30 reports on youth crime.

On the effects of jailing children, they’re unanimous: it harms them.

These are children who have already been hurt, let down, rejected or traumatised.

Communities where programs support kids and families as part of a broader systemic change have lowered their crime rates.

If you want to see a diversionary program in action, drop down to Emerge Café.

You won’t see a lot of teenage criminals idling with their iPhones.

You will see decent young people, gainfully employed, turning their lives around.

But we need more programs supporting children and their families – before kids disengage from school, before they are taken into out-ofhome care, before they go on their first crime spree.

Everyone in the system – each police officer, magistrate and politician – knows that jailing children doesn’t reduce crime, but at election time jailing is what angry voters and Parliamentary Oppositions, of either party, demand.

So Kathy, it seems that if we want to be safe, we have to make sure kids at risk and struggling families get the kinds of help and support they need.

That means letting your MPs know that you will support policies that will produce the changes that reduce youth crime – not waste millions on more jails and making things worse.

Phil Armit, Toowoomba